“I was taking three medications for migraines. Now, I haven’t touched a pill in 12 months!”

If you’re wondering how you might be able to get off of medication to cure your aching headaches and migraines, keep reading.

Tyler Joseph, lead singer of the hit band Twenty One Pilots, quite accurately describes the pain in his famous song “Migraines,” where he sings, “Am I the only one waging my wars behind my face and above my throat?” in one verse, and “Behind my eyelids are islands of violence,” in another.

Sadly, many people can connect to that song, and the ideas of headaches and migraines are so relatable to listeners that the music industry has no shortage of earworms to describe them. Here’s some others:

Freddie Mercury and David Bowie might remind you of the awful experience with their line, “Pressure pushing down on me,” or Bruce Springsteen with his, “Blinded by the light,” AJR’s prolific “BANG! BANG! BANG!,” or best yet, Imagine Dragons’ “Thunder! Feel the thunder!”

(These will now live rent-free in your brain for the next hour; you’re welcome.)

So why sing about painful migraines and headaches? Studies show that over 90 percent of Americans experience them in their lifetime.

This staggering statistic means thousands of people in Hendersonville and surrounding areas wake up each day with headaches and, in many cases, take painkillers with harsh side effects that do very little to solve the actual problem.

But did you know there is another option available that will not only provide immediate relief for your headaches but also prevent them?

This option is inexpensive, time-effective, safe, and doesn’t involve pain medication, injections, or surgery.

Sounds too good to be true, right?

As I write this, it does sound like an outlandish dream. To not wake up with headaches again! To not be dependent on pills for an ounce of relief! As a doctor of physical therapy who specializes in headache treatment and management, I can truly say this is a daily reality for hundreds of patients I have treated for their migraines and headaches.

It’s not a fairy tale. It’s a real solution.

Below is some advice and education I give to my patients who suffer with headaches and migraines.

*Disclaimer: Any headache is abnormal and should be treated with caution. An in-depth evaluation by a headache specialist such as myself is required to rule out any potential harmful causes of your headache. I encourage you to obtain clearance by a headache specialist first.

Stop the Bad Habits (cue Ed Sheeran, please)

We can’t talk about headaches and bad habits without addressing medication. It’s easy to turn to prescription medications to treat headaches. Why wouldn’t you? There are ads for novel drugs before every YouTube video nowadays.

The problem with these celebrity-endorsed prescriptions is they don’t treat the root cause of the headache, have a ton of side effects and drug-to-drug interactions, and only address the symptoms. My patients call them “rescue drugs.”

Most of the prescription medications and over-the-counter supplements, such as caffeine, aim at reducing blood flow and pressure in the brain through a process known as vasoconstriction. Some other drugs address inflammation and nerve function as well.

This is extremely beneficial for one out of every four patients who do indeed have abnormal amounts of pressure and blood flow to the brain. Pharmacological and medical intervention is critical for these people.

But what about the other 75 percent who are taking medications but still get headaches?

Find the Root Cause

Every patient I see receives a thorough, hands-on neurological evaluation and examination. Lifestyle factors are evaluated as well. Migraines are complicated and can be triggered by so many factors that are simply not fixed with a pill.

Some of the greatest triggers can be stress, sleep patterns, eye strain, vitamin intake, excessive medication intake, exposure to toxins, overpowering smells, and even excessive meat and cheese intake, to name a few.

However, the single greatest overlapping trigger among all headache and migraine types is neck health. The top three classifications of headaches (migraines, tension-type, and cervicogenic) are all either caused by neck pain or are strongly associated with it.

Question: Which one of these factors actually involves your head?

Answer: Literally, none.

Almost every single one of these triggers is modifiable and does not require medications to correct. Whether that is changing your pillow, investing in a sleep study, taking breaks from looking at your phone every 20 minutes, getting appropriate sunlight exposure, checking your home for molds and mildew, making small changes to your diet (such as reducing caffeine and eliminating sugary sodas), or simply changing your posture for two minutes can have drastic effects on your migraines and headaches.

And best of all, you can do it all today. No prescription required.

You can make these changes yourself and see your headaches diminish in a matter of hours. But it doesn’t stop there.

As a headache specialist, I will be able to identify exact locations in your neck that have been causing your headaches and treat them with non-pharmacological methods such as exercise, dry needling, spinal mobilization and manipulation, cupping, and Instrument Assisted Soft Tissue Mobilization (IASTM.)

Making these changes doesn’t just control the volume of your headache soundtrack, turning the headache louder or softer like medications do. They unplug the radio. Close out the app. Disconnect the headphones.

They change the playlist to Surfaces singing, “Feeling good, like I should,” Mandy Moore’s animated, “At last I see the light,” and Katrina and the Waves’ classic hit, “I’m walking on sunshine. Don’t it feel good!”

Want to learn more about how to get rid of your headaches and migraines without medications, injections, or surgeries?

Check out the links below:

www.ptascend.com/blog

www.ptascend.com/free-resources

www.instagram.com/theascendpttn

www.facebook.com/ptascend

About the Expert:

Dr. Tomlinson received his Bachelors of Science in Exercise Science from Harding University in Searcy, AR in 2016. He returned to his alma mater and received his Doctorate of Physical Therapy in 2019 where his education was focused on the treatment of musculoskeletal disorders with a heavy emphasis on manual techniques for the treatment and management of spine-related disorders, specifically migraine headaches, sacroiliac joint disorders, and chronic low back pain. Now, Jacob is the owner of Ascend Physical Therapy, where he enjoys working with his patients one-on-one for a truly unmatched experience for health and rehabilitation. Jacob is married and has three children. In his free time, he enjoys playing with his boys outside, hand-tool carpentry, soap-making, and baking sourdough bread.