If you have ever suffered from a migraine, I’m willing to bet that you tried your hardest to learn the cause of that agonizing headache. I know I did. My first migraine was 12 years ago, and the pain was so intense that I thought, “I cannot bear to let that happen ever again!” I searched high and low for answers, but they were few and far between; on the other hand, my migraine attacks were not. I looked everywhere, getting more and more desperate, but nobody could help me… Migraine causes have been a mystery for a long time.
Causes Of Migraines Have Been Mysterious???
The only knowledge that the scientific community could offer me back then? Every migraine sufferer has heard – over and over again – about “triggers.” A trigger is what will sometimes initiate the chain reaction that may lead to a migraine. But this doesn’t explain the CAUSE of a migraine, only what may (or may not) ACTIVATE one!
And what’s worse, the list of triggers goes on and on, and most of them are next to impossible to avoid as you go about your daily life – such as loud noises and weather changes. Weather changes? Is that supposed to be some kind of sick joke? How in the world am I supposed to avoid changes in the weather?!
Despite this discouraging lack of knowledge, I have kept on top of ongoing headache research for 12 years now … and guess what? Finally, some exciting – and promising – new developments are surfacing about migraine causes!
Serotonin May Be the Key to Discovering to Migraine Cause
Serotonin (also known as 5-hydroxytryptamine, or 5-HT) is an organic compound known as a “neurotransmitter.” Neurotransmitters are basically just chemical messengers. Producing abnormal levels of serotonin in your body has now been linked to migraines (as well as to a number of other baffling disorders, including bulimia, depression, and alcoholism). Serotonin seems to influence your mood, and it has a definite impact on your blood vessel constriction.
When a person is suffering from a headache, there are various physical changes that occur within the body to cause those agonizing symptoms that you know so well. For example, scientists know that there are significant changes in the blood flow within your brain. It is also proven that the levels of serotonin in your body drop dramatically when you’re suffering from a migraine.
Many researchers now believe that serotonin plays a major role in the constriction and expansion of blood vessels. When serotonin levels are high, your blood vessels constrict. But during a migraine attack, the drastically low levels of serotonin cause your blood vessels to expand to an unusually large size.
These artery expansions are believed to be the cause of that throbbing pain you feel behind your eye or in your temple. Such dramatic changes in your serotonin levels and blood flow are believed to cause not only the pounding agony in your head, but also the distorted speech and vision that often occurs during an attack.
Are you still unconvinced about the correlation between serotonin levels and migraine causes? This article is too brief to delve into the details, but you should continue researching. Every year, there is more and more data to support the link between serotonin and migraines.
And consider this fact: many migraine sufferers report that the pain ceases after they vomit. Guess what? It has been proven that vomiting increases serotonin levels in your blood. Could it be that we are finally on the brink of understanding the true migraine cause, and thus … dare I say it … on the verge of developing a cure?
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