To ask for your advice on chronic neck pain/tension?

[purpletablet]

I’ve been struggling with ongoing neck and shoulder pain that’s waking me up multiple times a night. It’s been getting worse recently, and I wake up feeling stiff, sore, and have a headache. I’ve tried new pillows, different sleep positions, mattress toppers, I’ve been to the osteopath, I do yoga and different stretches but nothing seems to help.

It eases off slightly during the day but as soon as I go to bed the cycle starts again. It’s like no matter what position I’m in I can’t get my neck to relax so I constantly feel the tension.

I’ve spoke to the gp about this before but they were less than useless. I’m thinking about asking if they’d be willing to prescribe a short course of muscle relaxants to see if that could help reset everything.

Has anyone had a similar experience?

Go see a physio

I swear by my Tempur memory foam pillow. It’s reversible so one side for back sleepers and the other for side sleepers.

Second the physio suggestion. I had chronic neck pain and tension headaches - going to the physio and getting the right exercises to do is what fixed it (while the meds the GP threw at me did nothing except make me feel like shit). Its not a quick fix though, you have to do the exercises religiously every day.

Yep i third the physio suggestion.

Another one here for physio, I was suffering for months with neck pain and numbness/pins & needles down my right arm.

I had a short course of muscle relaxants and have been having weekly physio for past 9 months and it has been life changing. I only take the occasional muscle relaxant maybe once every 6 weeks or so now.

Went to the GP years ago with similar pain mainly one side of my neck. He asked what job I did and said the stress was probably making me tense and grind my teeth at night. You can get a mouth guard made.
Yours might not be the same of course.
Those electronic heated shoulder and back massagers are good for relaxation and neck and shoulder pain or a wheat bag that is microwavable.
Best cure for my pain was retirement! Not helpful if you are only young.

I self referred to physio months ago but it’s a long waiting list unfortunately.

Ok this sounds bonkers but hear me out—do you have some unresolved anger stewing around?
Are you saying yes to stuff you’d rather say no to?
We women carry a lot of anger and resentment in our muscles, particularly our necks and shoulders.

I had chronic neck pain like you describe for years.
Psychotherapy and an Aeyla pillow have sorted me right out. Plus massages!

Osteopath worked for me after the belief was a stroke, it was actually a frozen neck muscle area. Physios did nothing but work on the side with pain, when the issue was the other side of my body. What do you do during the day for work? Do you repeat movements, carry heavy bags, drive a vehicle with heavy steering.... ? It is as important to address the cause as work on alleviating the pain / muscle issues and it is not a quick fix.

Can you afford a chiropractor? This sounds like their sort of thing.

I have the same. Physio and fortnightly sports massage help. I pay private for both as NHS physio waiting list round us is 6 months and the pain gets unbearable.

I have chronic neck pain - tension plus 2 x bulging discs and cervical stenosis.

I recommend a chiropractor or osteopath (if you're in southern England please do message, and I can thoroughly recommend the guy I see). But make sure they don't just go in and and attempt to manipulate your neck!!

Ibuprofen rather than paracetamol. If you've been taking paracetamol regularly, then look at Medication Overuse Headaches - it's definitely a thing. Try ice packs or heat and see which you respond best to, I use both at different times as mine sometimes trigger into the worst migraines. I use 4Head sticks and I also use this, I have both the heat and cooling versions: https://welzo.com/products/hempe-muscle-and-joint-gel-50ml-hot?currency=GBP&variant=52523578687872&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=Google%20Shopping&stkn=27bbd07605a7&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=&utm_term=&utm_content=&gad_source=1&gbraid=0AAAAAoyp3sKT3-Ib4p34U1XLQJ47uUYiH&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI8sOysL_ujAMVmYtQBh2IDBk3EAQYAyABEgJhKPD_BwE

I try to meditate regularly or at least lie down with some ASMR headache or stress relieving tracks. And also look at your diet.

Do you have any other joint pains? I had similar neck pain that was worse at night and on first waking, which was eventually diagnosed as ankolysing spondylitis. Apparently it is more common for women to present with neck pain rather than the more common (in men) lower back pain.

Don't go to a chiropractor - they are complete woo. Osteopath fine. Physio fine.

While you are on the waiting list, try cervical retraction exercises, because they will improve almost all neck pain. Do the exercise within pain - do not push through pain. 10 small movements that don't hurt are better than a few big ones that do. You are aiming to strengthen the postural muscles, that prevent the poking chin we all tend to get from our daily lives, and which squashes the upper part of the neck and overstretches the lower part (I'm oversimplifying massively!).

It's really difficult to find a demonstration of this being done correctly, even by professionals, but this one is close. But don't return to your starting position, as your starting position is most likely a poking chin, at least slightly! So do the pull back, and then 'release' the pull back, rather than returning to where you were.

Something that’s helped me hugely is massaging trigger points (the painful, hard knots) hard in shoulders daily. They need to be ‘released’. It hurts but the improvement afterwards is amazing. A surgeon advised this in A and E. My partner does about 2 mins daily for me, but am going to try a tennis ball against the wall to see if I can also do it myself.

Thanks everyone. Tried to get an appointment with the gp today but could only get to speak to the nurse practitioner. She said they don’t prescribe muscle relaxers for chronic muscle tension and has prescribed me a neck rub instead.

While you wait for a physio appointment, you could try an osteopath or regular deep tissue massages. I opted for the latter! I also tried a combination of Indian head massages and feet reflexology, which was weirdly calming. As for any tension headaches, try giving yourself a scalp massage.

Also, have you tried something like Deep Heat (or equivalent) as a quick fix? A lot of people from the farming community swear by Uddermint for various ailments, including aching muscles, headaches, mastitis and relief from rheumatoid arthritis, among other things 😁

Regular sports massages and Physio.
If you’re a side sleeper, Dunelm do a goose feather pillow that is amazing. I can’t remember the make but I’ll try and find out. It’s not hugely expensive either.

How do you know you haven't got some sort of arthritis? I have spinal stenosis in my neck. Exercising can make it worse. I'd get it scanned. It isn't that expensive.

youtube has done good physios videos for neck strengthening and neck posture fixing exercises

I've been having infrared saunas. They warm up the muscle and help relieve pain for me. I went for massages but found them painful. The infrared sauna are relaxing and help with the pain.

I had acupuncture done by my physio, has made a huge amount of difference for my neck and shoulder pain.

I've been to a private physio this morning and had dry needling and massage in neck and shoulders. The relief of tension and restoration of range of movement is instant. It is sore today but I know by tomorrow it will be much improved. It's expensive but I booked yesterday, seen today, will be much improved tomorrow and once it started affecting sleep for me that's worth it. I do physio led pilates every week and she has told me which exercises to do to stop it happening again.

So you grind your teeth OP?

I do at night and honestly it's mad how much pain it can cause. My whole head and neck hurts and then that pain turns to a migraine. I also get pins and needles in my face, which I'm not sure is TMJ or the migraine, because my whole head seems to be a mess.

I now only use feather pillows, and before I go to sleep I make sure I'm relaxed, so do a body scan.

I have the same. It's been going on since early January. Does it ever make you feel unwell? Sometimes I feel ill from it.