Moving through Midlife | Helping Midlife Women Move Better and Feel Better

163 | Simple Strategies to Relieve Upper Back Pain through Habit Stacking

• Courtney McManus

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Imagine a life free from the nagging pain of a stiff neck and aching upper back. Join me, Courtney, your guide and personal trainer, as we explore actionable strategies to combat the discomfort that plagues our modern sedentary lifestyles. We’ll uncover how everyday activities like desk work and driving can sneakily influence our posture, leading to that persistent muscle tension. Together, we'll practice envisioning a string pulling from the crown of your head to correct forward head posture—a simple yet powerful tool towards achieving better alignment and easing muscle stress.

Throughout our episode, I share easy movements and stretches you can incorporate right into your daily routine, without having to carve out extra time. From opening your chest with hands behind your head to engaging the mid-back with exercises like rows and Lat pull-downs, these strategies are designed to promote mobility and strengthen your upper back for lasting relief. We’ll also touch on the significance of varying your sitting positions and identifying compensatory patterns that might be affecting your body’s overall movement. If you’re ready to embrace midlife and aging with grace, join our community, share these insights with others, and let’s journey towards a healthier, more confident you.

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Speaker 1:

How are you feeling today? Do you notice that you may struggle with tension in your upper back, or maybe you think of it as upper back pain or shoulder blade pain? Do you notice that you are struggling with that a lot? One thing that I tend to see a lot with my clients is this upper back and neck pain that we have, and it's especially around the shoulder blades. It's very common and this usually happens due to all the things that we are doing in life. So whether we're lifting children or grandchildren, carrying heavy bags, working long hours at a desk, using our mouse, even sometimes the way we drive and sleeping in awkward positions, can create this back tension, this upper back tension, and I wanted to share a couple of things that you can work on practicing to help to relieve that upper back pain and improve your posture so that you start to feel a little bit better.

Speaker 1:

Welcome to Moving Through Midlife. I am your host courtney, a personal trainer and movement specialist who wants to help you move through midlife with more grace. Each week we will discuss ways we can show up better for ourselves and our children without the burnout. We will focus on overall health through habit stacking to help increase energy, provide movement snacks to help you move more throughout the day, while also moving your body more, and learn from professionals on moving through midlife with ease so that you can feel confident with aging. Gracefully Grab your earbuds and join me on a leisurely walk while we discuss moving through midlife.

Speaker 1:

With our modern lifestyle, we tend to suffer with back tension, upper back pain and neck pain because we live such a sedentary life and because of the rounded forward of our shoulders due to computers, due to reading books, due to phones, due to a lot of things. It's just the way it is. So I want to provide you with some strategies to help you work through this pain and see if you can help to alleviate it. Now, obviously, if you're dealing with a lot of pain, you definitely need to go see a doctor. I always would recommend that first, especially if it's this aggravating pain. But if you're just dealing with like a stiff neck in the morning, when you wake up, things like that, or you've been working at your desk for a while and you start to feel that tension between your shoulder blades, these are the exercises that you can work on practicing to help with those types of pain.

Speaker 1:

So I try not to give a bunch of corrective exercises, even though I, you know, that is a field that I'm passionate about. I want to provide you with things you can do in your everyday life because, therefore, you're more apt to do them. If I gave you a slew of exercises to add on to the end of your workouts, most people would not do them. You know, if you think of if you've ever seen a physical therapist, they'll give you a list of things to do, and I have clients who work with physical therapists and then they see me as well and I'll say something like did you do those exercises? And they're like, no, I didn't exercises. And they're like, no, I didn't. So I mean, it's very common that we don't do these exercises because it's just adding one more layer in. So if we can find ways to do this in our everyday life, wouldn't that be so much better?

Speaker 1:

So the first thing we're going to do is talk through driving. When you are driving, there are simple things that you can do to start to help alleviate this pain and sit with better posture. Now, I always caveat this better situation. Obviously, posture is a moving target and our body is designed to move through different positions, so a stagnant hold of sitting really tall is not better posture, so to speak. Okay, but we do have some things that we can work on to help with our alignment, to ease the stressors on our muscles. Our body is designed to stack upon itself, joint by joint, stack upon itself. What happens is due to weakness, movement patterns, things like that, weakness in the muscle, movement patterns we tend to pull into positions. So I'm going to provide you with an exercise to kind of help you to stack your body more up on itself, and you'll notice that well, you may notice that you feel a sense of relief in this position. So what you're going to do is I would recommend doing this in your car, while driving, but you can practice it now if you're not driving and all you're going to do is you're going to imagine someone pulling a string and you may have heard me talk about this before from the crown of your head. Okay, now, the reason I don't want it from the front of your head or from the top of your head is because of what may happen at your chin. So, the crown of the head, if you imagine someone wearing a crown, it's going to be that back area of the head kind of like where, if you wore a high ponytail not the top knot, but a higher ponytail on the back of the head, right about that area, and we're going to imagine someone pulling a string and lifting us up, and what you should notice when you do that is one you sit a lot taller, but your chin drops slightly. You sit a lot taller, but your chin drops slightly. So what happens?

