It’s pretty easy to crack your neck.
With that being said I never advise people to crack their neck on a consistent basis.
Unless it just happens when people stretch.
It’s the people that grab their own head and twist it, that’s a bit extreme.
What that does is basically twist the bones of the mid to lower neck. This can be restricted or cause this cracking noise from an issue higher up in the neck.
The people that come into my office who do this on a regular basis will tell me that they get some relief from it but they still have neck pain and discomfort going on higher up in their neck. They will tell me that they still have a kink or stiff point at the base of their skull that they just can’t get!
They’ll mention how if only they could crack that area real quick they’ll be set.
So Why Can’t You Just Crack That Part?!
This part of the spine and body are completely different from the rest. The top two bones in the neck are different from all the other vertebrae in the spine even. The reason this is, is because of what their purpose is. They are in charge of holding our heads on!
They are named for this even, Atlas and Axis.
In Greek mythology Atlas is the Greek god who is holding the entire world…well actually the skies and heavens.
It makes sense why our C1 vertebrae is named the Atlas as it connects our head to the rest of our body. Our head is where we get most of our information and the master control system of our entire body. It’s basically our world or skies and heavens. Without it we are lost as we wouldn’t have a head!
There are a ton of muscles and ligaments that are attached to these top two bones and the head. This is another reason why it’s hard to just crack this area on your own.
At the same time with how important this area is to your entire body being able to crack it would be dangerous in my opinion. I think this may be a reason why you can’t just crack it on your own…a defense mechanism by the body.
If there is neck pain at the base of your skull we need to get this taken care of as it can have consequences later down the road.
Part of the brainstem actually resides within the top two bones of the neck. So it’s no surprise that when you do have pain at the base of your skull it can be hard to get rid of it on your own. Most people aren’t familiar with the brainstem and how important it is to our overall health, well being, and functioning of the body. The brainstem is essentially the fuse box of our body. Every nerve that sends messages from the brain to the rest of the body originates at the brainstem.
This is why if we have pain at the base of the skull, in my opinion, it isn’t something that we want to ignore, but rather something that we should look into getting fixed properly. The last thing I would want is for my fuse box to have a tripped breaker. Which is usually the case when it comes to having pain at the base of the skull.
If this is the case obviously we need to figure out how to get this fixed and where might be our best bet to do so! Well what we do at The Specific Chiropractic Center Naples is exactly this, we focus on the top two bones in the neck.
The Fix
When someone comes into the office and they mention that they have pain at the base of their skull I know exactly what needs to happen next and what’s going on. First we run some nervous system tests, which most of the time come back saying that there is some sort of abnormal function of the nervous system. I will also check their posture. Why is this important? Well because these top two bones in the neck, which are right by the base of the skull, hold the head on. If we have a misalignment going on here the head would be sitting crooked. By looking at someone’s posture with their eyes closed we can quickly check to see what might be going on.
From this point we will continue doing more scans of the nervous system and take a specific set of x-rays of this part of the neck. We put the neck and head into motion so that we can see if these top bones are moving correctly or if they may be stuck in some way. This shows us how the adjustment needs to take place. When the adjustment is given there is no twisting of the head or neck. A special table is used allowing us to make a very specific adjustment to the bone that needs to be adjusted and nothing else.
This type of chiropractic care is much different than a traditional chiropractor. Which makes sense as our goal is to make sure the top bones in the neck are in the proper position instead of making sure we can make a big cracking noise with your entire spine.
Sure getting cracked like a glow stick is something that some people really like! At the same time when you have pain at the base of your skull, that type of chiropractic care isn’t going to be the best option for you. You need something that is going to be specific and focus on where the problem is coming from, a misalignment of the top two bones in the neck. If you have had this pain for a long time, getting this fixed sooner than later is a good idea as it can potentially cause larger issues for you down the road. If you’re interested in what we do at The Specific Chiropractic Center Naples give us a call!