What actually causes headaches?
Years ago, when I was in high school looking to the future as a pre-med undergraduate in college, I pulled a college textbook out of a bargain bin and found a big orange and black book on diseases of the digestive system and proctology, It was one volume of a set and since it was free, I decided to take it home. I never read the book cover-to-cover, but I did open it every now and then and read little snippets of information. One key piece of information that has been useful to me is the fact that digestive problems can cause headaches.When I first met my husband, he had chronic, painful headaches. He also had problems with alternating diarrhea and constipation. Eventually, a doctor diagnosed him with IBS (Irritable Bowel Syndrome), but we never accepted that as a suitable diagnosis since there was no treatment for it. IBS seemed to be the type of disease that doctors diagnose when they don’t know what’s wrong with their patient, but can’t admit that they don't know.
My husband and I went through a period of poverty following 9/11, and as a result, our eating habits changed. Since meat was expensive, we stopped eating so much of it. Instead, we ate a lot of beans and rice (or occasionally rice and beans). One day, we both looked at each other and realized that John’s IBS had all but disappeared.
With some experimentation, we discovered that my husband was sensitive to beef. If he merely ate something that had touched beef, he would experience abdominal cramping and days on end of diarrhea alternating with constipation. Getting rid of the beef changed his life.
We became vegetarians.
We paid more attention to how different foods and ingredients affected us.
Over time, we discovered that trans fats (also known as mono-and-diglycerides as well as fractionated oils and a variety of other names meant to dupe consumers) caused both of us days of grief including stomach issues and headaches. After we discovered the woes that trans fats caused us, we cut them out of our diets too, but occasionally, some would still sneak in by accident. Then, we would have about 5 days of lethargy, headaches, tummy aches, and even a little depression.
Little did I know, there were trans fats in my ibuprofen. I would take Advil (aka ibuprofen) to relieve my headaches. But the brand of ibuprofen that I bought contained the very thing that caused my headaches in the first place. Ironically, when we ate a lot of trans fats, we didn’t really notice the side effects. The less we ate, the more we noticed the headaches and stomach problems. We reasoned that trans fats must be addictive.
Many years of experimentation and paying attention to our diets has shown us that when our digestive system is upset, usually we also have a headache. Although I’ve had sinus headaches before, most of my headaches, I believe, are associated with tummy issues. Because the digestive system traverses the entire body from mouth to rectum, if there’s swelling in the intestines or stomach, it pushes on other organs and nerves that are nearby which can cause “referred pain” in the neck, shoulders, and head.
The idea that a digestive upset could take place in isolation from the rest of the bodily organs and functions is silly, to say the least. If you eat something that causes profound bloating in your intestinal system, all of the organs in your abdomen are affected by proxy. Imagine how a swollen large intestine could push on the large arteries and veins in the abdomen and how this extra pressure in the body could, theoretically, raise one’s blood pressure. The higher blood pressure alone could lead to headaches and other symptoms. But doctors will rarely mention a digestive problem to patients suffering from persistent headaches.
Gluten sensitivity, celiac disease, sensitivity to dairy products, and other food-related sensitivities can all ultimately be at the root of chronic unexplained headaches. Pharmaceuticals can also cause headaches. Even over-the-counter medications can cause digestive turmoil and related head pain. But doctors are trained to think about the human body in terms of discreet and separate systems that don’t interact very much. Implicating the digestive system as the underlying problem behind headaches would be a threat to pharmaceutical companies that make their profits off of drugs that are consumed by mouth.
If you have chronic, unexplained headaches, start a food journal. Look more closely at the ingredients in the foods you eat and how these ingredients impact you. Or, take a few weeks or a month to try making some of these changes, and see how your symptoms change in response to these dietary changes:
- Do you regularly eat animal products, especially things like red meat and dairy products? Go on a strictly fruit and veggie diet (note that this strict vegan diet should not be continued indefinitely, since it can cause vitamin B12 deficiency; only cut out animal proteins temporarily as an experiment to see what exactly you're sensitive to, you'll need to add some back in in some way or another later to keep up your vitamin B12 levels and other essential nutrients, like iron, that are present in meats).
- Are you a vegan or strict vegetarian? Add in some chicken broth, chicken/turkey/poultry, or eggs on a daily basis. Try to get meat and eggs that are free-range, if possible. (And just to be clear... Brewer's yeast, lentils, and vitamin B12 or B-complex supplements are no substitute here, as a human, you need animal proteins in some form, and not having enough of these and the nutrients inside of them can be enough for some people to develop chronic headache and migraine problems)
- Do you eat out a lot? Switch to eating only home-cooked food. When you cook, only use whole foods and spices, and cook EVERYTHING yourself; avoid even condiments, since there are often toxic ingredients hiding in these.
- Do you eat packaged/processed foods? Eliminate these completely. No cheat days. No exceptions.
- Do you eat deep fried foods, even if they're homemade? Try eliminating these completely from your diet, and avoiding heating oils in any way (even in things like stir fries or roasted foods).
- Are you able to eat organic foods? If so, consider switching to an all-organic diet. Organophosphates and other pesticides can sometimes cause gastrointestinal problems, headaches, and other health problems. Prioritizing organic foods may be enough to get rid of headaches in some cases.
- Try eating more apples and grapes. Does this help? Even a little bit? If so, your problems may be gallbladder related.
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