Nix the pain in your neck
Spend a little too long at the computer, and you feel it for hours afterwards. It's that stiff, sat-too-long feeling that you get from maintaining one position too long with no break.
You're weak.
More specifically, your trapezius muscle is weak. That's the one that runs between your upper back and shoulders, supporting and moving your neck.
The best remedy isn't a gut shredding NSAID, but a dumbbell.
A 10-week study was done with 48 women who were heavy computer-users, causing them to suffer chronic stiffness and pain in their neck and shoulder areas. They were assigned to one of three groups in which they lifted weights, did aerobic exercise or were given counseling on health.
The women given the strength training exercises used hand weights three times per week, 20 minutes per session. The aerobics group rode a stationary bike.
Here's how the results shook out: the women who lifted weights experienced a 70 to 80 percent decrease in their pain ratings. For the women who rode the stationary bike, they felt better for the first few hours after their workout, but their shoulder and neck pain kicked in again after that.
Needless to say, having someone lecture you about general health doesn't make the pain go away, which proves it's really not all in your head.
The trick with the weight training was the targeting of muscles that are weak. The researchers pointed out that stronger muscles can obviously handle more load— which translates into less opportunity for pain to kick in.
Exercises can be performed very easily at home. As always, I recommend you have a certified personal trainer work with you a few times until you get the hang of it. It's not enough just to lift weights—you've got to do it right. Doing it wrong will make you worse off than when you started.
