Kids, teens and adults going back to school or work at a desk sooner or later will feel the effects of trigger points (abbreviation: TPs) silently & perniciously developing in the muscles of their neck & back. Many have had the unfortunate experience of waking up, unable to turn their head to one side because of excruciating pain.

Doctors tell you that it will last 7-14 days no matter what you try – medications, ice, chiropractic, physical therapy or massage. What you CAN do though is prevent this from happening & also eliminate chronic aches & pains & headaches.

First you need to get a tool & for the neck, it has to be small enough to get to those muscles. Tools like The Stick, Theracane, Trigger Point Technologies, and others are necessary to get complete relief. Here’s an example: imagine that you tie a knot in a bungee cord then you stretch both ends out & away from each other. Let’s say the knotted bungee represents a muscle with a TP.

When you try to stretch a muscle with an active TP in it you are straining the ends because the middle doesn’t share in the movement. This can result in micro-tears at the ends or tendons possibly causing tendinitis. The solution is to add compression to the TP to reduce the knot, force feed oxygen into it then stretch it out to get normal elasticity & flexibility back in the muscle & fascia.

The current discussion is about the neck & one of my favorite TP tools is the Theracane. It has been around forever, my clients love it & it has a 5 star rating at Amazon.com. You can order it from them at this link: Theracane.

If you don’t order the Theracane, at least grab a tennis ball & use it as a tool to start applying pressure to & rolling on the trigger points that you can find in your neck & shoulder. After you do this then try this stretch program that is inspired from my Qigong/taiji teacher, Dr. Chan: Qigong Neck Series 1.

Try this everyday for 2 weeks & you will experience relaxation, decreased tension, & more flexibility in your neck & shoulders. Enjoy & please send me your comments!