Is Bad Posture Causing Your Headaches?

“Sit up straight!” is a phrase you often heard from your parents, grandparents or Old Aunt Lucy as you were slouching away in the old classic dinner booth, chicken table or resting upon the sofa, but this phrases was often said for good reason. If you do not know already, your parents were trying to prevent you from having future health issues. Slouching is one of the main causes of not only neck, back and shoulder pains, but also those gnarly headaches too. In fact, the good old slouching position you so love sitting in has this fancy medical term known as, “Upper Crossed Syndrome,” which merely means, “Bad Headache.”

So why does bad posture cause headaches? 

Bad posture causes headaches because tension forms along the spine from not sitting up straight. It also causes pressure on the nerves, which leads to neck and shoulder, discomforts. When there is tension on the neck and shoulders there is usually pressure along the crown of the head due to poor circulation around the nerves. Poor circulation around the crown of the head leads to headaches. Some of the worst types of headaches you can get from sitting in a slouching potion for an entire day every day or even just a short period are:

1. Migraines: This type of headache causes blurry vision, nausea and severe pain all over the head.
2. Tension Headaches: This headache causes aches at the crown of your head into your neck and shoulders. 
3. Cluster Headaches: These headaches go away and come back often causing at least two to five headaches each day. 
4. Rebound Headaches: This form occurs daily from sitting in poor posture and taking medication to ease the pain you are feeling in your neck, shoulders and back instead of simply correcting your posture. 

What are the best ways to correct bad posture? 

In order to remedy the headaches you have been receiving from sitting in bad postures you must correct the bad posture by:

• Sitting on a ball at the office desk instead of a computer chair
• Laying straight on the floor for 20-minutes each day
• Exercising and training your muscles through body building workouts or yoga postures so your spine can align properly and hold you up the way it was design to while you are in a sitting position
• Visit your chiropractic for an alignment so you can sit up properly 
• Practice sitting and standing straight up in front of a mirror often
• Practice walking with good posture 
• Sleep on a firmer mattress or floor for a couple of nights until your spine aligns 
• Sit at an office desk and chair that forces you to sit up straight