Stop Letting Headaches Control Your Life: A Guide to Finding Relief

If you suffer from daily or near-daily headaches, you may feel as though they’ve taken over your life. Whether you’re taking medicine to tame them or taking steps to avoid them, it seems that every decision you make has your headaches as a factor.

Chronic headaches occur at least 15 days per month and last for more than four hours if you don’t treat them. Types of chronic headaches include: 

• Migraines: one-sided, pulsing pain often accompanied by other symptoms, such as visual auras
• Chronic tension-type headache: two-sided pain that feels like squeezing or pressure
• New daily persistent headache: arise suddenly without prior history and quickly become constant
• Hemicrania continua: one-sided, spiky pain with ocular symptoms, including teary eye

Using over-the-counter painkillers to treat chronic headaches may eventually backfire. Your body adjusts to the medications and they no longer work. 

At Advanced Medical Care, our experienced and innovative neurologists get to the root of your headache pain so you can live your life without the constant fear of an attack. At our offices in Queens and Brooklyn, New York, we conduct a series of tests, including nerve tests, so we can design a customized treatment plan.

Do headaches control your life? Here’s how to get your hands back on the reins.

Do stay hydrated

Before reaching for a painkiller, reach for the glass of water you’d use to swallow the painkiller. Dehydration causes headaches. Don’t wait until you’re thirsty to drink; thirst means you’re already slightly dehydrated.

If you have chronic headaches, you may be extra susceptible to dehydration headaches. Be sure you drink plenty of healthy fluids each day, as well as the electrolytes and minerals, including magnesium, that help your body incorporate those fluids.

Do exercise

When you’re in pain, you may think about skipping the gym. But exercise can help prevent headaches and also reduce their severity. 

Exercise releases endorphins in your body, hormones that flood you with a sense of well-being. Exercising also brings more oxygen to your brain and other tissues and helps alleviate the stress that might contribute to your migraine.

Don’t consume junk

It’s not just the influencers anymore: Even the US government warns Americans away from highly processed foods that are filled with empty calories and chemicals. Ditch the boxes and cans and pick up foods in their natural forms:

• Fruits
• Vegetables
• High-quality protein
• Good fats such as organic, extra-virgin olive oil and avocados

Stay away from sugar, alcohol, cigarettes, and recreational drugs. While you’re building good habits, ditch the junk habits, too: Limit your screen time and go outdoors more often.

Do prioritize sleep

While a few outliers are genetically wired to thrive on just 4-6 hours’ sleep, you can’t train yourself to become one of them. Give your brain and body needed time to relax, restore, and rejuvenate. 

That means you should aim to get 7-9 hours of sleep at the same time every night. Also do what you can to improve your overall sleep hygiene. 

De-stress as needed

You don’t need to develop an involved meditation practice or head out to a silent retreat to de-stress your body and mind — although, if you can do so, go for it! Even simple breathing techniques can help reset your body and unleash tension.

Try a version of breathing technique called the cyclic, or physiologic, sigh. Research demonstrates it can relieve tension and stress after just a few rounds: 

• Inhale through your nose, filling your abdomen and then your lungs
• With full lungs, take another brief inhale through your nose
• Gradually empty your lungs, breathing out through your mouth

Just a few minutes of cycling through this breathing pattern can give you similar results to 30 minutes or more of meditation.

Get the right medications

Relying on standard painkillers can cause a rebound headache. This headache is also called a medication overuse headache, which gives you a good sense of why they occur. Up to as many as 2.6% women and men around the world suffer from rebound headaches, and they can even occur with prescription medication.

Our neurologists take a variety of approaches to help your body recover from and prevent headaches. This may include novel therapies, such as intravenous (IV) hydration and minerals, lifestyle changes, and tailored medications.

Don’t let headaches rule your life. Get personalized care from our experienced team by contacting Advanced Medical Care today.