The Headache Healer’s Handbook. Jan Mundo

thinking about a good outcome results in improvement, then can’t we just think it without undergoing the treatment? Consider the true story of champion platform diver Laura Wilkinson.

      Wilkinson had been a ten-time U.S. National Champion in women’s ten-meter platform diving. Unfortunately, she suffered a serious injury during training six months before qualification rounds, downgrading her chances to make it to the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney, Australia. She broke three bones in her foot and was unable to dive for two months during her recovery. A layoff this long can spell the end for athletes, who need to keep their muscles and form in top condition. Laura’s sport required her to use her feet to push off from a three-story-high platform and flawlessly complete a dive. And it was her feet that were injured. Her chances didn’t look good.

      Cleverly, instead of physically practicing her dives during her recovery, Laura did the next best thing: she used mental imagery to practice her dives. In other words, she ran through them in her mind’s eye and felt the action of diving in her body. Remarkably, she recovered in time to qualify for the Olympic team.

      Maybe you watched the 2000 Olympics on television and remember watching her dive. China’s team had won the event at seven of the last eight Olympics and was heavily favored to win the gold medal. No pressure there! But Laura Wilkinson won — the first American in thirty-six years to do so.

      Laura’s mental training helped her accomplish what she could not do physically when injured, and it propelled her to victory. Like a champion, you too can use your mental focus and the power of thought and belief to help your body relax and relieve your pain.

      In Greek mythology, the warrior goddess Athena was most known for her wisdom and practical sense. Born wielding a sword, straight out of her father Zeus’s headache, she had an independent spirit, was a fair and compassionate mediator, and tried to prevent war whenever possible. When necessary she fought bravely, assuming disguises and devising the Trojan Horse in opposition to a provocation to war. Athena never lost a battle.

      I encourage you to be a warrior like Athena — a headache warrior — and pursue and attack your headaches, determined to win each battle and the larger war. If you lose your way, get right back on track and conquer your headaches with passion, creativity, and cunning. Be willing to do whatever it takes to be a warrior for your own health, and along the way, combat the inner and outer forces that seek to deter you from claiming your power to heal your headaches. It is the hero’s journey.

       Part Two

       Handling Headache Triggers

       5 The Chinese Menu Theory

      When I was forty-two years old, my migraines worsened, becoming so regular that I could predict my periods with them: each month I got a severe migraine the day before my period started. When I began learning stress reduction practices, that pattern changed, and most months my period would arrive without being announced by a disabling migraine.

      I started comparing my heavy migraine months with those that were migraine-free and found that when I ate and slept better, drank more water, and was less stressed during the previous month, I would not get the migraine. The opposite was true when my previous month’s activities were not as healthy. Perhaps you have noticed a similar pattern in how several things seem to add up to create your pain.

      This led me to concoct the Chinese Menu Theory. The name goes back to my childhood in Los Angeles. On some Sunday nights, my family would go out to dinner at our favorite Chinese restaurant. We would order our food “family style,” meaning each person would choose a dish from column A, a dish from column B, one from column C, and so on. All the delicious dishes of food would be brought out and placed on a lazy Susan in the middle of the table, and we would all partake of each dish to make up our meal.

      In that same way, combinations of factors often add up to headaches, whereas one alone might not. Imagine that instead of ordering a family-style dinner, you are ordering your migraine from a menu of triggers. You could choose a potential trigger from column A — skipping meals, for example — which by itself may or may not produce your migraine. You could choose one from column B — for instance, lack of sleep — and again, you might get a migraine, maybe not. Choose another from column C — perhaps shoulder tension — and you may or may not get a migraine. From column D, we’ll choose stress; perhaps you will get that migraine, perhaps you won’t. But . . . if you combine items from columns A and B; B and C; A and D; A, B, C, and D, and so on . . . together they would add up to create your personal migraine stew.

       Sample Migraine Triggers Menu

      My most reliable trigger combo used to be hours of chewing gum while clothes shopping, plus no water or lunch. (Who needs food?) My energy was powered by dopamine, the feel-good hormone that shopping produced in my brain. It was fun while it lasted, but my jaw was working overtime, combined with everything else, and the next day’s migraine would make me regret it.

       Everything Counts

      This program works because we consider everything that might trigger a headache — and in all domains.

      If you have tried a number of individual self-care strategies with limited success, including a variety of natural methods, it could be that you’re not looking at everything. For example, you might have quit caffeine or eliminated entire categories of foods, such as wheat or dairy products. Then your headaches continued, so you ruled those items out as triggers and put them back into your diet. After all, eliminating them seemingly had no effect. Or perhaps you tried massage or meditation to reduce your stress but concluded they weren’t helpful because your headaches persisted.

      That’s where the Chinese Menu Theory comes in: it addresses your whole self. You are not just what you eat or drink or your exercise routine or your stress. You are all of it combined. By taking everything in your life together as a whole — diet, lifestyle, posture, thinking, mood, stressors, and so on — you can gain new insights into how your triggers add up to your headaches.

       Common Headache Triggers

      The following list of headache triggers is adapted and expanded from one first published in Migraine: The Complete Guide by the American Council on Headache Education (Dell, 1994).¹ It’s usefully arranged by category — dietary, environmental, lifestyle, physical, medication, and hormonal — so you can mine each area for clues and look at your life as a whole. You might notice this list is similar to but more extensive than the one you completed in the personal profile in chapter 3.

      Lists of headache triggers are subjective. You are a unique individual, a delicate balance of chemistry with a history and an emotional life. What affects you might not affect me and vice versa. With some triggers, quantity also counts: a small amount of chocolate, wine, or exercise might not trigger your migraine, but a larger serving or a longer workout just might.

      Perhaps you will recognize some of your triggers and rule out others from the list. Perhaps you aren’t certain, or have no idea. For now, simply read it and see if anything rings a bell.

       Headache Triggers

       Dietary

      additives, preservatives

      aged cheese

      alcoholic beverages

      artificial sweetener

      avocado

      banana

      beans

      beer

      caffeine