Speaker 1:

When we are living our normal everyday life, many of us move into this forward head posture where our head kind of juts forward, our chin juts forward and our eyes are always looking for the horizon. That is kind of what the vestibular system tends to do is we're looking for the horizon. So no matter what position our head is in, it's going to try to level itself based on what the horizon is doing. So if you have this rounded forward position, your chin is going to jut forward as well, so that your eyes see the horizon level. What we're going to try to do is counteract that. So when we lift and lengthen up, you'll feel this slight drop of the chin and you should still be able to see the horizon. Well, okay, so from here. So we're not dropping too far down is my whole point. We don't want to drop the chin. I never said drop the chin. I said lift up, lengthen through the crown of the head and your chin will naturally drop. I just want to make sure that that's clear, because then you don't want to be creating a lot of tension in the neck from trying to drop the chin. So once you're in this position, lengthening up, chin is slightly dropped.

Speaker 1:

You want to imagine pulling back towards, if you're in the car, the headrest. Now, the way the seats are made, a lot of them are ergonomically made, but unfortunately it's like this ergonomically made, but in this rounded position I feel like every time I get in my car I'm like sinking pelvic is tucking under and so don't push as far back as maybe the headrest is if it's far back and it feels awkward. Always listen to your body for cues. If something doesn't feel right, stop. So what you're going to do from that point is just gently pull the head back and all you're trying to do is get that ear directly over top of the shoulders, right? So if I were to draw a line from your ear to your shoulders, they would be in a straight line. They wouldn't be at an angle. That is the first thing you do. It's going to correct your head posture. That is the first thing you do. It's going to correct your head posture.

Speaker 1:

The next thing that you can do is the back breathing, which I know. I've recently done an episode on back breathing and I tend to mention it a lot when I talk about core anxiety, all of these different things, because it is just that important. All of these different things because it is just that important and it is where we work on trying to get those back ribs to expand that 360 breathing, jellyfish breathing. What you're going to do again, if you're sitting in your car, you want to breathe in, take a deep breath in, and you want to see if can you feel that back your back ribs moving into the seat behind you. That is working on that expansion. You might feel like this drop or lengthening in your back. Those tend to be the things people will say like I'll feel a sense of relief or this lengthening stretch in my back when I do that. So that is the second thing.

Speaker 1:

And then the third thing you are going to need a tennis ball. If you don't have one, no worries, but at some point see if you can find a ball, it needs to be the size of a tennis ball. It could be a soft ball. Harder balls like a lacrosse ball, a golf ball, those are going to be a little bit too hard. So I would move with caution with that. If you're in a chair where you're going to be putting it between your body in the chair, it's not going to be terrible because it's going to be pushing into that seat a little bit more. But I think a tennis ball is a better option. So I keep my tennis ball in my car and I just take it with me when I'm driving. If I'm feeling some tension in my shoulder blade, I just pop that tennis ball back in between my shoulder blade in the car seat and I just kind of roll around. When I find those tension spots I lean back into it and I take a few deep breaths. I try to fix my posture, sitting up straight, practicing that back, breathing and breathe and see if I can release that tension spot. That is one of the easiest things and it provides so many people with so much relief. So let's move on to now.

Speaker 1:

We're living our day and maybe we sit a lot at work or maybe you're sitting and waiting for your child. I mean the endless hours that I spend at my daughter's dance studio. These are the kind of things that you can do If you're sitting a lot, waiting for people watching a soccer game. All of these things you can do, these different movements that will again help to relieve upper back and upper neck pain. So all you're going to do is, when you're sitting, you may notice that you start to slouch forward it's probably pretty common for most of us and you'll feel this tightening of the chest. So it's like this rounding forward. Your chest tends to tighten up because all those muscles are shortened and all of the muscles on the back start to become lengthened. And all of the muscles on the back start to become lengthened. They're getting rounded and they're being pulled out of. You know they're extending their length.

Speaker 1:

So what we can do is we're going to then place our hands behind our head. We're going to open up and kind of create that extension. We're going to press our head into our hands, letting our elbows open up out at the side. I'm trying to do it while I'm talking, so I'm sorry if my voice starts to sound like it's farther away and you'll go through a slight extension. This should feel really nice. It should feel like you're opening your chest muscles, should feel like you're maybe lengthening. You might feel some upper back popping, neck popping. All of it should feel really nice, and just do that.

Speaker 1:

You can lean back against a chair. If you have a chair high enough and that will allow you to. You know, use gravity to kind of extend through that position. This is a gentle stretch. This is not something that you're trying to press yourself into. It's just a relaxing position to be in.

Speaker 1:

The other thing that I would encourage you to do is some side reaching and stretching. So every few hours or every 30 minutes, take a moment to reach your arms from side to side. You might reach for something far away. Imagine you're reaching towards the right for something far away. That's going to allow your ribs to slide back and forth over the pelvis from side to side and then reach like you're reaching towards the left as well. You might notice some tension sticking points. If you do, you need to practice some breathing and some core exercises. That's where that move better, feel Better bundle is great, because I've got the core connection course in there for you to look through and work on. So just moving side to side with the rib cage and then even reaching up over your head and crossing that arm over. So your right arm is going to cross over to the left side and the left arm is going to cross over to the right side, and that's going to give you some nice stretching and this is going to help release the upper back tension that is caused by static sitting. You can also stand up and do these exercises. You'll probably notice a lot of relief as well.

