Don’t Let a Migraine Stop You In Your Tracks Try These Natural Remedies

Do you often suffer from splitting headaches so bad that they affect your work and personal life? Have you been popping painkillers and trying to just fight through them? It can be a miserable experience, especially when you feel like you’re putting your life on hold to deal with a migraine. However, migraines are often tied to your overall health and there are diet practices and natural remedies that can often go a long way towards solving your migraines, along with a doctor’s prescription. In some cases, changing your diet, lifestyle, and exercise practices may do the trick completely, and you won’t even need a prescription to get rid of your migraines. You don’t deserve to live in pain — find ways to help alleviate your symptoms and perhaps cure your migraines once and for all, in the way that best suits you.
What Are Migraines Exactly and What Can Cause Them?
Migraines and a bad headache are different things. A migraine is usually identified because it’s a throbbing headache that comes back again and again. It generally only targets one side of the head and can often be so severe that it causes nausea or disrupted vision in the patient.
It’s not totally clear what precisely causes these awful splitting headaches, but scientists and doctors mostly frequently attribute them to genetic factors and stress from the environment. Women, for example, are more likely to have migraines than men, and if you have a family history, you’re more prone to having them yourself.
Big hormonal changes like pregnancy or menopause, hormonal medications, or any changes in estrogen can trigger migraines, as can certain foods and food additives that are heavily processed or excessively salty. Stress, alcohol, strong lights and smells, changes in sleeping patterns, and even changes in your environment can all contribute to a migraine’s onset.
What Else Should I Know About Migraines?
At least half of those who suffer from migraines don’t get a formal diagnosis and are undertreated and under 50% don’t speak with a physician. Also concerning is the fact that people who are prone to migraines or severe headaches are three times more likely to suffer from depression than those who do not suffer from migraines or bad headaches.
Almost 55% of those who have migraines get one or more attacks every month and almost 15% have one or more attacks per week. It’s important to talk to your doctor about your migraines — they can help you manage the pain and you can also perhaps, find alternative methods for dealing with your migraines yourself — cutting out salty or processed food, finding ways to deal with stress, and lowering your alcohol consumption, for example.
How Can I Treat Them?
There are certainly medications that your doctor can prescribe to help alleviate your bad headaches, which includes both pain-relief medicine stronger than what you could get over the counter, and preventive medicine, which hopefully will reduce the strength and frequency of your migraines.
However, if you’re interested in more holistic methods, eating healthy and exercising more can often help eliminate or reduce the severity of your migraine. Monosodium glutamate, aspartame, heavily processed foods, and very salty foods can often be triggers for migraines. Cut back on how much alcohol you consume and try to live “cleaner.” This can often solve many other problems as well and you may feel fitter, more energetic, and happier overall!
Getting the proper amount of sleep, finding stress management techniques, and doing muscle relaxation exercises (such as yoga) may also help, since stress and environmental factors can often trigger migraines.
If you’re female, you may also want to consider reducing your intake of estrogen — for example, if you’ve started getting migraines since taking birth control, you might want to look into switching your birth control to a lower estrogen one can help.
If you have migraines, don’t suffer in silence. Say something! Start looking up ways you can practice self-care at home and see if those natural remedies help. If nothing is working, absolutely consult with your doctor and take medication to help manage your migraines.