- Okay- - Go, baby, go!
- We're talking about neck pain today.
It's such a...
- Pain in the neck.
Yeah, well, it's a pain in the neck.
Everyone works on computers, cell phones, et cetera.
Head forward posture. It's a very common irritant.
Bob and I have, we've received thousands
of comments on
our neck pain,
and between that and our
actual patients that we've worked with-
- Right.
We're gonna show you the top five stretches,
and Bob, you concur on these five.
- I will concur.
- We concur, then you know we got gold here.
(Bob laughs)
♪ Bob and Brad ♪
♪ The two most famous ♪
♪ Physical therapists ♪
♪ On the internet. ♪
- All right, the first one, oh, before we go any farther,
I do want to add, not only do these often help
help with neck pain, but they can also relieve headaches,
particularly the ones in the back of the head
that wrap forward, and upper back pain.
So the first one, sitting in the firm chair, good posture,
just like Bob is demonstrating, get your fingertips close
to the center of your neck and push into the skin
and stretch that skin, we're splaying, stretching the skin,
the fascia underneath,
and getting those muscles to relax that are tight.
And now what you can do is work at different levels,
lower and work up, whatever feels the best for you.
And then a...
Yeah, Bob was saying
he doesn't have his mic on.
Do circles and get into those muscles,
that can really help out.
And then add this little trick,
it can make a big difference is to add
neck or cervical extension
while you're pulling here.
Now if you do these, and you do that,
and it does not feel good, you do not want to do it.
But I think a lot of people will find
that that extra little stretch going backwards
is gonna really help relieve some more pain.
How you feeling, Bob? He says excellent.
Well, good, he said good, not excellent.
Okay, we're gonna go to number two.
(air whooshes)
Okay, number two, this stretch is sideways stretching,
or we're gonna actually modify it and get the
levator scapulae, which is a small muscle,
connects from the head to the shoulder blade,
and that muscle can really knot up.
So again, sit with good posture,
right ear to the right shoulder, and then slightly forward.
When you go slightly forward,
you're gonna feel that levator muscle tighten up.
Do not stretch this aggressively.
Only about 15 seconds or so.
You can add a little over pressure
gently with your fingertips.
Bob's doing a nice demonstration there
and I always tell people, look down
into your front pocket on one side,
that'll give you the right angle.
You do not have to give over pressure.
Only do it if it feels good.
This is one of those stretches that should just
feel like, oh, that's clearly the spot.
Do both sides.
All right.
Good.
(air whooshes)
All right, number three.
This is a nice decompression stretch.
And what we're gonna do, is,
first I'm gonna show there's these bumps right here.
Those are called mastoids.
That's some little bone sticking out behind your ear.
You're gonna take the pad of your thumb
or the the thenar eminence,
and you're gonna hook those bones,
and push
straight up, and relax and breathe.
So what Bob is doing, he's putting traction and pulling up,
and Bob just mentioned last week he had some problems,
and he's doing just his technique,
took care of the problem.
Life was good. Right, Bob?
- Yep, absolutely.
- He said absolutely.
That's a nice, quick decompression technique you can do
without anything but your body, your hands.
Okay, Bob's saying he cups around the ear,
and you'll feel that, I can't do it
with my headphones on, 'cause
it makes all the noise that irritates you guys.
Alright, we're going to number four.
(air whooshes)
Okay, the fourth stretch.
Now with this stretch, you will need a towel roll.
So you have to spin it up, and
kind of get it into a nice roll like this.
Put it around your neck.
And, typically you're gonna start low on your neck,
and it'll have a tendency to slide up,
but you want it low on the neck for most people.
And we're simply going to
pull down so that it's against your body.
Just start with a little chin tuck,
and then roll your head back
and you can see how it supports right here,
and now, if Bob had his chair lined up,
but we have it just for the video,
you can lean back into the chair and look back,
and then you're not gonna hold it there for a long time.
Five to 10 seconds perhaps.
It should be no pain.
It should feel like, good stretch.
Now if this is feeling okay,
but it feels like it needs a little bit more,
simply go back
and go up, like Bob is pulling up,
so we get a little traction or decompression
with
the cervical extension.
I don't know, I've had so much success
with this in the clinic with patients.
- [Bob] I agree.
They start out going like this, it's tight, little painful.
With the towel and either straight down or up,
they say, "Oh man, I can go back farther. It feels better."
If that's how you respond to this,
Keep working it, and it's gonna show
improvement very quickly.
On the other hand, if it does create pain
for whatever reason, stop and just stop.
This is not one of the five for you.
Okay, we're going on to our fifth and final one.
(air whooshes)
All right, the final stretch.
Now this is different.
It's actually, instead of working up and down
with the head or pulling it, we're gonna rotation,
the last motion we have not stretched yet.
So like Bob is showing there, over to the right,
keep good posture, shoulders back and go over
if you wanna add a little over pressure,
fingertips
and go.
And then check the other direction, to the left.
Posture.
Over.
Now, oftentimes you'll find that
one way it will feel good, the other way,
there might be a little pain or maybe even some sharp pain.
If that's the case, do not go that way.
Go the way it's pain free.
Five to 10 repetitions holding five seconds or so,
and then retest the painful side.
Oftentimes, with some stretching one way,
the other way will get better.
Do not push into it.
If it's sharp pain, it's your body saying stop.
So listen to that.
The next thing is, we're gonna take the towel roll.
Once again, it's such a nice tool for neck stretching.
Bob will, this is probably the hardest one to do.
It's a little complicated, but go with it slowly.
So,
cross over and grab there.
Here. So we got a crisscross.
Now the towel goes across your jawbone.
If you do not go across your jawbone,
and you go across your neck, you simply choke yourself.
It's not very good.
So again, Bob is, he doesn't have his mic on,
so I'm gonna talk through it.
This way, he's stretching.
This one simply supports down.
The support from the towel around the neck is incredible
on how it supports and relaxes a neck.
And then to switch to the other side,
you have to, there you go,
you just switch hands.
The other hand reaches over.
This one reaches there.
Bob, you're doing outstanding work.
All right, so that's the five neck stretches.
One of them will more than likely help relieve your pain.
So go through 'em,
pick the right one, and be very happy and grateful.
So, Bob, I think we can fix just
about anything except for...
Do this.
The broken heart.
Bob's much better at that than I am.
So have a good day and be careful.
(upbeat music)