FAQ Episode 85: The role of your A.Q. in migraine management
Frequently Asked Questions about Natural Migraine Relief
“I didn’t ask for this, but I guess its mine to own up to.” ’Emma’, a 23 year old patient of mine who had a eight year history of migraines at the time we met.
A significant factor predicting your success in managing any medical problem, especially migraines, as well as most other challenges in life, is your Accountability Quotient (taking responsibility vs expecting someone else to solve your problem).
Part of become a mature adult is the understanding that you, and you alone are in charge of your life. You are the accountable one. Accountability is NOT about placing blame, but rather, of accepting responsibility to move yourself forward. Yes, we hope that some outside entities will come and help out. Family, friends, concerned professionals and even Dr. Google and her support community can all play valuable roles. The first step in healing anything is taking full accountability. If you have a health condition like migraine headaches (or any other), your progress in clearing it will likely be several steps that are guided initially by your due diligence in understanding how and why you were oh, so special, to be granted the honor of this challenge. When I met Emma, she had just graduated college and was a year into a job she loved. But due to suffering from three to four migraines per month, felt like she was constantly either on the verge of a headache, or recovering from one. When we first sat down together, she concluded her introductory comments with “I’m ready to do whatever it takes.”
Turning accountability into results
Let’s walk through the five steps that Emma took to manage her migraines.
Recognition of ownership. The problem is yours, not your spouse’s, your parents, or any or all of the doctors you’ve seen. Yours. Own the whole miserable, painful mess. For years Emma had given the title of ownership of her migraines to her very caring parents. She had been sent to her PCP, GYN and three neurologists with only partial resolution of her headaches. As a young and newly independant adult, she finally decided that “this was hers to own up to.”
Knowing your story. We spent time to better understand her family history and the nuances of her own medical history, especially trigger factors and the role of her puberty and ovarian cycles in promoting her headaches. We used the Migraine Action Plan (the MAP) from the Natural Migraine Relief course to pull together the root cause factors that best explained her migraine headaches.
Triaging options. Even after winnowing down the therapy options, we had several paths to follow. I like the keep-it-simple approach, having found that “the perfect plan is the enemy of the good plan” (aka “a good plan started today is far better than a perfect plan next week.”) Emma started therapy with the four to five things from her MAP that looked to have the most bang for the buck for her story.
Walking it through the process. We didn’t get overnight success. During the first eight weeks, we used “the Basic Four” (also see this link), charted her cycles and used phased progesterone support therapy, added focused methylated B vitamin support, and managed a chronic gut dysbiosis problem. After the first eight weeks, her headaches were reduced ~50% and were generally ~50% less severe, when they occured.
Taking action allows additional insight. The initial improvement in Emma’s headaches gave two additional benefits: 1) the overlap inflammation from any one headache had been lighting the fuse for the next one. Cutting the chronicity of the headaches reduced the cyclic promotion of that would-be-next headache. 2) As the headaches became less frequent, it became easier to tease out additional and sometimes subtle promoting factors that could be managed situationally. In Emma’s case, `her level of hydration, episodic reactive hypoglycemia, and some specific chemical sensitivities all had additional roles in provoking her migraines. Managing these situationally, along with additional time in grade for the initial underlying therapy moved her relief benefit to the next level.
Now Emma has a moderate headache every 3-4 months, usually when all the wrong provocative stars align (especially… binging the wrong foods, along with too much screen time, weather fronts and pollens.) Previously she had been using a triptan drug 3-4 times a month with equivocal benefit. Now when she has the rare headache, prompt use of that same medication gives excellent results to short circuit the migraine. The baseline therapy that fits her profile has become second nature to her. She went from “depressed and stuck in a rut” to feeling capable to live the full life she had been anticipating as an active young adult. And it all started with the simple but significant step of sharpening up her A.Q.
Take a look at your own Accountability Quotient and ask youself “What next steps will help me take ownership, and then control of this problem?” Reading this blog weekly will add encouragement and education along that journey. It is free to subscribe, so please sign up, and add comments or questions on the migraine related topics you want to hear more about.
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