Why Do Headaches Hurt?

Now that's a question that is never asked! Another question might be, “Why does anything ever hurt in our bodies?”

The simple answer to both questions is that pain is a warning signal that something is wrong.

If your hand touches a hot frying pan, pain tells you that something is wrong. If you eat something that is spoiled and you get abdominal pains, it is telling you something is wrong. If you have a horrible tooth ache, you are being told that something is wrong.

Pains in our bodies are a lot like the red warning lights that can come on in our cars. If your oil light comes on, it is your car telling you that something is wrong. Keep driving your car without handling the warning and you are likely to be replacing your engine soon.

We could have reached up under the dash and unscrewed the light. We could have put some masking tape over that pesky bright red light. But most of us know that the smart thing to do is to add oil as quickly as possible. We don't cover up the warning. Instead, we correct the cause of the problem.

This seems to be the smart approach in dealing with our vehicles. Would it perhaps also be the smart approach in dealing with warning signals in our bodies?

An interesting fact is that many people (and many doctors) believe that if the warning sign cannot be detected, the underlying problem is no longer there. Not true. It is sort of like painting a dry, dying tree green and making believe it has adequate water. It gives the appearance of having fixed the problem, but in fact, it did nothing but cover up the fact that the real problem is still there and continuing to get worse.

You see, when you have a headache or any other pain (or malfunction), you have some choices. You can disregard the pain and pretend it isn't there. Or you can cover it up with drugs or some other remedy and (again) pretend it isn't there. (Can you imagine someone being burned by a hot pan but taking pain killing drugs to disguise the pain without moving his hand away from the heat?)

OR . . . you can find out what is causing your pain and correct this cause. Isn't that the smarter approach?

Causes of Headaches

Technically speaking, there are about a dozen causes of headaches. These include:

• “Breakers” blown in the brain. Picture the electrical breakers that “blow” when an appliance cord shorts out. We have similar ones in our bodies that need to be reset in the brain.

• Toxins that your body can't adequately eliminate.
• Vertebrae out of place in your neck such that the nerves and brain stem are being irritated.
• Alterations from the normal blood flow to and from your brains.
• Very rarely tumor, stroke or concussion.

Each cause of headaches is generally caused by something else. For instance, a vertebra out of place can be caused by a whiplash accident. Toxins can come from drugs, alcohol, food additive and more. Changes in blood flow can be caused by hormone imbalances and stress. Even tumors, stroke and concussion are caused by other things.

The big “take away” is that the basic, fundamental, underlying causes of pains must be found. And these causes must then be corrected.

In my practice, I won't do anything to cover up pain because I want the pain to stay until the cause is removed. I'm not suggesting that you should be a martyr and suffer needlessly. As long as you are correcting the cause, there's nothing particularly wrong with getting relief along the way. But to cover the warning signs and not correcting the cause just isn't a good idea.

If someone wants to know my specialty, I tell them that it is finding and correcting the causes of peoples' health problems and pains. I love this because there are rarely if ever side effects and people genuinely get better (instead of having the illusion of improvement).

Do you have a pain or problem? Have you tried covering it up with drugs or some other remedy? Would you like to find out what is really wrong and get it truly handled?

If so, find the “Make and Appointment” button and get scheduled for a no charge consultation and preliminary examination. Together, we will get to the bottom of what is really causing your pain.