Head presses exercise to relieve computer neck pain

Hey guys, lurked these forums at Patient info for a bit...thought I'd give back.

Recently I used Clive's forum post to fix my elbow pain (well, identify & treat it). Thought I’d give back with an issue that was bugging me about ~4 months ago.

The problem I was facing consisted of a lot of tension, soreness and pain in my neck and shoulders when sitting at a desk and using the computer (freelance web designer here so a lot of time spend behind a screen!).

The issue was my sitting posture; specifically the fact I was typing without anything supporting the weight of my arms.

This actually explains it well here -  https://neckpainfromcomputeruse.com/  (links allowed on this forum? Oh well hopefully its fine!) - basically you're meant to lean on something in order to stop your shoulders scrunching up and hurting by taking all the weight of your arms when you type all day long.

So anyways I ended up going to a physiotherapist to get advice to solve the pain I was getting in my neck and shoulders form computering all day.

Firstly – the physio told me to use Tiger Balm or a heat pack, (I much prefer TB as it works much faster although it’s pretty expensive and can’t stand the smell)..

But another exercise he told me was ‘reverse head presses’ to relieve computer induced shoulder and neck tension/pain.

Here’s how to do them:

Step 1: Go to your bed and lay down on your back, with your stomach facing the ceiling.

Step 2: Rest your head on your pillow (pillow should be standard pillow width nothing fancy or over the top).

Step 3: Using your hand, feel the area about 3 inches above your hair line on the back of your head. You should feel a bump that is made of bone (called External Occipital Protuberance) 

Step 3: Using this bump, very gently push the back of your head into the pillow (arms and legs should be flat on bed like you’re about to fall asleep). You should be pushing hard enough that you feel slight pressure in your forehead and close to your eyes. But you should also be pressing gently enough that you should feel no pain.

Step 4: Press like this counting ‘one-thousand’, ‘two-thousand’, ‘three-thousand’ and so on until you reach ten-thousand. (So its about 10 seconds total).

Step 5: Rest about 10 seconds, then repeat the process 10x total. So it’s 100 presses in total, with 10 rest periods between each set of 10.

Do this every morning and if you still have a lot of tension and pain in your neck and shoulders do it before bed as well.

Doing this exercise really loosens the muscles up and provides movement contrary to what is causing the pain in your neck and shoulders in the first place (forward-leaning, scrunched up posture for 6 – 8 hours a day).

Hope It helps! Any questions comment below!

Oh - and I'm not a medical professional. Consult a physician before taking my advice lol...

0 likes, 0 replies