Upper Back & Neck Therapy

Join me online for a deep exploration of our neck and shoulders. Enjoy a therapy ball massage along your shoulder blade and rotator cuff muscles, decompress and realign the cervical vertebrae of your neck, learn chest opening stretches to improve posture and reduce strain and injury to your neck and shoulders, and learn how to gently release your neck in a way that will help to stretch your muscles and ‘floss’ the important nerves that travel from your neck into your shoulders and arms. Experience the neck and shoulder relief and repair that Therapeutic Yoga offers! I look forward to seeing you in class!

This therapeutic yoga class will take you on a gentle journey to help loosen your shoulders, decompress your upper back, and restore the health and movement your neck desires!

Join us as we discuss the anatomy of the Trapezius muscles and learn how to release them. These muscles are one of the common culprits in causing spasms in the rib space between our shoulder blades and spine, as well as pain in and around our neck and the top of our shoulders. First we will learn what and where the trapezius are, then to feel the activation and function of each region of this rather large muscle, we will learn how to use therapy balls and other rolling tools to massage and release, stretches to lengthen and repair. The result? Freedom of movement, feelings of increased vitality, and a happier, healthier upper back, neck, and shoulders! Please also remember that our traps can often be a source of tension headaches or triggers for pain in other areas. If you experience headaches or pain, please stop and be sure to leave me a comment in the Yoga on Demand Community Hub. We can adjust this routine to make it safe for individual needs, and let's face it, we all have different habits associated to our traps. I'd love to hear more about yours!

In this class we will explore the phenomenon of 'Head-Forward-Posture.' What happens, why, and most importantly, what can we do to realign our posture and repair damaged tissue so that we can restore the health and vitality of our neck and entire spine!

In this class we explore the musculature of the neck, eyes, and jaw. Fascial rolling techniques and gentle stretching will help us release adhesions or restrictions which may be causing pain. Strengthening the muscles which move our eyes will help improve vision, focus, and the speed of our reactions, while releasing stress / trauma and helping the brain heal. This class is for you if: you spend more than 1 hour per day looking at a screen; get tension headaches or migraines; have TMJ or other jaw related conditions; suffer from poor vision or eye strain; experience neck pain or suffer from head-forward-posture, or if you are recovering from a mild-moderate concussion. None of the above! Congratulations! Don't worry, this will still be a good maintenance routine for anyone who has a neck, eyes, or a jaw ;)

Do you get pain and tension between your shoulder blades? Tight shoulders that feel pinchy when you lift your arms up? Do you experience tightness or restriction in your breathing or chest muscles? This class will help with all these things and more! Join me as we decompress and mobilize our thoracic spine by loosening key fascial structures surrounding the ribcage and shoulders, safely introduce new ranges of aligned motion, and nourish our spine to help reduce pain and speed recovery towards movement liberation!

Complete the chain and release the grip of tech neck. Complete your journey through the spine’s deep support network this week! After exploring the lower back’s thoracolumbar fascia and the mid-upper back’s thoracic fascia, our final live online class in this mini series targets the nuchal fascia. Located at the back of the neck, this thick band of connective tissue anchors your neck muscles to your skull and upper spine. Poor posture, "tech neck," and stress cause it to become stiff, thick, and dehydrated, leading to chronic neck pain, tension headaches, restricted movement, dowager humps, and spinal degeneration. In this session, we will use targeted fascial rolling, gentle stretching, and spinal decompression techniques to release trapped tension, restore hydration, and rejuvenate this vital tissue. Join me live online this week to unlock your neck and complete the chain!

