How to Relieve Neck Pain
Recommended products and strategies to relieve neck pain, especially in hypermobile bodies.
I have struggled with chronic neck and upper back pain for the last decade. At points, the pain has been debilitating. Fortunately, after years of working with physical therapists and now some hypermobility experts, I have my pain under control.
In the hope of helping others do the same, I have created this guide of products, resources, and strategies that have helped me reduce and manage my pain.
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Neck pain is complicated, and I don’t pretend to know how to resolve everyone’s pain. It can be caused by a variety of local and systemic issues, and it can even be referred pain from a different part of the body. Neck pain can also result from issues in your body anywhere below the neck, such as issues resulting in an uneven gait or posture. If you are experiencing neck pain, please consult with your health care providers.
Direct Pain Relief: Ice and Heat
When you’re in pain, what you want first is something, anything, that will take the pain down a few notches. Aside from pharmaceutical options, which I encourage you to talk to to your healthcare providers about, the next line of attack for direct pain relief is a combination of ice and heat.
It can be hard to know whether ice or heat will be best for a given pain or injury, so you may need to experiment to see what works best. The general advice is to use ice for something that is inflamed, and to use heat for something that is stiff. Some injuries may benefit from alternating ice and heat therapy.
Combo Cold/Hot Packs
As the number of body parts I treat with ice continues to climb, I have become a fan of buying ice packs designed specifically for the troublesome spot. Getting a rectangular ice pack to stay where you need it can be a pain in the neck (No I will not apologize for Dad humor). To limit frustration and maximize relief, I recommend a contoured neck wrap ice pack like this one from Arctic Flex (paid link).
If you’d prefer a solid multi-purpose icepack, my go-to are the ones from Rester’s Choice (paid link).
Both of these also can be heated in the microwave to serve as hot packs!
If you already have ice packs that you like and you just need help getting them to stay in place around your neck (or wherever you need them), I have two economical tricks I learned from physical therapists. One option is to place the ice pack in a thin sleeve, like the kinds they put under splints (below on the left), and then tie it around where you need it.
Personally, I don’t find having something tied around my neck terribly comfortable, so I prefer the shrink wrap solution. You simply take cheap furniture wrap, and wrap it around your shoulders in a crisscross around your body to keep an ice pack in place. When I was a teenager in PT for my shoulder, I would leave every session with a giant bag of pebble ice shrink-wrapped to my shoulder. It’s odd-looking but effective.
Heating Pads
There are endless varieties of heating pads, so I am simply going to recommend the two that I use. I have a large square (paid link) one which has six levels of heat and an auto-shutoff. It’s soft and large enough to cover most of my needs, but larger heating pads are out there if you want one. I also have one that wraps around my neck and shoulders (paid link) with a snap in front, so it can stay in place when you are up and working, eating, reading, playing video games, etc. [Edit: The original product I purchased is no longer available, so I’ve updated the link with something similar.]
If you want a wireless experience that feels more luxurious, I also recommend weighted microwaveable neck wraps. I find the scented version calming when I am using it before sleep. If my olfactory senses are overwhelmed, there is an unscented version too. It’s like wrapping a warm weighted blanket around your shoulders to soothe your overworked nervous system.
Releasing Tension
After calming pain with ice and easing your joints and muscles with heat, you can work on releasing the deeper tension. Please use caution with these products and techniques, and consult with a physical therapist or other healthcare provider to ensure you use what’s right for you.
Massage tools
I love professional massages, and I try to get them as regularly as I can afford to help manage my pain. Fortunately for the time between professional massages, there are plenty of tools you can use for massage at home.
I use a combination of myofascial release balls and a foam roller to massage my neck and release trigger points, and I use this combination all throughout my body. I’ve linked to these massage balls and foam rollers specifically because they are less firm than typical ones. If I use tools that are too firm, I end up flaring up my muscles instead of relaxing them. My Pilates instructor told me this is common with hypermobile/EDS bodies, and that it’s important to be gentle.
For my neck, I start with the foam roller to gently warm up my muscles with broad pressure, similar to the instruction in this video. Then I progress to deeper, focused pressure with the massage balls. I leave them in the net and put them under my neck and upper spine, alternating between being still and rotating my neck back and forth, as demonstrated in this video.
You can use two tennis balls in a sock instead if you happen to have those lying around, but tennis balls are a bit too big for me and not the right density to really get into the troublesome spots on my neck. They wear out with time, and I had to keep stealing them back from my pets who believed they were wonderful toys. I bought these ActiveProZone massage balls (paid link) about five years ago, and I was surprised how much better I liked them than the tennis balls.
For deeper percussive therapy, massage guns are awesome. A few years ago, my elbow PT’s office had just bought one, and I couldn’t believe how much it helped relieve the knots in my forearm. I bought one from the same brand my PT used (Achedaway Pro 16mm Amplitude Massage Gun Deep Tissue Percussion (Paid Link)), and I use it often.
