Neck Pain

Jim Palenscar · From: Oceanside, Calif, USA

I suffer from chronic neck pain due primarily to several collapsed discs. I've blamed it on not treating my body like a temple in so many ways but have come to know a number of steel players who suffer from the same malady- including my partner at Goodrich Kevin Ryan. My previous occupation had my head looking down and my arms up a bit as well much like the posture of a steel guitarist from the waist up and quite unlike most other occupations and I wondered if there was a correlation?

Wally Moyers · From: Lubbock, Texas

Two years ago tomorrow I had a cervical fusion on my neck to correct the same problem. I still have to be careful not to use a computer monitor mounted too high in my studio or hold my phone too low. For me it hurts more while playing C6th than E9th I guess because its closer to me so I have to look down more while playing it.. I've also noticed I wake up hurting if I use too many pillows when I sleep at night. The key is keeping your neck as straight or upright as possible.
This is a insightful article about it..
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/11/20/text-neck-is-becoming-an-epidemic-and-could-wreck-your-spine/?utm_term=.d0b33e1e4795

Bud Angelotti · From: Larryville, NJ, USA

Mind over matter -Mind over matter -Mind over matter - Ow my aching neck!
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Dave Zirbel · From: Sebastopol, CA USA

I got it too...8 hrs a day on the computer and pedal steel/guitar at night... Crying or Very sad

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Dale Foreman · From: Crowley Louisiana, USA

Count me in on the pain! I also get spasms in the shoulders but not going to stop me from playing!
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Ollin Landers · From: Willow Springs, NC

After more than 40 yrs of sitting in front of some sort of computer terminal for my job it finally got me too.

I've had a 3 level cervical fusion C4 to C7. I have two plates and 8 screws holding my neck together now.

I have another bulging disc at C3/C4 that needs to be done. The disc is pressing on my spinal cord.

I have permanent damage I can't ignore with loss of strength and numbness in my left hand and arm.

But I've learned to live with the pain. I found the absolute best thing to do is "ice" my neck down on the days it gets really bad. I sit in a recliner and use an ice pack on the back of my neck.

I had to take narcotics in the beginning when the pain was really bad. Now nothing calms the nerves down for me as well as ice. Have not had any narcotics in 3 years.
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Jim Palenscar · From: Oceanside, Calif, USA

My wife- a hairdresser for almost 50 years- has a similar problem and got great relief from having a pain doctor perform an ultrasound guided radio-nerve ablation where they basically fry the pain nerves in the neck using very small electrodes ("he did the Monster Mash" Smile

). Unfortunately it needs to be repeated about annually but she is now pain free. It is certainly an alternative to surgeries that not always work.

Jerry Roller · From: Van Buren, Arkansas USA

Jim, the Star Chiropractic in West Los Angeles has the DXR9000 decompression machine. You need to check into it. I was facing back surgery a year ago and found a spine clinic in Conway, AR who has four of those machines. I have been taking treatments with very good results. I had 4 lumbar herniated dics and ond was leaking spinal fluid. They combine pull/release computer controlled decompression and hydration to hydrate and return the disc to its proper shape as much as possible. They have a machine for cervical as well as those for lower back. It was expensive for me as my insurance would not help but was well worth the cost to avoid surgery that I feared would not be effective at best. I have seen many people get very good results at the clinic. I would incourage you to look into this treatment. I found the one in LA but I'm sure there are other clinic close to you who has the DXR9000. You have to drink a lot of water to help the treatments work.
Good luck
Jerry
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Jim Palenscar · From: Oceanside, Calif, USA

Thanks Jerry- will check it out.

kevin ryan · From: San Marcos, California

Yeah this topic hits home for sure... Been staring at a computer since 90-91 full time, playing 1000's of gigs too... After awhile the neck got so painful, I went with the surgery 3 years ago.. I'm still dodging pain as much as I can, trying to be careful like Wally is talking about... I had the Anterior Cervical Discectomy and Fusion,, Not sure I would recommend it... I am just getting through a couple of pretty sore weeks with the neck... I tweak it sometimes ... If thats as bad as it gets... No problem!!! Love playing to much and everything else!

