Trial and error and many, many flareups and painful days. I wish I had a more encouraging answer than that but that's how I've been doing it just a whole lot of experimenting. A lot of the stretches I've been doing lately is stuff I've made up myself.

I just turned 49 last week and I've had TOS since I was 17 or 18 so it's been awhile now. I had surgery 20 years ago(scalenectomy) and that just made me worse. Last year I was lying in bed watching TV and I realized I just had to do something to try and improve myself. I was going stir crazy and needed a reason to get up in the morning. I pulled out the Sharon butler book that I had, read it cover to cover and it made lot of sense to me. I've stretched every single day since then but it's been no picnic. The first several months the pain was horrible and it took me eight months before I could straighten my right arm all the way out. Everything was that tight. I've learned to pace myself, on the good days I stretch more aggressively, and on the painful days I just do a lot of movement exercises. Circles with neck, shoulders, arms etc. just to keep the muscles moving and the blood circulating.

To be fair, I don't work so my muscles get plenty of rest after stretching. I don't think I could have kept this up if I was trying to work.