What We Treat

Headaches Treatment in Lakewood.

The one that starts at the base of your skull and takes the rest of the day with it. The blinds you close at two in the afternoon. Most headaches like that begin in the neck and shoulders, and a cause-first evaluation is how you find out if yours does.

Tension headaches Cervicogenic headaches Migraines and neck tension Talk to a Specialist

Sound Familiar?

Does this sound like you?

  • Reaching for something to take before you’re properly awake
  • Pain that starts at the base of your skull and climbs up behind your eyes
  • A tight band across your forehead by three in the afternoon
  • Turning the car radio down because the noise is making it worse
  • Closing the blinds in your own living room in the middle of the day
  • Calling off the grandkids because today turned into one of the bad ones

Two or more? You’re the one who keeps everyone else’s day running, which is exactly why this became something to get through instead of something to fix. Keep reading.

Why It Happens

The headache is the alarm. Not the fire.

Your head hurts. But very often the trouble sits lower down. Muscles at the back of your neck and across your shoulders stay switched on all day. They get tight, then tender, then they refer pain straight up into your head. Joints in the neck stiffen and stop doing their share of the movement. A screen, a phone or a pillow keeps the same tissue loaded for hours. Stress pulls the whole thing tight again overnight.

None of that shows up when someone asks you where it hurts. Sorting out which of those is driving yours takes a cause-first evaluation: how your neck moves, where it’s stiff, which muscles are doing too much, and what your day is doing to them. It’s also why medication helps for a few hours and then stops. It quiets the alarm. It doesn’t touch what set it off.

Physical therapist checking neck and shoulder muscle tension during a headache evaluation

The Honest Truth

A headache you plan around is still running your day.

If you keep waiting

  • The good days keep getting scheduled around the bad ones
  • Something to take stays the whole plan, instead of the backup
  • The neck and shoulder tension feeding them never actually gets looked at

If you start this week

  • You find out whether your neck is driving them, by the end of visit one
  • Hands-on work on the tight tissue starts before you leave the building
  • You get a plan with an endpoint, and you know your own triggers by the end of it

Nobody regrets starting too early. Plenty of people wish they hadn’t waited.

How We Fix It

Four phases. Fewer headaches.

Every plan has an endpoint, and it’s drug-free. Here’s what the four phases look like when your headaches start in your neck, one-on-one with a licensed physical therapist, every visit.

First visits

Pain

Take the pressure off.

Hands-on work on the tight neck and shoulder tissue, starting your very first visit, so the next headache has less to build on.

Early in your plan

Prime

Give your neck its motion back.

Targeted mobility work restores movement in the cervical joints that stiffened up while you were bracing against the pain.

Middle of your plan

Perform

Build a neck that lasts all day.

Progressive neck and shoulder strengthening, so your head is still well supported at hour eight and not just hour one.

The endpoint

Prevent

Know what sets yours off.

Your desk, your posture, your pillow and your stress load all get worked through, so you leave knowing your triggers and what to do about them. That’s the endpoint, not another appointment.

Related Conditions

Pain rarely stays in one place.

Headaches rarely travel alone. Here’s what else we treat.

1

Neck Pain

Turning your whole body to check the blind spot, because your neck will not.

Learn More 2

Chronic Pain

Pain that outlasted the injury and started running your calendar.

Learn More 3

Dizziness & Vertigo

The room tilting when you roll over in bed.

Learn More

Questions, Answered

What people ask before booking for headaches.

That’s the first thing people ask, and it’s a fair question. The hands-on work is gentle, and it stops the moment you say stop. Your therapist works the neck and shoulder tissue at a level you can handle that day, then adjusts based on how you respond. Nothing gets pushed through a headache. If a technique isn’t sitting right, we change it that visit, not next month.

No. In California you can start on your own. Direct Access lets you attend physical therapy for up to 45 days or 12 visits, whichever comes first, before a physician sign-off is needed. So you don’t have to wait on somebody else’s calendar to get started. Therapy also works alongside what you’re already doing, including medication and chiropractic care.

You’ll know where you stand at the end of visit one, not six weeks in. As a general guideline, 2–3 visits a week for 4–6 weeks is what gets the most out of care, and that’s a guideline, not a promise. Sessions run 30–60 minutes. We accept 14 insurance plans and check your benefits before you start, so the money conversation happens up front. Either way, you get a plan with an endpoint, not an open tab of appointments.

Book Your Visit

Ready when you are.

Request a time and a real person calls you back during business hours. No phone tree. No ‘someone will reach out.’ Just a plan.

  • Hours Monday–Friday, 9:00 AM–5:00 PM
  • (562) 512-3320 Prefer to talk now? Call us.
  • No doctor’s referral needed to start

We call back during business hours, Monday to Friday

Step 1 of 5

So we know who to look for when you walk in.

Visit Us

Care this good, this close.

The PT People

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