Tension Headaches

 

TENSION HEADACHES PAIN PATTERN

Since the pandemic I have a seen an big rise in clients presenting with headaches that start at the back of your head and can migrate to an area which patients describe as behind the eye. They tend to be worse when screen time and sedentary sitting increase and that was a very common trait that was occurring. No need for the 15 min walk to and from the station or to pop out for a lunch break. It all accumulated to spending more time at the desk.

Our tissues will therefore adapt to their environment and disrupt normal muscle and joint function. The nerve endings in these tissues then start to become sensitised and for good reason. It all comes down to threat to our brain. If the nerve receptors in our muscles and joints sense compression and a joint ultimately loses its joint motion variability, the feedback from these receptors to our brain is that it doesn’t like this. Filter in some more threat to our bodies like work and family stress, a lack of good quality sleep and food and drinks that can spike inflammation, then hey presto these headaches can present.

 

One of the main muscles that becomes shortened and overly sensitised is the semispinalis capitis which inserts to our spine between the shoulder blades and runs up and attaches to our skull. If this muscle stays chronically shortened it can start to irritate the greater occipital nerve and when this happens, that is where we get the tension headache arising.

These headaches respond really well when we target this muscles plus others with active release technique, myofascial cupping and medical acupuncture as I find that a combination of all three helps stimulate blood flow and oxygen uptake into the tissue and help desensitise the nerves that are irritated.

Then we always need to feed this back into getting these muscles and joints moving with exercise to break the pattern of how they have been working. Here is an exercise that I suggest you try as it targets the semispinalis capitis. Let me know if it has an positive affect with your heachaches. I would recommend you do this movement on both sides for 1 min and repeat on the hour for 6 hours. Its a nice way to also break away from the desk as well

If you have any questions on this article or how I can help you with your tension headaches then please get in touch.

Thanks

Mario