Call it turtling, iPosturing, or text neck, just as texting isn’t going away and nor is text neck!
You text and your neck muscles have to hold your head in a forward position for the whole time you are texting . . . as the muscles get tighter . . . the headaches start!
In the world of smart phones todays doctors are seeing thumb pain, elbow issues, neck and shoulder pain and headaches. There is generally no trauma for these complaints, there is, however a lot of time spent on a smart phone or tablet.
Its very hard, in today’s world to say “don’t text” so text neck isn’t going to go away any time soon unless you address the posture related problems that come with texting.
“I’m a big advocate for trying to stretch,” Martinson said. “Usually you develop tight muscles on the front of the body from sitting forward, so we try to stretch those out. Tight muscles generally have weak muscles on the opposite side of the body, so we try to do some strengthening for the upper back muscles.”
Stretches to counteract text neck:
- sit up straight, with your head up and your chin up, and pull your shoulder blades down and together along the back. Stop what they’re doing every one or two hours and do five to 10 repetitions
- when you’re standing put your hands behind your back to bring your shoulders back so your posture just automatically becomes better
While texting:
Put your shoulders back, line your ears up over your shoulders, and make sure your shoulders are directly over your hips and then hold your device at an angle that brings the smart phone to you instead of taking your head to the smart phone.
If your head is forward at a 15-degree angle, the weight on your spine is about 27 pounds while at 30 degrees of forward flexion, to your neck muscles your head weighs about 40 pounds. enterprise cloud . server hosting info up or down domain whois information .
