The Underlying Cause of Migraine: Migraine Brain
If you suffer from migraine, I'd like to let you in on a big secret. I truly believe that migraine is not an incurable disease, but a preventable condition. I am living proof.
I believe that migraine has a known cause and a known method to prevent it. The problem of course is that Western medicine, and their pharmaceutical-oriented training is often looking for the cause or source of pain or illness, and then treat the symptoms.
We all know it would be much better if they were focusing on the actual cause of the migraine, and then preventing the conditions behind that cause to occur in the first place. So I want to share with you the foundation of my Migraine Prevention Lifestyle:
It's the work of Dr. Angela A. Stanton, PhD, and her book is called Fighting the Migraine Epidemic, How to Treat and Prevent Migraines Without Medications, Complete Guide. Dr. Angela Stanton is a scientist, researcher and a migraineur, and has created this incredible body of work. I highly recommend that all migraineurs read this book to better understand their own migraine brain anatomy and the specific needs it has to remain migraine-free.
I am in NO WAY affiliated with Dr. Stanton and I am not compensated for promoting her book. I don’t agree with 100% of her theories and conclusions as I personally wasn’t able to prevent migraines permanently using only the methods presented. It focuses on biochemical balance achieved through nutrition and nutrition only, whereas I recommend further lifestyle changes. But I truly see Fighting the Migraine Epidemic as the cornerstone of migraine prevention, upon which we can build a very successful Migraine Prevention Lifestyle. We owe her a huge THANK YOU for her work!
Her theories are the best I've seen in the world of migraine prevention, but her work has been dismissed and diminished, because it's not pharmaceutical in nature. Let's be honest, no pharmaceutical company is going to sponsor a study that prevents migraines, because if they did, they wouldn't be able to sell any medication. Therefore they wouldn't be able to make any money if a natural solution was found.
So this information is not generally presented to medical doctors, to headache specialists, to neurologists, or to migraine specialists. This is something that we have to learn about on our own, because the current medical paradigm doesn't take natural healing seriously, no matter how much success has been had.
Just to be clear, the research, theories, and real-life experience I refer to is regarding primary migraine, not secondary migraine. Primary migraine sufferers are those who have migraine as their primary condition, not migraine secondary to an injury or another condition like traumatic brain injury or a tumor. The theories presented may very well apply to secondary migraine, but I don’t have the personal or practical experience of that scenario to share with you.
Dr. Stanton shows through her work that there are 3 coinciding conditions experienced by all migraineurs.
These conditions are summarized in my own words:
1. Your brain is special and sensitive to sensory inputs (aka migraine brain).
2. The stress from the sensory inputs causes stress hormones to be released, which is detrimental to the biochemistry of the brain. (biochemical imbalance)
3. The anatomy and function of the brain’s response to sensory stimuli leads to the quick uptake of minerals and subsequently the brain is left out of homeostasis and unable to meet the brain’s energy needs, so a migraine ensues. (cortical spreading depression) (1).
I will be discussing these three conditions over a series of articles, but we will start with the first: migraine brain.
The Migraine Brain
The term ‘migraine brain” may have been first coined by Carolyn Bernstein, MD in her book The Migraine Brain: Your Guide to Fewer Headaches, Better Health. There’s a lot of overlap between her book and Dr. Stanton’s, and I would reccommend them both. I do, however, have a problem with continuing to call migraine a “disease” and with the prescription of ineffective, brain-damaging drugs for treatment and prevention, so I prefer Dr. Stanton’s angle.
The migraine brain is unlike “normie” brains. It is anatomically different from non-migraine brains: It has greater energy needs across all functions. This means more energy expended for sleeping, dreaming, exercising, and let’s face it - just being awake in the modern world. (2)
Migraine is not a disease, because we can prevent the attacks from happening by sustaining the necessary biochemical balance in our body. With 15% of the adult population suffering from migraines, isn’t it more likely that we all share the same condition in our body, rather than an “incurable headache disease”?
