Hi everyone, I wanted to share a bit of my work on migraines….so have a read or if you don’t have a few minutes to spare right now maybe book mark this and come back to it later.
I was seeing a 29 year, young professional lawyer from the City as she was suffering from horrendous migraines. Migraines that debilitated her so much that she would have to either stay home or use the small dark room that the firm had set up for her at the office. The migraines came on at certain times of her hormonal cycle.
She was on two medications for her migraines but the intensity of the migraines was getting worse and each time she experienced a migraine she was now taking longer to recover
What are migraines?
Migraines are basically painful headaches, that are generally accompanied by nausea, vomiting and oversensitivity to light and noise, dizziness, weakness and sometimes numbness.
Causes of migraines
There are a plethora of causes…
Trigger foods; these include the most common tyramine containing foods such as cheese, red wine, chocolate, fermented foods, over ripe and dried fruits
Hormonal, some women can experience these painful headaches during ovulation, others just before menstruation, others during menstruation and unfortunately for some all the way from ovulation till after menstruation
Reactions to medications including the birth control pill
Poor nutritional lifestyle, including lack of good quality water, lack of minerals and vitamins such as magnesium, zinc, vitamin C , calcium and B vitamins
Physical injuries, such as a car accident, or specific head injury
Post meningitis
The conventional treatment of migraines
One treatment is to abort ‘the migraine attack’ and this generally involves the use of medications called triptans such as sumatriptan and zolmitriptan. Sometimes anti-nausea medications are prescribed as well as non-steroidal anti-inflammatories like the standard Ibuprofen or Tylenol.
The second is to actually prevent migraines if you are experiencing more than say 3 a month. These medications vary considerably from tricylic anti-depressants through to anti seizure medications.
Unfortunately, all these come with some severe side effects when used long term.
In Nicola’s case she had been suffering from migraines since the onset of puberty. A clear indication her hormones were in disarray. She was put on the birth control pill (BCP) in her teens to prevent the migraines. The BCP which helped initially, no longer helped when she was at University. By now she had tried a few different BCPs. The migraines were now worse than the original pubescent ones.
Nicola’s migraine treatment
Initially we removed all trigger foods to reduce the ‘burden’ on her body. Although Nicola’s migraines were due to a hormonal imbalance just reducing the inflammation by removing some of the tyramine rich foods actually reduced the severity of her migraines HOWEVER the frequency did not change.
Having worked with Nicola over a period of 10 months with monthly sessions she is now totally migraine free and medication free. Naturopathically, we used a combination of approaches which included; some, nutritional changes, liver cleanses, a birth control pill detox and homeopathy. In her last session, just earlier this month, Nicola’s request was to maintain ‘a prevention programme and remain migraine free through personalizing her nutrition programme’ . So in order to fine tune her nutrient requirements we have sent off for a hair tissue mineral analysis.
Individuality
Each migraine is unique to each individual. It is of utmost importance to me as a practitioner to ‘treat’ the individual with the migraine not the migraine that has the individual. Nicola’s case was hormone related but of late I have seen two adult cases of migraines triggered post meningitis that have now all cleared.
To book an appointment or a free 15 minute Skype contact me at info@khushmark.com
To health!
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