Headache is one of the most common health problems we suffer. People can suffer from migraines or tension headaches for years and begin to accept this as how life is, a new normal. But it’s not normal, it’s a sign that something is not working properly in your body-mind. We can use Chinese medicine and acupuncture to identify what is not working and re-establish health.
If your current ‘normal’ is lying in a darkened room waiting for a migraine to pass, missing work and events, and missing feeling like yourself, then it’s time to reclaim your healthy state, and start to imagine life without headaches.
Chinese medicine is a natural and effective treatment for migraine and tension headache.
Acupuncture can reduce the frequency and severity of headaches and is at least as effective as prophylactic drugs but with fewer reported side effects (1).
Taking a painkiller simply masks the symptoms of a headache. It may be helpful in the short term however it will not resolve the issue and headaches will continue to recur. You can instead use acupuncture to move towards long-term resolution.
The Chinese medicine system identifies headaches arising from dysfunction in various organ systems or channels (meridians), each of which will present differently in terms of location and nature of pain. We will identify which type of headache you suffer from and what is causing it, and then we use acupuncture to help your body-mind re-establish health and correct the cause of the headaches.
Symptoms are a sign that something in your life is not working.
Understanding this is a key to your long-term health. By simply masking symptoms we keep living lives that are out of balance and the issue doesn’t resolve. Through the course of treatment, we will learn what’s really going on for you and tailor the treatment accordingly. It is highly individualised.
If you’ve been getting migraines or headaches for a long time, perhaps you also have a level of body tension and experience anxiety. You may discover changes you need to make in your life – such as changing unhelpful habits – that will support long-term resolution of not only your headache, but other health challenges as well.
Chinese medicine provides a powerful framework to understand your physiology.
Using this framework, we put your story together to help us understand what’s going on. We use symptoms to understand what’s out of balance and have the tools – acupuncture and herbs – to help re-establish health in mind, body and spirit.
By really addressing the root cause of your migraine you can be on your way to feeling clear-headed again, at ease in your skin and optimistically plan for the future.
You can book an appointment to see me here. If you’re new to acupuncture and would like to have a chat first, you’re welcome to book a free 15-minute phone consultation to discuss your situation.
(1) Linde K, Allais G, Brinkhaus B, Fei Y, Mehring M, Vertosick EA, et al. Acupuncture for the prevention of episodic migraine. Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2016(6):Cd001218. https://doi.org/10.1002/14651858.CD001218.pub3