Living with Neck Pain – Top Tips For Temporary Relief (And a Long-Term Solution)

Neck pain is one of those things which can come on suddenly and get worse until it’s a constant annoyance in the background of your life. When you’re trying to get things done and enjoy yourself in the free time between work and other chores, you don’t want to be battling neck pain and constantly needing to reach for painkillers. There’s a few things that you can do – so let’s take a look at what’s on offer. 

1. Identify the cause

The first thing you can do to try and get a handle on your neck pain is to find the cause and target it. Are you sleeping in an awkward position? Are you constantly peering at a screen which is too low and forcing you to tilt your head at an unnatural angle? Do you have long, heavy dreadlocks? It could even be stress – are you under a lot of pressure at work?

You’d be surprised how many common activities we do without thinking about it are directly or indirectly responsible for neck pain. The key is finding out what the problem is, and then trying to do things to stop it from becoming an issue. 

2. Try stretching it out

Sometimes, the cause of neck pain is a mystery but it can just be something you can fix for yourself. Gently stretch your neck and try to feel for areas of tightness and sore places – these are your key indicators to what the problem is and what you’ll need to do to fix it. 

Naturally, you might want to consider going to a London osteopath if you can’t solve the problem by yourself – they are some of the best help you’ll ever get when it comes to making sure that your body is kept in tip-top condition.

3. Painkillers (in short doses)

We’re not quick to recommend painkillers as a way to handle things like neck pain because there are more holistic ways to treat the problem. However, there are a handful of situations where you can benefit from some temporary relief. Ultimately, the goal should be to give the body a day or two to heal itself, and that relief makes life easier until you can. Our bodies are powerful tools who can, with a few exceptions, heal themselves over time and take care of aches and pains. 

Closing Thoughts

Neck pain is massively irritating and often very uncomfortable to live with. However, it will have a trigger, which needs to be found to best solve the problem. If it’s something you get on a recurring basis and don’t know what the issue is, then an osteopath is the best bet. Osteopaths are easy to find in big cities like London, but you can also find osteopathic clinics in many other locations. Osteopaths are experts in finding out what is causing the issue and then skillfully manipulating the beck to provide some relief and ensure that the problem doesn’t happen again. Nobody should have to spend all their lives in pain, after all – we want to help make some meaningful changes.