In this class we will take a deep dive into our ribcage and learn how key fascial connections between the ‘serratus anterior’ and ‘rhomboid’ muscles, when tight or adhered, can often become a source of pain for both our ribs and neck. Loosening and mobilizing these tissues around our ribs can not only create easier breathing and less shoulder and upper back pain, but it can also increase the range of motion and health of our neck and shoulders. Our neck and head have an incredible amount of compensation that they are subjected to since they are the highest part of our body in the field of gravity. As such, they have to adjust to every misalignment, adhesion, and injury that is below them. Without restructuring the ribcage, it can be almost impossible to get the neck to heal, but when the ribcage improves, the neck will automatically benefit from the space created which, in turn, allows it to recognize new opportunities for better alignment with less compensation. Through decompression, fascial rolling, mobilization, and long-hold stretches, we will learn to give our ribcage what it needs to restore the natural movements which should be available to it, and set the foundation for what our neck needs in order for it to be able to heal and feel better!

This class is dedicated entirely to making our neck happier and healthier! Through an understanding of alignment and function, we will explore WHY the neck hurts in the first place, and will look in some of the most common and least common causes of that pain. Through posture correction, fascial care of the ribcage and upper spine, and correct stretching and decompression techniques we will relieve tension and pain and help liberate your neck and get it feeling great again!

Explore your upper body and seek the answers to the question of your neck pain. Your head is heavy, roughly 10 pounds. It’s balanced at the top of a gravity resisting and highly dynamic movement structure. Any variance or disruption of alignment below forces corrective compensation up the chain, and your neck is often adapting to multiple opposing forces as it works to keep your head up and your eyes level. In this class we will look at the number one cervical misalignment of modern times – Forward Head Posture. Realigning your neck won’t happen over night, but you if you take some simple, relatively easy, and safe steps regularly, the results can be incredible. I invite you to join me on this journey of realization on what it really means to become aligned!

Your lower back pain has an upper back story. Last week, we dove deep into the thoracolumbar fascia and its role in chronic lower back pain. This week, we follow that same fascial chain upward — because the TLF doesn't stop at your lower back. It continues all the way to your skull, meaning that tightness, stiffness, or dysfunction in your upper back and neck can be a hidden driver of lower back pain you may never have thought to connect. Think of your spine as one long, continuous rope of connective tissue — pull on one end, and the tension travels the entire length. In this class, we explore how the fascia of the upper back acts like a fitted stocking wrapped around the deep spinal muscles, anchoring into the bony ridges of your spine and fanning out to attach along your ribs. When we spend our days hunched at a desk, this tissue becomes thick, sticky, and immobile — and when you try to rotate or twist, instead of gliding smoothly the way it was designed to, it grips and tugs, forcing your lower back or neck to pick up the slack. Over time, that compensation quietly becomes your chronic pain. Through targeted yoga movement, we'll restore natural rotation through the upper back, coax those fascial layers back into fluid motion, and take the hidden load off your lower back for good.

This second session of our neck care series we will explore the relationships which exist between the structures of our ribcage and neck, learning to understand how fascial tension from one affects the other. A body with a mobile, stable, and healthy ribcage generally doesn't experience neck pain or misalignment. However, when things in the rib region go out of balance (especially in certain key areas we'll be exploring), the results can create chaos and pain for both the neck and the shoulders! Join me for this upper body exploration as we explore, learn, and uncover some of the hidden causes of your neck pain!

With today's modern world of chair sitting humanity is seeing a shift in the health and alignment of the upper spine which is causing injury and pain for many people. Do you have a job or lifestyle that requires you to spend more than 4 hours a day seated? Do you get neck pain, shoulder pain, or upper back pain? Then this class is for you! Please enjoy it regularly, I promise it will make a difference!

Do you have poor vision? Are you prone to headaches or migraines? Do you get neck or jaw pain, or have an injury or condition in these areas? Do you feel fatigued and unfocused, even after a good night's sleep? Do you feel stressed or overwhelmed regularly? If you experience any of the above, there is a very good chance your eyes and jaw may be contributing to these symptoms more then you may realize! The musculatures which control our eyes and jaw are often overlooked and under-appreciated. However, when they are in balance and healthy, we can dramatically improve both our physical and mental health as we learn to see the world more sharply, stress and strain less, and improve our vitality and the felt sense of ease in our body!