Joe Goldmark · From: San Francisco, CA 94131

For folks who don't have these awful disc issues, but do get a lot of sore necks and shoulders. If you're a stomach and back sleeper (not a side sleeper) try using a very thin pillow that allows your head to be very close to the bed. You might also try a bean pillow which molds exactly to your head. Your sore necks will disappear.

Joe

Mike Perlowin · From: Los Angeles CA

Bummer, Jim. I hope you feel better.
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Ollin Landers · From: Willow Springs, NC

Bud Angelotti · From: Larryville, NJ, USA

Where do I find this bean bag type pillow?
I did some searching & found all kinds.
Can you point me to the one you speak of?
Thanks!
Bud
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Barry Blackwood · Posted 6 Dec 2016 10:49 am

Joe and Ollin, are you referring to the Sobikawa pillow filled with buckwheat hulls?

Ollin Landers · From: Willow Springs, NC

Barry and Bud

I thought I would never like the Buckwheat pillows because they are rather hard.

I have one that is essentially the same thing but it has shredded foam as well to make it softer. It came unfilled with a bag of hulls and shredded foam so you can set it the way you want. I think now it ships stuffed and you have to take the extra filling out. Just get a heavy duty bag to keep the excess in until you get it just right.

I also sleep with a CPAP mask and I'm able to sort of make a little indent in the pillow and it fits the mask very well. It also doesn't change shape unless I change it so my mask stays on all night.

https://www.amazon.com/Natural-Form-Fit-Pillow-Quilted-Bamboo-Shell/dp/B00I0YWCKO
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I spent half my money on gambling, alcohol and wild women. The other half I wasted. W.C. Fields

Joe Goldmark · From: San Francisco, CA 94131

To my surprise, the pillow is "Buckwheat Hulls".
It's made by Kent & Spiegel in Culver City, CA.

I used to feel that I needed to sleep with my head fairly high and that I'd get dizzy when I had it too low. But I had sore necks, etc. Somebody gave me the pillow and I quickly got over the purported dizziness, and the sore necks and shoulders disappeared. I think that anybody who has these kinds of issues, would want to give this a try since it's such an easy and cheap fix. Also since the pillow molds to your head, it doesn't curl up and "suffocate" you at night. I sleep on one front corner or the other depending which way I'm facing when I'm sleeping on my stomach. TMI? Sorry if I sound like a salesman, just happy that something actually worked for the better.

Joe

Bud Angelotti · From: Larryville, NJ, USA

Thanks you Joe & Ollie! Smile

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David Mason · From: Cambridge, MD, USA

"Hey Doc, every time I tilt my head like this I get sharp shooting pains and numbness and invisible midget armies attacking me with spikes!"

"Umm... so, don't tilt your head like that?"

I know far more about this stuff than I ever would've wished for, at least in a non-paying capacity. Unlike Mr. Moyers, I HAVE to use a lot of various-sized pillows and construct an immobilizing little sleeping nest for myself, because if I roll over "funny", certain little nerve pathways close up, stuff starts pinching, and if I'm in dreamland the midgets really DO attack, my arms get caught under a steamroller, an improbable walrus starts chewing on my feet... I just have to manage it, adjust posture, everybody's different.

Your spine and nerves are like a tree with branches poking out between the discs and there are all SORTS of different ways to pinch and hurt. Painful damage in the cervical and lumbar areas are most common, but you can pinch off the nerves to, say, your pancreas, go to sleep with a stomachache and wake up dead. One good source of odd pillows is the stuffed-animal bin at a Salvation Army or Goodwill store, and you can just cram stuff into pillowcases as needed. Mine is also opposite Mr. Moyers in that extending my hands out hurts more - I can lift furniture if I can get right up next to it, but with my (left) arm extended I can't pick up a 5-lb. bag of sugar.

One thing you DON'T want to do initially is "power through the pain", hairy-chested non-whiny "merely a flesh wound, my dear" kind of nonsense. Pinched nerves can eventually shut down and DIE, so until you know EXACTLY which is what in there, whimper away. Before my cervical fusion my doctor COULDN'T give me painkillers, I was telling him about rotating the tires and cleaning out a garage and he was mumbling stuff about paralysis, hmm.

