Headaches
Headache is a name given to a chronic functional problem where the patient suffers from pain, pounding, or pressure in the head for no apparent reason. Other names are tension headache, migraine headache, and cluster headache. Headaches are often associated with other chronic degenerative diseases like high blood pressure, heart disease, arthritis, depression, chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia and diabetes.
Headaches are almost always multi-factorial. Some of the contributing causes may be high levels of oxidative stress, malnutrition, vitamin deficiencies, poor bowel health, hormonal imbalances, metabolic imbalances , food allergies, poor sleep habits, excessive stress, sinus problems and poor glycemic control. Often times, high estrogen, low progesterone ratios, is contributory.
Symptomatic treatment is almost always unsuccessful. Only finding and treating the root cause of the problem will lead to a successful outcome.
Patients that suffer from headaches must pay very close attention to their diets. Many of these patients suffer from excessive levels of free fatty acids in their brains. Therefore they need to avoid things like fried foods, food additives, neurotoxic agents (MSG, aspartame, nitrates, nitrites) they may also suffer from low blood sugar problems. Low blood sugar will affect brain chemistry as glucose is the major fuel for the brain. Therefore, low blood sugar is one of the primary culprits involved in headaches. However, high blood sugar can also contribute to headaches as high sugar levels will activate the parasympathetic nervous system, causing the blood vessels feeding the brain to over dilate. Many headache drugs actually work by constricting the blood vessels to the brain.
Dietary Recommendations
