Anyone have a magic home remedy to loose a stiff neck? I was stretching this morning before lifting weights and felt a twinge in my neck/upper back area. I stopped right there and went home but my neck is very tight/painful - feels like a pinched nerve in my trapezius muscle. It hurts to look left, look down or take a really deep breath. I have done this a few times before over the years and its usually take 2-4 days to go away. Anyone know of a technique to speed recovery time?
it’s a pain in the ass as well the neck. in these parts we call it a “crick” in the neck. you prob know the usual ways to get it loose but as you say it mostly takes time.
–massage
–NSAIDS eg motrin if the news doesnt’ scare you.
–heat
–if you try to swim initially it will suck but then get better as the session goes on but then hurt agin just as much later------>washout
–stay off aero bars
A chiro will get it out pretty quick, and you won’t miss a lot of training screwing around. They do electri muscle stimulation, followed by massage, and then tell you to put heat on it.
I fuught for years with recurrent stiff neck as you describe. Probably flare up on me every couple of months. Never really bad, but an aggravation. And it was always associated with doing something.
Finally went to a doctor who said my facet joints were somehow torqued. He gave me vioxx and a prescription for physical therapy. Having not had good experiences with physical therapy I didn’t pay much attention until one day I realized there was a physical therapist in my own health club.
They confirmed that one cervical vertebra was torqued out of position and retorqued it. That day was the end of my 4 year bout with neck pain.
So all I’m saying is forget the home remedies, if it keeps coming back then you have an underlying cause.
A chiro will get it out pretty quick, and you won’t miss a lot of training screwing around. They do electri muscle stimulation, followed by massage, and then tell you to put heat on it.
I should add that this was followed by my first “cracking”–I don’t mean by the wandering fingers of the massage therapist, I mean by the chiro. I was apprehensive–everybody has told me “Don’t let anybody screw around with your neck”–but I lay face down, he did some downward compression on my back, then he had me tilt my head back, and he moved it to one side, crack, and the other, crack. I had not been able to get a crack out of it for weeks–only to one side. He also got rid (so far) of a nagging hammy problem I have had for years–he did this a while ago with the electric stimulation and deep massage.
I have always found ice works better than heat–sometimes overnight relief.