Fundamentally, human beings just aren't actually completely evolved to walk upright, like your sinuses drain FORWARD - you can actually cure the common cold, just remain on all fours and drip away. Back problems are a pretty universal thing, even those annoying super-healthy type, "optimist" people zoink their backs up pretty regular. I know what sets mine off pretty well by now, not getting enough sleep is up there, nerves live on B vitamins so it certainly can't HURT to take a big multi "B-50" or "B-100" supplement, you just excrete the excess in the form of flourescent pee... something like 80% of all human health problems would disappear if we'd all just DIE by the age of 40 like the good old days.

Bob Hoffnar · From: Austin, Tx

Jim,

I hope you feel better soon.
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Bud Angelotti · From: Larryville, NJ, USA

I hope everybody feels better soon.
Especially ME ! Smile

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Tony Glassman · From: The Great Northwest

Jim, If you feel like it, give me a call sometime i to talk about neck problems. There are a number different etiologies for cervical pain - several of which aren't related to discs. Over the years I've seen many cervicalgia patients in my medical practice.

You should have my phone number in your records as I've purchased an Emmons and a Quilter amp from your shop in the past
.

Bud Angelotti · From: Larryville, NJ, USA

Tony, May I call also please?
Thanks in advance!
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David Mason · From: Cambridge, MD, USA

Just to add two bits - first, you have far more time, information and motivation to figure out and evaluate your own health care and treatment than your doctor. I don't mean they're incompetent or willfully harmful, but the majority of these problems are not a "disease" to be cured but a "condition" to be managed (I hate getting old). And there's lots of variables, lots of real treatments, some sketchy ones, some confabulation for sure. And nerve pain is another tricky one that gets better and worse for no reason, just to dick with you. Like for me, a long stretch of poor sleeping is going to make everything else worse, anti-inflammatories do NOTHING, but inflammation is an enemy; other people have other results.

The most important part is to try to ISOLATE cures and treatment - if you change three different things at once and you all of a sudden feel much better - you don't know which change caused it, and in the long run you may end up spending MORE time fidgeting with each idea in trying to reduce the problem. (And develop some wierdass superstitions in the meantime!) It's hard to go back to something knowing it may make you worse, but you really need to change ONE thing at a time, and give each of the various ideas enough time to take hold. Some medications may be good for you in small amounts and bad in larger amounts - guess WHO gets to figure out how much is too much? Keep a little notebook and keep track of what you're doing. By all means keep your doctor aware, in fact they may be a little astonished to have any patient at all who shows up with an actual plan to get better!

"Doc, I feel like crap, fix me - NOW!" They get a lot of that. They will be MORE helpful as far as you testing different prescriptions, "exercises", even dietary things can have quite a bit of bearing - you may be toting around a low-level type of food allergy, like there's one that's potatoes, tomatoes and bell peppers, might not bother you until you happen to pile too much of them on in one day; for sure allergies can add to inflammation, so if you've got a pinched nerve, the surrounding tissue swells, which cause more pinching, which swells so... well, it may be another batch of stuff needs some experimenting. If-you-can/once-you-do zero in on some specifics you may benefit from a referral to an osteopath, they're like a chiropractor but a "real doctor" TOO - meaning the insurance is likely to PAY if it's a referral from your primary.

And I said "exercises" above meaning some gentle stretches, maybe some careful alignment work (my left shoulder is one inch lower than the right. Boy, don't Precision basses sound good though!) But BEWARE of physical therapists! I've been to three, I bailed out on two of them after they beat the CRAP outta my spinal cord and bailed on the third BEFORE they beat the crap outta my spinal cord. Wonderful people, lovely, they mean well, but - they're physical therapists. If the therapy is making your nerve channels swell closed and you feel awful, the solution is... more physical therapy.... So you feel even worse? Uh-oh - YOU need some physical THERAPY for that.... Whoa!

Jim Palenscar · From: Oceanside, Calif, USA

Thanks to everyone for sharing their thoughts. Actually I was just fielding a bit of a survey to see if we as a group had more issues with this than others and at this point it doesn't appear that we do. I agree w David Mason's scientific method approach by only trying 1 thing at a time in order to ascertain the efficacy and the absolute last thing on my list is surgery. I can handle the 24-7 headache- drugs are a marvelous adjunct for control- but I would be happier if I didn't have to take them. Tony- I might just take you up on the phone call- thanks Smile

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