When they say “incurable” it usually means “incurable through traditional medical and pharmaceutical approaches.” If it’s truly incurable how is it that so many people have learned how to prevent migraines from ever happening? How is it that menopause seems to “cure” it?
Migraine brains are very sensitive to the biochemical balance of the body. If you are dehydrated (lacking enough water and minerals to conduct electricity in your body’s essential systems), the brain will have a massive energy crisis resulting in a migraine.
This sensitivity to imbalance is likely genetic. Migraineurs need 50-100% MORE dietary sodium than a “normie” because we tend to excrete more sodium through urine than they do. That means that we need to consume more electrolytes in a variety of ways (supplements, food, mineral water) and reduce the activities or habits that promote the electrolyte imbalance (3).
“Cellular imbalance is always the cause of every pain, while the pain is the symptom we feel. Cellular imbalance in most cases refers to a state in which some crucial mineral or energy sources are not available to the cell for its optimal functioning” (4).
The crucial minerals that are missing here are electrolytes, and it leads to an ionic imbalance of sodium, potassium, potassium, chloride, magnesium, calcium and water. So migraine is a symptom of the brain’s environment. I totally agree with Dr. Stanton when she says “migraine is an energy crisis rather than a disease” and I have a complimentary theory in development that further supports this statement (5).
So the underlying cause of migraine is really just electrolyte deficiency or imbalance in our special brains? Not so fast. Yes, the main issue with migraine brain is the ionic imbalance preventing energy and information to constantly flow through the body and the brain - BUT - there are many factors that go into WHY there is an imbalance at any given moment. I will never claim there’s some quick-fix solution to migraine. There isn’t one. You and I both know any claim that “you’re dehydrated” is a massive oversimplification of the condition that doesn’t help anyone.
The biggest take away from Dr. Stanton’s research and theories is that migraines are not the result of disease or sickness, but rather are anatomically different from non-migraine brains and need to be taken care of very specifically. Does that change things for you?
Instead of being afflicted with a disease, you have been gifted with a very special brain! It might not FEEL special, but that’s only because our modern lifestyles don’t allow us to experience our unique gifts.
For example - back in earlier times when we lived off the land as hunter-gatherers, our migraine brains would have made us very special within our tribe. Our sensitive sensory organs would mean that we would notice things others might not: change in barometric pressure, a noise in the night, being able to smell if food is foul sooner than later.
Our migraine brains are so sensitive to change that, under the right conditions, we would have enhanced abilities relating to survival as compared to the tribe. But in today’s modern society, we are bombarded with light, radiation, chemicals, stress, and non-nutritious foods which cause this biochemical imbalance. So you are totally normal for feeling that any trigger can come from practically anywhere and knock you down with a migraine.
Now before you say, “But Oriana, if this is true then why doesn’t my doctor know about it?” let’s review: natural modalities of healing are not in the wheelhouse of a traditional M.D. Pharmaceuticals and surgical interventions are more prevalent. What I’d rather you focus on is the results obtained by following this theory and making biochemical balance your lifestyle goal.
I haven’t had a migraine in 500 days at the time of this publication, after suffering for 27 years with migraine. I even had a chronic migraine every day for a year! (Catch up on my story here.) Dr. Stanton has helped thousands of people achieve migraine prevention through her book and Facebook group. I have two other migraine coach contemporaries who achieved full migraine freedom like I have. And all of this success is without medication. Does your doctor have a success story like that to share with you?
In my next blog I’ll discuss the impact of the sensory sensitivity unique to migraine brains and what to do about it.
Is this migraine brain theory hard to accept, or does it make sense to you? I’d love to hear your thoughts on a FREE Lifestyle Discovery Call.
XO 💋 Oriana
References:
Stanton, A. Angela: Fighting The Migraine Epidemic: A Complete Guide: How To Treat & Prevent Migraines Without Medicine. North Charleston, SC: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform; 2017.
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