For the neck, you do need to be careful because it’s a delicate area. I recommend asking a physical therapist or other healthcare provider to show you how to safely use it on that area. The massage gun I have is large and a bit unwieldy, so I often ask my husband or friend for help using it. On a recommendation, I also bought this absolutely ridiculous looking massage gun holder so I could use it on my own back. It works surprisingly well.
There are smaller massage guns which are more portable and easier to use. I haven’t tried these myself yet, but based on the information and reviews, these are what I would buy if I were going to give a massage gun to someone else.
The Theragun mini (Paid Link) is a more budget option, but if you want to go all out for maximum functionality with the smaller device, the Theragun Prime (Paid Link) is the way to go. It even has its own app.
Strain Relief
To further relieve tension and improve alignment, I use this gentle neck cradle called the Real Ease Neck and Shoulder Relaxer (Paid Link). It’s designed to provide gentle traction and encourage your cervical spine into proper alignment with the rest of your spine, allowing the surrounding muscles to relax. Other neck cradles I’ve tried are made of a solid silicone, so they don’t give at all and end up putting me in more pain than when I started. This one is just foam and gentle spring loading, so it won’t force your neck into any position it doesn’t want to be in.
For more a more intense traction experience that is still tolerable, you can try something like this neck hammock device. There are a wide variety of traction devices out there, so you may need to experiment and see what works best for you.
Daily Support
If you’re doing the work to improve your spine health and reduce your neck pain, it’s important to support that effort in your day to day life. While sleeping, working, or just living, you want to keep your neck safe and supported and strong.
Pillows
It’s frustrating to have all the work you’ve done to improve your neck pain undone undone by a single night’s weird sleep position. Chiropractors and PTs kept recommending cervical pillows to me. I tried a variety, but they always made my neck pain worse. All of the cervical pillows I tried had a “hump” for your neck and then a deeper well for your head, but this put way too much pressure on my neck.
I tried a Purple Pillow next, and this worked pretty well for me for several years. It allowed me to continue to make progress reducing my pain, but I would still sometimes wake up feeling my neck was in an uncomfortable position. I did another search for cervical pillows and found there were a wider variety of designs available now. I tried a few and landed on the Ergonomic Cervical Pillow for Neck Pain (Paid Link).
When I sleep on my back in the center, and my head is supported on both sides. My neck has just the right amount of support, and there is a space for my shoulders to slide in, which allows the cervical spine to maintain alignment. I can roll over to my side, where the pillow height is taller, so my neck won’t sag uncomfortably. I very rarely wake up with neck pain anymore, and I will never go back to using a different type of pillow.
If you are recovering from an injury, you may find it difficult to find a position to sit comfortably in where your neck is properly supported. For these situations I recommend a wedge pillow set like this one above on the right (Paid Link). The wedge system is good for any kind of back pain, but when I slipped a disk in my neck and could barely move for a week, this is the only way I could sit comfortably.
Posture Support
Compression shirts can be comforting in general for hypermobile/EDS bodies, providing proprioceptive feedback to let our brains know where our joints are and keep them safe. I’ve had a difficult time finding compression wear for plus sized women, but the largest sizes available for IntelliSkin and Alignmed posture correction compression shirts do fit me. They have several different options for both men and women.
I find it’s just a gentle correction and a comforting sense of compression, encouraging my shoulders back into their sockets so my head maintain comfortable alignment with my neck.
Increasing mobility and strength
To maintain the benefits of cold/heat therapy, massage, and alignment support long-term, a program to improve neck mobility and strength is key. I can’t recommend enough finding a good physical therapist, personal trainer, or other health professional who is experienced with hypermobile patients. If you don’t know how to find one, I suggest joining an online support group, who often have lists of recommended providers.
In addition to working with physical therapists and a Pilates instructor, over the years I’ve used a variety of additional resources which I’ve outlined below.
First, over a decade ago a PT recommended I read Treat Your Own Neck 5th Ed by Robin McKenzie (Paid Link). It’s short and contains helpful depictions of the exercises. I read it and came back to the PT and worked with her to practice the movements that would help me the most.
More recently, Kevin Muldowney’s book Living Life to the Fullest with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (paid link) was recommended to me by EDSers on Twitter. It’s a comprehensive guide to physical therapy exercises for people with Ehlers-Danlos (or Hypermobility Spectrum Disorders) and their physical therapists to work together to appropriately treat hypermobile bodies. It covers the whole body, including an extensive section on the neck and spine. At the link above on the right you can get the hard copy on Amazon, but there is an e-book version on Kevin Muldowney’s site as well.
Dr. Laura Kuan is not specifically a hypermobile expert, but I find her joint mobility videos helpful and easy to follow. In the video below walks through a progression to improve both mobility and strength.
If you found any of this helpful, please subscribe to be notified by email when new posts are published. Let me know in the comments below or on Twitter what you found helpful and what else you use in your life to improve your own neck pain.
Disclaimer: No content in this post is intended as medical advice. If you are experiencing an injury that relates to the topics discussed, please consult with your health professional(s).
**Edited 4/23/23 to replace links to products that are no longer available, and add some additional information.