Whiplash is an injury that happens when sudden impact or movement causes your neck to be forcibly bent forward and then backward, or vice versa, like we would see in the action of a whip. The associated forces involved in such an accident can damage the muscles, ligaments, and fascial membranes of the neck and upper back, and can often create injury to the nerves and bones in this region. If left untreated, the incorrect development of scar tissue and compensatory patterns often create long-term pain and misalignment patterns that leave us with frustration and limitation. Luckily, treatment of whiplash related injuries can be done relatively quickly after the onset of the injury (depending on the circumstances anywhere from immediately to a few weeks after injury), AND the damage can be reversed after decades of neglect and pain, or anywhere in between! This gentle class will teach you what you need to know to care for whiplash injuries at all stages, and even if you don't have a whiplash injury, will help to improve your upper back and neck mobility, postural alignment, and fascial health!

Join me for a relaxing class designed to improve the mobility of our shoulders, realign our neck, and reduce pain in the entire upper body. In this class we will learn how our upper back and shoulder alignment affect the health and alignment of our neck. We will explore techniques that help to improve our posture, reduce tightness and adhesions in our shoulders, and reduce any pain or misalignment in our neck. Explore the 'hidden culprits' that often fly under the radar of our awareness and quietly cause referral pain in other areas and learn how to release them through a safe process that will make both your neck and shoulders happier and healthier!

The thyroid gland, a small, butterfly-shaped endocrine gland located just below the adam's apple at the base of your neck, produces hormones that regulate your body's metabolic rate, growth, and development. It plays a role in controlling heart, muscle and digestive function, brain development and bone maintenance, and also plays a large role in our energy, vitality, and libido. When our thyroid gland is struggling we may experience issues in controlling our weight or regulating our internal organs, difficulties sleeping, fatigue, digestive irregularities, cold intolerance, 'brain fog', dry skin, thinning hair, menstrual irregularities for women, low libido, and even depression. Lucky for us, our body is designed in such a way that we are able to access our thyroid glad in a number of ways that affect it's health and ability to repair. In today's class we will learn how to use modern research, yoga, pranayama, and the intelligent design of the body to massage, cleanse, nourish, and move our thyroid and it's associated tissues in a way that helps to improve it's function, as well as it's ability to self-repair and regulate. I invite you to join me on this therapeutic journey and experience the effect of some much needed thyroid love!

Join me as we take a deep exploration of the complex realities which shape the possibilities available to our neck, jaw, and eyes. Learn how to realign, mobilize, and reduce neck pain and headaches, experience the profound sense of peace and relief provide by a relaxed jaw, and explore the seldom talked about role of our eye muscles and movements and their ability to improve spinal communication, heal trauma, improve vision, and reduce symptoms of headaches and concussion. If you struggle from neck or jaw pain or conditions, poor vision, concussion or headaches, stress or anxiety, or if you spend more than 2 hours of your day looking at a screen, this class is for you!

If you have ever felt a stubborn ache in your forearm, an annoying tingle in your fingers, or a sudden weakness in your grip, your body may be signaling that its vital neural pathways are under pressure. Your hands are among your most valuable everyday assets, yet repetitive movements and modern posture frequently cause the tight fascia and muscles of our neck, shoulders, and arms to clamp down on the delicate nerve cords underneath. In this specialized, therapeutic yoga workshop, we will dive deeply into the physical signs of upper-body nerve impingement and actively learn how to release the specific muscular bottlenecks causing your discomfort. Through mindful movement, muscle retraining, and gentle "nerve flossing" techniques, you will learn how to safely break up tissue adhesions, restore smooth nerve mobility, and reestablish healthy, pain-free communication from your neck all the way to your fingertips. Join me live online to reclaim the strength, comfort, and vitality your hands deserve—reserve your spot and give your nervous system the targeted care it needs!