Speaker 1:

And then the third thing that you're going to do is vary your position while you're sitting, try to move through different positions throughout the day, bringing one leg up and moving it, you know, maybe in a figure four style or knee up to where it's popping up above the desk. If that makes any sense, you could even cross the legs. I'm not a big proponent of crossing the legs just because it does tend to torque the pelvis, but if you make sure to go back and forth between both sides, you will notice that there's less issues of pelvic problems. I mean not pelvic floor problems, although they can be affected, but more like hip problems. So you know, if you're going to bring your right knee up. You also need to make sure you bring your left knee up. If you bring your right knee out into a figure four position while you sit a lot like where your ankle is on your knee make sure you flip it up.

Speaker 1:

It's going to feel really awkward in the beginning and if it does feel awkward, that means you need to do it more, because that tells you you have a pattern that has occurred and that other position is uncomfortable and there's a reason for that. So that means you know lean into those uncomfortable positions. Those are positions you need to move into more. So while these things this stretching and these posture adjustments can help ease the immediate discomfort that you're feeling, you really have to start strengthening your upper back. It is essential for long-term pain relief.

Speaker 1:

Now I do want to caveat that with we first have to make sure that we're not practicing compensatory patterns. So you could test if you deal with a lot of neck tension. You can test for me laying down on the floor and bringing your knees up like you're getting ready to do a sit-up. But you're not going to do a sit-up, just lay down and relax. Place one hand behind your neck not behind your head but behind your neck and just relax and breathe, then you're going to let that knee fall down towards the floor on one side. Notice if anything happens at your neck.

Speaker 1:

If you are getting tense in your neck, then you use your neck in the way you move. That's a compensatory pattern you have to. You may not even realize it, like if you're out walking, you may not realize it, but by practicing this you may be like oh my gosh, my jaw tightens up, my neck stiffens up, just so that I can move my leg out to the side. That means you aren't using your core. Your core is no longer stabilizing you, so you're trying to find it somewhere up the line, which might be your thoracic area and your neck, something to pay attention to. This is not a common I mean, yes, common overall. But if you're like that's not me, then don't worry about it. But I would encourage all of you to go down to the floor and just see, especially those of you with neck issues, neck pain when I say issues neck pain and notice if you're compensating in other areas of your body. And if you are, the first thing I would start to do is try to relax and breathe and see if you can get the neck muscles to relax completely and then just start moving around and see if you can practice with your breath, using your core muscles to hold you stable rather than your neck.

Speaker 1:

If you have questions, feel free to reach out to me. You can always go through the Moving Through Midlife community on Facebook. I'm there to help answer any questions you have along the way. You can reach out to me privately. You can reach out through a podcast or through my email, or you can go into my program where I kind of dive deeper into movement patterns and things there. So you do want to make sure you're starting to strengthen your upper back.

Speaker 1:

I will say that I want to make sure that people do it correctly. So if you can find someone local to you who's a personal trainer just to start learning movement patterns, that is the best thing that you can do for yourself. It does not mean you have to have a personal trainer for a lifetime. It doesn't even mean I mean some personal trainers require packages, but some will be happy to work with you a couple of times to make sure your posture is good while you're moving through different movements and then you can be on your way. But definitely make sure that you're not compensating using other muscles to try to alleviate some pain in your back while you're strengthening your upper back, some pain in your back while you're strengthening your upper back. So those are the things that I am going to recommend for you.

Speaker 1:

If you have questions, again, always feel free to reach out to me. You can go to movingthroughmidlifecom this week. You can always ensure that the week that I am pushing this information out, I will be in there talking more in the Moving Through Midlife community, talking more about that. But if no one asks questions, then you know I'm not going to spend endless hours waiting for questions to be asked. So feel free to come over there. I'm happy to help you.

Speaker 1:

Oh and exercises. I want to tell you exercises. Oh and exercises. I want to tell you exercises you might want to incorporate. So you want to think rows. Make sure we're not using our upper traps for rows. We want to get our mid-back to start firing on for those Lat pull-downs, reverse flies.

Speaker 1:

All of these are great machines or exercises you can do. Start lighter for those of you who are new, even if you're dealing with pain and you've been doing exercises for a while. Sometimes it helps to drop down to a lower weight, to check your movement pattern before you go back up to a higher weight. So that is it. Hopefully this gives you some tips, some ideas for how you can work on easing and relieving that upper back pain and shoulder blade, and I hope you all have a wonderful day and make sure to keep moving. I hope you enjoyed this episode and found something to take away to help you practice healthier habits, move more or handle the midlife and aging with grace. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with a friend or leave us a review to help us reach more moms just like you. Head to movingthroughmidlifecom to join the free community or learn how you can move more and feel better in your daily life.