Headache sufferers can live their lives in frequent misery. While there are many natural cures for headaches that can help in the long run, tools for immediate relief of headaches are a strong need.
Far too many headache sufferers turn to medications to cure their headaches, but in no situation does the medication actually fix what is causing the headache in the first place. Many drugs use to treat headaches merely stop one brain cell from communicating with its neighbor, but do not make the original, problematic brain cell any healthier.
One very common medication used to treat headaches (most often migraine type headaches, although it is not uncommon for a prescription to be written for a tension-type headache as well) is amitriptyline, the most common prescription being Elavil. This class of drugs blocks both the serotonin and norepinephrine uptake in the brain (SNRI). As noted, this pathway has little to do with what actually causes the headaches in the first place, but can stop to progression of the signal from one brain cell to the next.
While there are many natural approaches for headache sufferers to use that can have strong effects on symptom, frequency and duration of the headaches, controlling stress remains one of the most powerful tools.
Acute stress is actually very good for the brain. If you think about it, this makes a lot of sense. If we had a Saber tooth tiger jump out of the underbrush looking to attack us, the last thing we want is for our brain to get all fuzzy and kick off a headache. Instead, acute stress snaps our brain and the way our neurons are firing into attention. Otherwise, as a species, we wouldn't be here on this planet.
Chronic stress, on the other hand, has a very detrimental role in brain function. Much of it is focused around the hormone cortisol and one of the derivatives of cortisol called tetrahydrodeoxycorticosterone (THDOC). In acute situations this compound has a strongly anti-seizure, anti-migraine effect. However, in the long term with chronic stress, the same compound becomes very pro-seizure and pro-migraine. So, stress is a major trigger of both headaches and seizures. This is most likely due to this particular hormone.
So, it all boils back down to needing to manage our stress with a variety of different tools to keep stress levels under control. Ideally, any stress we experience should be the short term brain protective stress rather than the long term chronic brain damaging stress.
There's a lot of ways to calm the brain and keep one neuron from inappropriately firing to its unsuspecting neighbor and creating a migraine or a seizure.
One very powerful method to calm the brain that has been around for several thousand years is meditation. It can be as complex as a meditation course or can be as simple as a relaxation CD that you'd buy used at a bookstore for $5. The choice of methods is up to the individual.
A recent study compared the effectiveness of using amitriptyline vs hypnotic relaxation that was done in the neurologist's office. The results were very encouraging:
1) Over half (58%) chose hypnotic relaxation over the drug approach
2) The patients who used higher levels of analgesics were more likely to choose amitriptyline
3) When given a choice to later switch groups, over 5X the number of patients chose to switch over to hypnosis vs drugs
4) 74% of patients in hypnotic relaxation group had a good response (50% or greater improvement)
5) Only 58% of patients in the amitriptyline group had the same response
6) Long term adherence with hypnotic relaxation was greater than the drug
Meditation has been shown to actually calm the brain. These are based on EEG studies where we see less brain activity during meditation. Realize that there's no other time that the brain truly quiets down. Even in sleep the brain is very active. It's only during meditation that we start to see brain waves and brain activity slow down. So, meditation is wonderful for affecting that in a positive way.
Other ways are biofeedback. There is actually a device called the RESPeRATE that's FDA approved to lower blood pressure and is basically a biofeedback device for breathing. The device is used by putting on headphones and listening to the tones that indicate when to breathe in and when to breathe out. During this time period, you find that your focus is entirely on your breathing. Once that happens, you're not focusing on anything else, which is essentially a form of meditation that allows the brain to quiet down. In our office we've had people who are in the middle of an anxiety attack use the RESPeRATE. In 15 minutes they are a completely relaxed person.
There are other devices similar to the RESPeRATE. One uses visual stimuli where you focus on certain designs with specific music playing in the background, and you find that the focus becomes so intense on what you are hearing and seeing that it gives the brain a chance to rest and not think about everything else that contributes to your stress levels.
We live in a society that stresses us out beyond anything that any society has ever come across before. It's work, it's home - these stressors don't ever seem to go away. Our body deals well with acute stress, but it's the chronic stress that really starts to break down our brain.
These tools and others can help to calm your brain, but you also need to take a good look at your life and what is stressing you and do whatever it takes to start to remove the stresses or learn to not let them go. Quite frankly, whatever you're stressing about today, and probably the next 10 things you're going to stress about tomorrow, really aren't going to matter. They're going to happen whether or not you stress about them. However, we seem to stress more about the things that are most out of our control. Does this not seem ridiculous? If they're out of our control, what's the point of stressing over them? And, there is no doubt that your stress levels are destroying your brain slowly, piece by agonizing piece.
For more info read: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1526-4610.2011.02055.x/abstract
More on the Resperate: http://lifecarechiropractic.com/blog/general-information/product-reviews/resperate-reviews-and-cuts-down-stress-in-15-minutes/
Dr. Bogash has a passion for understanding physiology, the medical research and how the combination of these two can lower the risk of disease or manage current chronic diseases such as diabetes, cancer, hypertension, obesity, osteoporosis or heart disease. Visit http://lifecarechiropractic.com/blog/?p=blogroll to sign up for Dr. Bogash's Rantings, a biweekly email that summarizes the daily blog posts related to improving society's health.
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