In the seasonal change from summer into fall toward winter, I tend to see an increase in neck tension complaints as the fall chill sets into our bodies. People are unconsciously shrugging or holding their shoulders toward their ears as a defence against colder temperatures and fall busyness, not to mention the seasonal colds and flus that begin to affect us.

Neck tension and pain can stem from many roots, the most common ones being postural strain, side effects of illness and stress and joint stiffness in the upper spine. Luckily, most neck complaints are minor in nature, in that they pass with appropriate support and gentle mobility practice. Here are a few of my go-to ideas for supporting and easing neck complaints:

Get on your nerves

One of the best ways to support an easing of neck tension is to work with the nervous system. Many stretches get into the neck muscles, but sometimes an even gentler approach is appreciated in this sensitive part of the body. The soft tissues in the neck serve to move our heads, help in balancing and orientating our bodies and guard important aspects of our neurology. The neck muscles take their job very seriously, and tension here can mean a perceived threat to any of our vital structures in the area. By taking a nervous system-friendly approach, we can relatively quickly ease any postural tension in all areas of the neck, at no risk of irritating anything further.

The nervous system responds very well to easy and slow ranges of motion. Try this simple routine:

• Setup: Sit or lay back with your knees bent and feet resting on the floor. Let gravity take over your shoulders.
• Rotation: As slowly as possible, rotate your head as if to look over one shoulder only as far as you can go with no sensation (we are not looking for a stretch here), then repeat this the other direction.
• Repetition: Move slowly and within the easiest available range of motion back and forth for about 20 passes.
• Side flexion: Repeat this idea with side flexion (tilting one ear toward the same side shoulder, in the easiest range of motion).

Breathe easily and steadily throughout. You’ll likely notice the range of motion available naturally increases given time, with no force necessary.

Catch and release

Next up, you can continue to treat the soft tissues and the nervous system in the area by doing a gentle tense-release practice. Tense-release practices, also known as progressive muscle relaxation, work by intentionally contracting muscle groups, then intentionally relaxing them. For the purposes of easing neck tension, we will work with the shoulders.

• Seated or laying comfortably, with your natural in-breath bring the shoulders up toward the ears as high as you comfortably can; then, with your natural exhale, release the shoulders back toward the ground. Repeat this five to 10 rounds.
• Staying with the shoulders, do another five to 10 rounds of inhaling to draw the shoulders toward the sternum, exhaling to let them sink back to where they began.
• Then, one more set, this time drawing the shoulders back toward the spine with the in-breath, and then releasing them to their start point with the exhales.

Warm regards

The neck tends to respond well to heat, especially with the kind of tension that tends to build up over time or stiffness that feels deep in the joints. Using a flax bag or hot, moist towel, wrap the neck and settle into a steady, rhythmical breath.

• Aim to inhale for three to six seconds (whatever is easy!).
• Exhale for about the same duration.
• After a moment, begin inviting the exhales to lengthen.

You could also do this breath practice in a hot shower or bath, imagining gravity making its way into the bones and tissues in the neck as you exhale.

When to seek support

At the end of the day, neck tension and pain can certainly be intrusive. Seeking out hands-on support from your local practitioners may be a good option. The neck generally responds well to treatments such as massage therapy, acupuncture, osteopathy, craniosacral therapy, athletic therapy, physiotherapy and others. Having neck tension assessed by a professional can provide options for more specific exercises and treatments that help improve your overall quality of life. If neck pain becomes intrusive to sleep or daily function, and is accompanied by headaches that do not change with time and treatment, and radiating pain down the arms, it’s important to seek professional assessment as soon as possible.

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Here are a few at-home ideas to try this winter to hopefully take the edge off some of the aches and pains that can come with the season.

Heat

Warmth, especially warm water, can be very beneficial for joint discomfort. If accessible, warm baths with Epsom salts added can work wonders on stiffness and achiness. If getting in and out of a bath isn’t appealing or possible, foot soaks in warm water with Epsom salts added can be just as beneficial. Warm water increases circulation by dilating our blood vessels. This helps to ease stiffness and aches that can occur in joints due to limited fluid circulation in and out of the area. Epsom Salts contain magnesium, a mineral our body needs to appropriately conduct electrical signals and maintain healthy soft tissue tone, hydration and bone density. The mineral is commonly quite difficult to get enough of in our diet and is absorbed well through the skin from a foot soak or a bath. You might also add essential oils of your choosing or herbs such as ginger, peppermint or rosemary for added aromatherapy and circulation support.

For those who experience joint pain in their hands, warm soaks in Epsom salt water can be a way to ease this discomfort, at least temporarily. For those who have pain in bigger joints such as their hips, back or knees, baths or foot soaks can be a great winter routine. Heating pads such as flax- or seed-filled Magic Bags can be a great way to access the benefits of heat therapy in lieu of water-based methods. Hot water bottles are another way to access this form of heat therapy.

