Overcoming menstrual migraine

Going from breakdown to breakthrough. How I learnt to balance my hormones and in turn, brought balance back into my life.

I’ve come to realise that the only craic I’ve had with friends and other women in my life around periods has been around how ‘hormonal’ we are, how heavy a period we are having, the period pain we are enduring and how they’re making us emotional, depressed and angry. Who’d be a woman, I often hear.

The latest contraception to stop them – the injection, the mini-pill, the coil, the implant, I’ve had them all and all I ever experienced was the opposite. I bled every day.

Over recent years, it seems we are often getting headaches with our periods. Headaches, migraine, fatigue, brain fog, bloating, period pain, sleepless nights – the list goes on.

Photo by Sydney Sims on Unsplash

In the past, it never occurred to me that we should never experience any of these symptoms, that they are not natural or a normal part of menstrual health. I feel like I’ve been led to believe that these are all part and parcel of what it means to be a woman. What else should I expect? Just get on with it like everyone else for goodness’ sake, stop being pathetic.

It was only at the point of being determined to heal myself from chronic migraine, chronic pain and chronic suffering that I even gave it a moment’s thought. The book “Balance Your Hormones, Balance your Life” was recommended to me and it was not only a game changer in the way I look at menstrual health but a real eye opener.

I got the shock of my life when I read that the full list of complaints and ailments so many of us experience aren’t signs of what is to be expected but are signs of an imbalance in our bodies, an imbalance in our hormones.

I’ve recommended this book a fair few times over the years and although Dr Claudia Welch takes a very complex and very much misunderstood topic, explaining it in a language we can more easily digest, it is a BIG read. A lot to take in, a lot of changes that can be made, so much to implement, it can feel overwhelming.

Photo by 青 晨 on Unsplash

Admittedly, it took me a long time to read it, small section by small section.

I was so ill at the time that I had no other choice than to make small change by small change (in the pursuit of getting better). By the time I read this book, I had already started to make some of the changes recommended so although it seemed a lot to contend with, I’d at least made a start, even if only a small one.

At the time, I had years of being chronically ill to contend with or years getting better, even if only a tiny bit at a time. An obvious choice of the direction to take as far as I was concerned. That, and I had 10 years to get this thing called menopause on my side and a fighting chance that I would not have to endure what I was starting to hear women tell me about, as they fanned themselves on the onset of each hot flush.

This approach (of making one small change at a time, imbedding that change before moving on to the next one and keeping this going on repeat) took me 3 years before I started making giant leaps forward with menstrual migraine. By which time, I found out that not only is menstrual migraine the most severe and disabling of all attack types, it’s also the most challenging and difficult of them all to overcome.  No sh*t, I remember thinking. I sure am living proof of this.

By the Spring of 2021, I’d made it to a place where, for the first time in my life, I was describing myself as ‘balanced’.  ME…!  Balanced is not a word I would’ve ever used to describe myself at any point in the past…I don’t think I’ve ever met someone so out of balance!

I’ve since wondered at the correlation between the balance in our hormones, the balance in our life and the effect imbalances in these areas is having on our health. It feels as if we are living in times where our body’s, our work and our lives are more out of whack than they’ve ever been before. And it seems to me this is being reflected in the increase and rise we are seeing in chronic health conditions, illness and dis-ease.

Later in the same year that I noticed a sense of balance in my life, my nervous system and my being, big changes started happening with menstrual migraine. 2 massive attacks that had plagued my life for over a week each spanning years began to decrease substantially.

Photo by Jason Dent on Unsplash

Around this time, I got hold of Claire Baker’s “50 Things to Know about Periods” and for the past year, I’ve been learning to sync my cycle with the seasons (winter for the week of my period, summer for ovulation and spring and autumn either side). Trying to coincide with the strengths and blind spots that each seasonal week brings every month.

Continuing and keeping up with allllll the other changes I’ve made to date, it’s never come as any surprise to me, that, aside from a couple of relapses (2020 and 2021) and a few odd hiccups (this year), I’ve continued to get better and better. My health has continually improved, my energy levels are up year on year. The frequency, duration, severity and symptoms of each attack reduces – to the point that I can now function during attack (mostly).

As each month goes by, I learn more and more about my cycle, what’s possible and where I need to best focus my time, energy and resources. I’ve also come to identify where I need to pull it back and how I can really go with the flow of things over resisting the flow of life (as I had become accustomed to).

Did you know that the lead up to our period can be a powerful time for us as women? And that it’s possible for us to thrive in this phase? I kid you not, it’s true.

I’ve started to experience it a few odd times myself and I’m confident this will happen more and more as I continue aligning myself with each season of the cycle.

I feel sure that we can all experience this too and that we are meant to thrive during this time, not suffer the way we do.

Because of the complex nature of hormones and menstrual migraine, there is tons of information that I can share on the back of all the research I’ve done, all the changes I’ve implemented and with how far I’ve come on my own journey.

I’m thinking of running a series of blogs on this topic and already have quite a few questions that I’ve been asked by clients and readers that I might respond to in a blog next week.

Are hormones, balance and menstrual migraine areas of interest to you? What questions would you like answering?