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The Strange World of Headaches

© Barbara J. Mitchell

One of the problems in figuring out what triggers headaches is that there are so many kinds of headaches. I've written about many of the more well-known headaches - migraine, tension, cluster, etc. In this article, though, I'd like to consider a collection of odd headaches, the type that have you thinking you're losing your mind.

One is related to the exercise-induced, or weightlifter's, headache I've written about before. It is a cough headache. Most common in middle-aged men, this is a sudden pain in the head that doesn't last long. It is brought on by coughing, sneezing, lifting a weight, bending over, or even stooping. Although it could be an indication of a serious problem such as a brain tumor and therefore needs to be checked out with an MRI, it's normally just one of those weird things that happens. After a few years it may go away on its own.

Another odd headache sounds to me like the kind of pain you get when you eat or drink something cold too fast; ice cream on a hot day comes to mind. It's called an ice pick headache. The difference is that it causes repetitive pain like being jabbed with an ice pick once per second in the temple or around the eye, or sometimes in the back or side of the head. Pity the poor person who has these headaches - not only is the pain terrible, but doctors may think he has some sort of neurological disorder. The information I found doesn't give a cause or cure, but it sounds something like tic douloureux. (See my 8/22/00 article, Trigeminal Neuralgia.)

Hangover headaches aren't really odd, but do you know what causes the pain? The alcohol causes blood vessels of the brain to enlarge and become irritated.

How about hunger headaches? They're caused by lowered blood sugar (because you need food), tense muscles, and again enlargement of the blood vessels. On the other hand, you may get headaches from eating some foods, or from ingesting vitamins such as B6, A, or Niacin, or minerals such as selenium or iodine.

Also there is something called hypnic headache syndrome. The victim wakes up regularly at night with a headache that doesn't go away for some 30 to 60 minutes. It may happen during a dream and there may be nausea with it. Some people have been helped by taking lithium at bedtime. It's different from clusters in that the headache isn't localized to one spot, it doesn't have anything to do with alcohol ingestion, and it only ocurs during sleep. It apparently has something to do with serotonin levels in the central nervous system.