Increasing circulation

Just as we can use external heat to ease discomfort and improve circulation in the colder months, so too can we stimulate our internal environments to increase our inner heat via circulation. It may sound counterintuitive to increase our inner heat (circulation) to manage symptoms that sometimes occur with inflammation, though this is a long-held traditional and proven modern method supporting the underlying reasons why arthritic pain manifests.

Low-impact cardiovascular exercise can be minimally irritating to joints, with all the benefits of circulation and movement through the joint structures and soft tissues commonly affected by arthritis pain. Low-impact exercises can include walking, chair yoga or aerobics, yoga and cycling. There are many online, free resources these days to guide you through yoga or mobility or even gentle aerobics, Zumba (dance) or strength classes to complete at home. All these options have been proven to decrease or even eliminate arthritis-related discomfort. It’s important to try a few things and see what both interests you and supports you.

Ensuring you add warming foods into your diet can be helpful as well. Soups, stews, curries and chilies are staples — and for good reasons. Many traditional health systems believe warm foods are the remedy to issues that include arthritis, joint pain and stiffness. This belief falls right in line with the idea that improving circulation through heat is a tried-and-true remedy, inside and out.

If pain persists and you find yourself unable to modify it through at-home movement or remedies, it’s important you seek the guidance of a qualified professional to investigate and find other ways to support you. Pain is a unique experience we all encounter.

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They’re using cold plasma, which is created by electrical discharge in a low-pressure gas. One of the most common uses is in fluorescent lighting, which creates light with little heat.

Cold plasma is the fourth state of matter, alongside solid, liquid and gas. It’s the most common form of matter in the universe, but it’s mainly found in stars.

“From the gas state, (matter) can be changed to a fourth state, which is called plasma. This plasma consists of electrons, ions, and ultraviolet light,” said Ehsan Feizollahi, a researcher who did his PhD on cold plasma.

In the food industry, it has been investigated as an antimicrobial treatment in fruits, vegetables and some meat products.

At the University of Alberta, researchers have found a way to decontaminate grain damaged by mycotoxins, while also boosting seed germination. They chose two major mycotoxins: deoxynivalenol (DON) and zearalenone, both commonly found in wheat, barley and oats.

Mycotoxins are produced by fungi in humid and warm conditions; DON and zearalenone, for example, are produced by fusarium.

Mycotoxins are also not good for either human or animal health when consumed. In people they can cause diarrhea, nausea, headaches, brain and kidney damage, cancer and even death. Animals experience lower feed intake and other health effects.

Atmospheric cold plasma (ACP) can allow the food and feed processing industries to create more effective, efficient ways to process grains that are safe for consumption, said Feizollahi. The researchers focused mainly on barley.

“One of the methods was by treating normal air and creating plasma, and then treating grains using cold plasma-treated air,” said Feizollahi. That treatment degraded the mycotoxins by 10 to 14 per cent.

Cold plasma can also be mixed with water, so researchers used plasma-treated water to steep grain, a process used in the malting industry.

“We substituted the normal water with plasma-treated water and we used that water to treat barley grains. We noticed that treating barley grains with plasma water boosted the germination and resulted in the degradation of deoxynivalenol,” Feizollahi said.

“By treating these grains, we can prevent financial loss to the industry and prevent health effects to animals and humans that are using these grains.”

An estimated 25 per cent of grains in the world are contaminated by mycotoxins. Removing them would result in less waste and better outcomes for human and animal health.

High-temperature treatment is ineffective against mycotoxins. They can be degraded using chemicals, but those have environmental effects and leave residues.

“Cold plasma is one of the methods that is a green method,” he said. “It doesn’t use any kind of chemicals. It doesn’t leave any kind of residue on the product. Also, we can create cold plasma by just using air and electricity. The electricity can be obtained from renewable resources, so it is a green technology.

“My other colleagues in the lab, they are working on different bacteria, like salmonella and E. coli.”

Fast acting

Feizollahi compared cold plasma to a sanitation material that can eliminate foodborne microorganisms and mycotoxins. One benefit is the short treatment time.

“It depends on the type of mycotoxin that you want to treat, but if you want to use it for steeping, it usually takes one minute to an hour.”

As well, treatment doesn’t reduce grain quality or change beta-glucan, protein levels, water content or physical characteristics.

“The plasma has the side benefit of decontaminating the water used in the steeping process. It can kill all the other microorganisms as well in the water. We don’t need to use any kind of antibacterial in the water if you want to use this water somewhere else. We don’t need to treat it with any kind of chemicals,” he said.

The technology is open to licensing through the University of Alberta and researchers have applied for a patent.

The next step is to try the technique on a larger scale for industrial use. Feizollahi said the researchers hope to try the technology at the pilot plant scale and see whether cold plasma has the same effects. GN

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The weather continues hot and dry, with thick smoke most days from the big fire that just keeps growing north of town. By last Sunday it had grown to more than 70,000 acres and more than 1,000 firefighters were trying to control it, but it is still growing daily.

