The most common health care complaint in America is headaches. There are many different types of headaches:
- Sinus headaches
- Cluster headaches
- Tension headaches
- Migraines
What are these headaches caused from and how can you avoid them?
How To Figure Out What Kind Of Headache You Are Suffering From
Sinus Headaches
You normally feel sinus headaches right in the cheeks or in the forehead. They commonly occur when you have allergies, a cold or some type of an infection. It feels like you have pressure right there in the face.
Cluster Headaches
Typically you’ll feel cluster headaches right behind one eye. You will feel a real heavy pressure behind one eye. It can be very, very painful, and sometimes debilitating.
Tension Headaches
Tension headaches feel more like a band around the head. You can also feel tension headaches on the back of the head, base of the skull, and different areas right in the temples.
Migraines
Migraines, many times, can be presented with some type of an aura where you have visual disturbances, nausea, you have issues with hearing and typically, it’s just one side of the face or a big part of the head. Or you may have a migraine with no aura and just specific, debilitating pain on one side of the face or the other.
Causes of Headaches
All of these types of headaches are pretty common, unfortunately, and I want to talk about some causes and then we’ll talk about some solutions as well.
Typically, the most common headaches, things like tension headaches and migraines, are caused by damage to the spine. This damage comes from poor posture because most people are sitting all day long, they’re using their devices, cell phones, computers, and TV. This poor posture puts constant Thoracic tension on the neck, on the nerves controlling oxygen and blood flow to the brain, and causes quite a few issues.
[Demonstrates on spine model] I’m going to show you what I’m talking about. Normally, when you look at the spine from the side, you’re supposed to have a nice curve here in the neck. When your posture’s hunched over, because you’re sitting all day long, or because you’re constantly using devices, what’s going to happen is, you’re going to lose the curve in your neck. Your skull’s going to shift back like this and it’s going to put significant pressure on your brain stem.
Your brain stem controls the oxygen and blood flow to your brain and this is also the major functional system of your autonomic nervous system. That means it’s going to control every major system in your body, which is why when you get a migraine, you’re also going to have visual issues, balance issues, issues with your eyes, ears, nose, and throat because those are the very same nerves.
These are also the nerves going into all of your sinuses so when you’re getting a sinus headache, it’s not going to be draining and clearing like it should.
When it comes to tension, when you’re hunched over, all the muscles in your neck and your upper back and the base of your skull are going to pull really tight and that’s what’s going to cause a tension headache because those muscles are fatigued or there’s constant stress on the body.
Cluster headaches are also associated with reduced hormones and reduction of oxygen and blood flow to the brain because when the neck’s not moving and it’s stuck in a poor position (a condition called subluxation), it’s directly blocking hormone production and blood and oxygen flow.
Home Solutions For Headaches
Here are some things that you can do at home when you’re having a sinus headache:
- Diffuse peppermint essentials oils
- Use a netty pot to help clear your sinuses out.
Cluster headaches are typically associated and triggered by stress, lack of sleep, and a lot of chemical toxicity in the body.
- Get more sleep
- Find ways to reduce stress
- Remove chemical toxins from your home, food, and environment.
Tension headaches and migraines are very much associated with posture and the spine and the nervous system.
- You want to make sure you’re doing good ergonomics at your workstation.
- You want to make sure you’re having your spine and your nervous system checked by a corrective care chiropractor.
- Make sure you’re doing regular movement throughout the day; that you’re not in a very sedentary lifestyle. I help people with
I help people with these kinds of issues in my office, all the time. In fact, we get great success.
Over 90%, with tension headaches and migraines. Even the people that have suffered from headaches for years, sometimes 10, 20, 30, 40 years, are now getting solutions because we’re actually fixing the source of the problem.
You don’t want to keep taking Advil, Tylenol, Ibuprofen or other pain related-type medications, because those all have dangerous side effects and they’re not addressing the real cause of the problem.
If you want to learn more about how we’re helping with conditions like headaches and other health related issues, naturally without medications, you want to join us for our next community dinner. You can go to our website dinnerwithdrtimsmith.com to know when our next dinner’s coming up, and you can register free on there as one of my guests.
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