Hey, what’s up everybody, Dr. Roger Saias here for PA Pain and Rehab in Philadelphia.
I want to continue our conversation about headaches.
We’ve been talking extensively about headaches, how to figure out what kind of headache you are experiencing and how chiropractic can help eliminate your headaches.
Today, I want to let you know what you can do at work or home, wherever you want honestly, to relieve headache pain.
I am not immune to headaches or tension. Being a chiropractor, I spend a lot of my day bent over people and if I’m not working on
patients I’m at a computer or I’m on my cell phone just like everybody else. I have a tendency to be rounded forward, creating a lot of tension across the upper back and shoulders and into my neck.
You don’t have to wait for us or another provider to help you if you experience daily headache pain or have been in an accident that is causing chronic headaches. There are some tricks you can do on your own for headache relief.
The trapezius muscles are a common culprit in tension or cervicogenic headaches. Spanning across the top of the shoulders, the trapezius attaches to the vertebrae in your neck. When this muscle is fired off because of posture or injury, it can refer pain into the head. Sometimes, patients will talk about pain right above the eye that is originating in trapezius muscle tension.
To help relieve this tension, in a comfortable position, take your thumb and index finger and grab your trapezius at the base of the neck and shoulder. Work your way across the muscle and find a tender nodule. When you find that tender point, you’ll know it. Gently press, or massage it a bit. You can hold the muscle at that point for 10 seconds and wait for the muscle to release.
Sometimes it may refer pain, you might feel pain in the front of your head and it’s totally normal. Well, it’s not normal to have pain but it’s very normal to reproduce the symptoms when you’re squeezing the trapezius.
You can keep finding points of tension and work to release them. Some people want to do this all day long.
The second trigger point I’m gonna show you is right above your eye. Use your finger and press right above your eyebrow, holding that position and wait for the tension to release.
The third trigger point is at the base of the skull. A lot of the muscles in the neck and back attach at the base of the skull. Feel around with your fingers and find where the neck and skull meet. You can run your fingers along that ridge and look for uncomfortable tension points. With your fingers, apply gently pressure for the tension to melt away.
The goal is not to harm yourself or increase your symptoms, but it should become a part of your routine, like brushing your teeth.
Self-care is important and taking care of your muscles is something that you don’t need someone else to do, in most cases you can do it yourself. It feels great, and if it’s part of the source of your problem, you’re going to get some relief, without the need for any medication.
You can control the headaches you’re having and be a part of the recovery. It’s not just getting adjusted, regular self-care can go a long way to preventing headache symptoms.
If you’re a headache sufferer and you’ve been down all the medical paths and you’ve taken the drugs and the Tylenol and the Advil and you’re still experiencing headaches, give us a call.
Perhaps your headaches are coming from your spine, perhaps chiropractic and the different therapies we offer in our office can help you get rid of these headaches and resume your normal life.
