3 Neck Muscles You Never Knew Existed, Part 1

Do you suffer for neck or shoulder pain? This article is to bring your attention to some muscles that I see are consistently tight on clients. In this three part series, each of the muscles I am going to name exist on either side of the neck.

Sternocleidomastoid (SCM)

Whoa! That is a long muscle name. 'Sterno-' originates because the muscle is a "jellied, denatured alcohol sold in a can and meant to be burned directly in its can." (AH! Your neck is on fire!) OR it could mean that one end of the muscle is attached to the sternum, a hard bone in the middle of your chest. You decide.

The 'cleido' refers to the muscle's attachment to the clavicle. The clavicle is that bone you may have broken on the slip-in-slide or from a mountain biking end-over-end maneuver. 'Mastoid' sounds cool and is the process by which the muscle attaches to under the ear. All together now...sternocleidomastoid! Boy, you sound cool. Don't worry. We'll call it the SCM.

Why do you care about the SCM?

The SCM likes to give people headaches. No bueno. Studies show that "50% of the general population have headaches during any given year, and more than 90% report a lifetime history of headache." This makes the SCM suddenly very relevant and interesting. To make matters worse, our heads have a tendency to sneak forward as we age, which puts a lot more weight on the poor SCM and potentially straining it to the max.

I want you to know about this muscle because headaches can be a horrible reoccurring event in many peoples lives. I want to help relieve that pain for you. In massage, the SCM can hold a lot of trigger points and can be a great muscle to release in a session if you're looking to relieve a headache. The red below shows the pain patterns you'll experience if your headaches are related to SCM tightness.

So if you're prone to a lot of headaches. There are a few ways that you can know if the cause is tightness in your SCM. First, you can touch underneath your ear to see if you can feel that ropy SCM coming down the front of your neck. You may have one side that is tighter than the other...doing it now, my right SCM is tighter. Second, you can look at the red pattern above and see if your headaches match that pattern.

Now whether or not you've found tightness or a similar patter, everyone can GENTLY try some of these SCM stretches. DID I MENTION GENTLY!!? Don't go yanking your neck around please. Completely relax your jaw and neck during the stretch please.