self help
Be Your Own Advocate
Happy Holidays
How to get through‘ the most wonderful time of the year’ without letting migraines and headaches play Scrooge.
By Kelly Rehan
Ahh … the holidays. It’ s time for busy party schedules filled with platters of aged cheeses and smoked meats, festive cocktails and stress. Lots and lots of stress.
Let’ s face it: The holidays are a painful time for most people. For migraine and headache sufferers, they can be an absolute minefield. Trigger foods take center stage, stress levels spike and regular sleep patterns are out the window. Even winter weather fluctuations increase your chances of developing head pain.
But that doesn’ t mean you are resigned to a blue Christmas this year. If you’ re vigilant about your lifestyle habits, there are ways you can help manage your pain.
Here are five healthy habits that should be in every migraine and headache sufferer’ s toolkit.
1. Keep a diary. Migraine and headache triggers vary widely from person to person, so the best way to identify your triggers is to keep a headache diary, says Joshua Cohen, MD, MPH, headache fellowship program director at Roosevelt Hospital’ s Headache Institute and Adolescent Headache Center in New York City.
“ Each time you have a headache, jot down anything you can think of that may have triggered it— changes in sleep, skipping meals or what you ate,” he says.“ Over time, you will discover patterns in your diary that can help you determine what you need to avoid.”
2. Consider shopping online. For shopaholics, the days between Black Friday and New
Year’ s Day are like the Super Bowl and Mardi Gras rolled into one. But shopping malls can be a trigger wonderland for people with migraine and headache, Dr. Cohen says. If you’ re worried a holiday shopping spree might make your condition worse, you can find everything you need( and then some) online.
“ Just walking into the mall to do some holiday shopping can be a challenge,” Dr. Cohen says.“ People are sprayed with perfume( an odor trigger), surrounded by lots of chaos( a sound trigger), exposed to fluorescent lights( a bright light trigger) and they may grab lunch at the food court where foods are often rich in MSG( a food trigger).”
3. Manage stress. Stress is a major trigger for migraine and headache sufferers, and the holiday season can cause anxiety levels to skyrocket.
George Rederich, MD, director of the South Bay Neurology Research Center in Redondo Beach, Calif., advises patients who struggle with holiday headaches to start thinking about pain prevention early— ideally months before the holidays. Headache sufferers need this extra time to learn and“ master” the necessary preventive care techniques before the stress-filled holidays hit. To help patients understand the precautions they should take, he recommends a book called The Relaxation and Stress Reduction Workbook by Martha Davis, et al. This guide helps people manage stress with a variety of skills based on their unique symptoms.
Additionally, he tells patients to use an even simpler stress-reduction strategy: Just say no.
“ You can be pressured into participating in things you don’ t want to do,” Dr. Rederich says.“ If that is happen-
16 HEAD WISE | Volume 1, Issue 3 • 2011