Ah, Headaches! - There Are Almost As Many Kinds Of Headaches As There Are Causes

I once knew a woman who'd never, ever had a headache. I did and do consider that to be grossly unfair. Not that I'd wish headaches or any other kind of pain on anyone, it just seemed unfair to the rest of us.

Headaches come in many forms and no one is totally certain of the mechanics. The basic theory is that blood vessels get all compressed by stress or some other factor and then stretch open suddenly, causing the pain. There may also be many different things that happen inside your skull that lead to pain.

There are almost as many kinds of headaches as there are causes. Worse, because they are inside the head, difficult to position physically and hard to monitor scientifically - you can test the nerves and such around a broken bone or inflamed joint - it is not always possible to be certain which of the many types an individual is experiencing and thus they can be difficult to treat.

Headaches come under rubrics such as throbbing, pounding, front of the head, back of the head, migraine, cluster... The list is quite long. The causes are even more extensive and more personal.

This is part of what makes them problematic. It is a pretty simple generality that if someone trips over the dog and bangs their knee into the railing that it will hurt - how much and for how long depends on the person and the force, but the basic premise is easy. The cause and effect around headaches is not so simple.

Many women get migraines when they are menstruating. Many don't. A lot of people experience headaches as a reaction to eating chocolate. A lot don't. It is fairly clear that a large percentage of headaches are related to some foods. But not all. Factor in such things, as eyestrain from staring at a computer all day, or neck pain radiating upward and the precise cause is hard to pin down.

Most of us don't try. We generally pop a few aspirin or acetaminophen and go on with our day, accepting the low level suffering as part of the cost of doing business. Maybe today it's the pollen and yesterday it was the smog and tomorrow it will be the fluorescent lights. We consider it to be part of living in the world.

Some people have to find a cause because they suffer debilitating pain and/or visual and cognitive impairment from the pain. They tend to work through a long process of trial and error to find what thing or combination of things triggers the pain and then come up with ways to avoid it and continue with their lives.

One of the things many of us don't think about is the part that physical manipulation of the head and neck can play in relieving the pain. Living in the world we do, we tend to turn to stronger and stronger painkillers in hopes of relief. They work, but can often be as crippling as the pain itself.

Many people manage to find relief in exercises of the head and neck. They may loosen tense muscles and increase blood flow or even simply reduce stress, which, sadly, is probably the biggest single cause of headaches.