Is There Such A Thing As A “Normal Headache”?

June 18th, 2008

During the time I’ve been in practice (dating back to 2001), I’ve had the pleasure to speak to thousands of individuals about chiropractic. Some of these opportunities came in the form of a lecture I’d given (to companies, groups or organizations at or around Pittsburgh). And other opportunities came in the form of one-on-one conversations. During many of these conversations the discussion would naturally gravitate to the issue of some kind of health problem the other person was experiencing. More often than not it would involve some kind of back pain, neck pain, headaches, migraines, fibromyalgia or some other common problem that chiropractic deal with day in and day out.

One of the most interesting comments I hear all the time is: “Yes, I have headaches, but they’re normal headaches.”

Let me clear this one up right away. There is no such thing as a “normal headache”. A headache is an abnormal symptom which occurs when something is wrong in your body. There are lots of causes of headaches:

  • vertebral misalignments (subluxations)
  • stress
  • sensory overload (loud music, bright lights, offensive odors)
  • abnormal posture (such as forward head posture)
  • hormonal imbalances
  • low blood glucose levels / hunger

Regardless of the cause, there is no such thing as a “normal headache!” Headaches are common, but they’re certainly not normal. It’s like getting mugged in Central Park in New York City. That’s common too, but it’s certainly not normal. :)

If you’ve been experiencing headaches, you need to get your spine examined by a Doctor of Chiropractic. The most common (and yet the most under-diagnosed) type of headaches are known as “cervico-genic” headaches. This type of headache is caused by misalignments of the cervical (neck region) vertebrae. The misalignments create pressure on the delicate spinal nerves (some of which go up into the head). By diagnosing which vertebrae are out of alignment and restoring them back to their normal position, the chiropractic can take the pressure off the nerve and relieve your headache problem once and for all.

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