Question:
About 4 years ago I started with terrible neck pain It started at work, while typing. About that time I started working very long hours in front of the computer Usually down the back right side of my neck, like the muscle in there is too short.

Massive pain almost daily, with short breaks in the pain sometimes for a week, then pain starts again. Tried meds, exercise, chiro, breathing, ice, heat, but nothing works Then I noticed the neck pain started accompanying my familiar migraine Then I found that Imitrex not only helped the migraine, but the neck pain, too.

Now, at this time, my neck pain almost NEVER goes away. I hurt literally every single day. If I put my hands behind my head my arms and bottom of my hands tingle or go numb, especially when I sleep that way. I get strange pains in my shoulders, tremendous burning between my shoulder blades. Sometimes I have the neck/shoulder/upper back pain without the migraines, but now the migraines are more than ever, and unlike the old days, my migraines now last several days, or they just keep coming back day after day, I can't tell.

Can someone please help me come up with a plan?

Answer:

I have neck pain just before migraine or headache and then sometimes not till the headache starts. and then again I will have the stiff neck thing and nothing happens. But it does seem to be all related to the same thing headache, migraine or what ever it is. Working on the computer can give you the stiff neck and then later the headache(with me) What seems to help at times is keep the monitor at eye level so that you are looking at it level, your head can't be even slightly looking up or down a bit. And change the refresh rate on the monitor so it's not flickering at you as much. And turn down the brightness. and as far as treatment and what some docs say - "Learn to live with it".

I get migraines, 1 to 4 a month, definately connected with hormones sometimes and often untraceable to anything in particular. I also have neck pain issues that go back to a car accident 20 years ago (rearended at a stop light, me in a VW bug and an 18 year old in a Land Rover, gues who got the worst of that!!) It seems that sometimes my neck pain (which extends to shoulders and head if it gets bad enough) is seperate from migraines, sometimes it can happen along with a migraine, and sometimes if it gets bad enough and I have other small triggers adding up (lack of sleep, stress, etc.) then it can develop into a migraine. Terribly confusing for me, and good luck trying to explain it to a doctor. But I do get help with my neck by practicing some basic preventative measures.

Trying to stretch often when working at the computer. Moving my head around instead of holding it toooo still for toooo long. The biggest help for me is actually one of those foam weird shaped pillows to sleep on. The ones that have a "mound" on either side to come up and support the neck. It was almost like magic. That pillow helped my neck pain level go from daily agony to very liveable. And I can always tell when I need to replace it because I will start waking up with daily neck and head aches.

So maybe try some things aimed specifically at the neck pain and see if you can help there independently of the migraines.

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