August 20

Last Saturday we invited grandson Nick to eat dinner with us. We had a great visit (hadn’t had a chance to talk to him since he was here last winter with the fencing crew rebuilding some of our old fences and creating the new loading chute) then played Tripoli — a game he’s loved since we used to play it with him and his sister and parents.

Monday we moved the heifers to the lower back field, and the nine pairs (young cows) from the upper swamp pasture to the ditch pasture below Andrea’s house. The next morning one of the calves had gotten through the hot wire and was out in the hayfield, so Andrea and I got the calf back in. Phil Moulton brought three loads of round bales of second cut for the heifers this winter. We’ll be keeping all of Babe’s daughters to go back into the herd.

Yesterday Andrea helped me put black plastic on the stacks of round bales near Shiloh’s pen. After lunch, she drove Lynn to town to the eye doctor. He’s lost much of the vision in his right eye. The left one has been compensating and he didn’t realize it until he shut the left eye and couldn’t see much with the right eye. The eye doctor checked his eye and said the impaired vision is due to damage caused by high blood sugar, so now Lynn has to be more careful what he eats.

August 30

Last Monday we sent the six older cows, plus Pandemonium (the young cow that’s been in “jail” all summer with her calf) and Bimbo — the yearling bull — to the sale yard near Butte, Montana. We didn’t have to haul them in our trailer; the guy who hauls cattle to that sale from this area had room for ours in his semi, so he sent the guy who works for him with his big trailer to our place to pick up our cattle. The new loading chute worked great!

Then Andrea and I hiked to the lower field to check the heifers. When she’d looked at them the day before, one called Malindy had noisy breathing (but didn’t seem sick) so we wanted to check on her again.

She was the last to come out of the brush when the heifers came to greet us, and she was having trouble drawing air into her lungs. It sounded like snoring — a classic sign of diphtheria. This infection in the back of the throat affects the larynx (voice box) and is caused by the same bacterium that causes foot rot. It gets into mouth and throat tissues if there’s an abrasion. The infection and swelling reduce the diameter of the airway and can sometimes totally shut off the air passage and cause suffocation. The way to tell the difference between diphtheria and pneumonia is that the animal has trouble drawing air into the lung if it’s diphtheria, and trouble pushing air out of the lungs if it’s pneumonia (due to fluid and congestion in lung tissue) and the animals is sicker; pneumonia is a systemic infection whereas diphtheria is more localized in the throat area.

We brought Malindy to the corral to doctor, with a couple of buddies to keep her company. It was an effort for her to breathe, so we brought them very slowly. We got her into the head-catch and administered antibiotics — long-acting oxytetracycline that gives coverage for two-plus days — to combat infection, a small dose of dexamethasone to help reduce swelling and inflammation, and a large dose of DMSO squirted into the back of her mouth.

DMSO is excellent for treating diphtheria because it is a great anti-inflammatory and reduces swelling immediately. We’ve used it many times to treat calves with diphtheria and it works better than anything else to shrink obstructive swelling and allow the calf to breathe. When I checked on Malindy an hour later (after we let her and her buddies into a pen with shade so she could get out of the heat) she was breathing easier, no longer making snoring sounds, and contentedly chewing her cud.

The next morning Rick Doroney came at 6 a.m. to start working on Andrea’s roof. It gets so hot during the day that he prefers to start work almost before daylight, to be able to quit by mid-afternoon when it gets hot and windy.

Even though Andrea’s house is only 10 years old, shingles started blowing off the first year. The guys who built the house didn’t take the backing off the shingles and they didn’t stick down. With every strong wind, more shingles blew off. We kept putting some back on, but it finally got to the point where there was too much bare roof, so we hired Rick to put a metal roof on. Andrea and Jim helped. Andrea was on the roof taking out nails and removing old shingles, and she and Jim lifted the long metal pieces up to Rick so he wouldn’t have to keep going up and down the ladder.

Thursday afternoon Lynn and I went to town and he did the town errands while I went to the dentist. It’s time to try to do something about my broken teeth. I had some chipped teeth a few years ago, then broke more in October 2019 when Dottie tripped while galloping after a wayward cow (taking a herd to the 320 for fall pasture). When she did a somersault and squished my head into the snow and frozen mud, it not only broke the back of one eye socket but also broke more of my teeth.

At that point I was more concerned about my vision than teeth so I put off having them fixed. Then COVID came along and I didn’t go to town at all, and didn’t worry about the teeth. I was getting by, until a few more pieces broke off. Now I can’t chew on either side; I eat soft food or things I can nibble with my front teeth. The nice thing about the meat from China Doll is that it’s so tender I can take small bites of those roasts and mush it around with my tongue enough to break it up and swallow it!

But it’s time to get my teeth fixed. The dentist is going to try to fix them, but my next appointment isn’t until September 27 so I’ll be eating carefully in the meantime.

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