Headache for psychological reasons. Headaches and their psychological significance

It is difficult to find a person who has never experienced a headache. It accompanies a great variety of diseases - from flu to hypertension, but sometimes pain appears suddenly and disappears just as suddenly. Doctors do not detect any diseases in humans, and complaints about headache are, in fact, the only ones. In this case, you should pay attention to the psychosomatic causes of the malaise. We will talk about them in this material.

Features of the pathology

In medicine, headache is commonly called cephalgia. This is an unpleasant condition that prevents you from living, working, studying, relaxing, and communicating normally. When a person has a headache, it is difficult for him to concentrate, remember something, and perceive.

This symptom is one of the most frequently mentioned in medical reference books. But as an independent phenomenon, cephalgia, according to statistics, is observed in 17% of the world's population. This refers specifically to those situations where complaints of headache with complete medical examination do not find a physiological explanation, that is, the person is healthy. At the same time, about 7% of adults and children on the planet suffer from constant headaches (occurring more than 2 times a week), and another 10% of people report regular or episodic attacks. About 80% of the total number of headache complaints have psychosomatic reasons, and are therefore recognized as psychosomatic disorders.

In medicine, it is believed that headache in the absence of concomitant diseases, of which it can be a symptom, most often occurs due to:

depression of consciousness, depressive disorders and states, the predominance of a gloomy, negative mood in a person;
pungent odors that force a person to change the rhythm of inhalation and exhalation;
meteosensitivity (almost 43% of adults and more than 80% of children differ hypersensitivity to changes in weather and atmospheric pressure);
excess stress (physical and mental) – large number training, running, walking, professional sports, intensive study, intellectual work;
small physical activity (sedentary lifestyle life and physical inactivity not only contribute to the accumulation of extra pounds, but also affect the speed of blood circulation, increasing the likelihood of developing oxygen starvation organs, including the brain);
stress and poor nutrition, metabolic disorders;
bad habits;
loud noise;
lack of sleep and excess sleep.

IN traditional medicine for persistent headaches, it is recommended to eliminate all harmful factors, rest, change of scenery, vitamins and lack of stress.

Psychosomatic reasons

At the intersection of medicine and psychology there is a special branch of science - the psychosomatic direction or simply psychosomatics. It views a disease or individual symptom in close connection with the psychological, emotional and mental state person. The data is drawn from many years of observations by psychoanalysts and psychotherapists and is carefully verified by physiologists and therapists.

In psychosomatics, headache is regarded as a disturbance in the perception of the world. This mechanism is in many ways reminiscent of the mechanism of development of an allergic reaction.

The human body has antibodies to something that it encounters from time to time or regularly in the outside world. When such a “collision” occurs, a headache immediately starts. And this does not depend on age, gender, nationality. There is an irritating factor (let's call it an allergen) - there is a reaction. There is no factor - there is no reaction, the person feels good.

Such psychological “allergens” are most often the stress that people experience in very specific situations.

Dissatisfaction with the world and one’s place in it, the feeling that the world does not accept, pushes away and constantly deprives (“others have this and that, but I have nothing”, “I am not worthy of this”).
The need to dissemble, deceive, be a hypocrite. Some people lie like they breathe, easily and naturally, but most people, in a situation where they need to lie, produce stress hormones that narrow the gap blood vessels, due to which the brain begins to experience a lack of much-needed oxygen. The more often the need to deceive arises, the stronger the attacks of headaches that start in as soon as possible after this event.
The need to talk and think a lot. This kind of “professional” headache is common among teachers and public speakers, as well as analysts, tax inspectors and heads of large organizations. Wherever an intense and tense thought process is required, the price of an error in which is high, wherever a person needs to talk for a long time, there is a place for psychosomatic headaches.
A headache is an alibi. There are situations when it is easier for a person to hide behind a headache than to do or decide something. If you do not want to find a solution to a problem, a person simply creates for himself a good reason to go on sick leave or simply lie down on your favorite sofa with a clear conscience and do nothing. This is how they hide behind a headache from the reluctance to solve personal problems (they avoid sex), this is how they avoid an unpleasant conversation that is long overdue.

Psychosomatics also has an answer to the question of who is susceptible to headaches more often than others. Reveal psychological portrait A typical classical patient suffering from cephalalgia was helped by many years of observation by psychotherapists. They claim that headaches are physical manifestation internal tension that people who have certain problems with an assessment of the world. In particular, most headache sufferers exaggerate their own importance. Their opinion of themselves is quite high, and in most cases it is unjustifiably high.

They place no less high demands on the world, in particular, on the people around them. At the same time, they do not always voice demands, but only expect that others will guess for themselves and comply with them. But others have no idea what causes that very “ allergic reaction”, which manifests itself as a painful attack of headache.

Resentment towards slow-witted comrades and compatriots is not everything; the first place in the development of cephalalgia comes to aggression, which is involuntarily born during the collapse of illusions, but which fairly intelligent and well-educated sufferers begin to diligently suppress.

The greater the aggression, the more effort is required to hide it. The higher the tension inside, the stronger the headache.

People with chronic cephalalgia are very pedantic. They do not accept the very idea of chaos, do not allow it in life, and try to control everything at all times. If someone mindlessly violates the rules they have established, this also causes a sharp negative reaction and headache. This does not mean that a person immediately rushes to make a scandal if someone moved his pen or cup to another place or did not put his shoes away on the shelf. No, they are silent, suppress aggression and disappointment inside, and after a couple of hours they lie unhappy looking with a severe headache and complain that the pills do not help them.

It is noteworthy that often with headaches, people with chronic cephalgia manipulate others: they demand silence, not making noise, walking on tiptoes, bringing them water, not upsetting them with negative behavior and information that they do not want to hear, unpleasant conversations. Well, who would refuse a sick person?

Children's cephalalgia

Often children copy from their own parents not only words and behavioral reactions, but also the way they relate to others. This is how high self-esteem and inflated demands on others are adopted.

Children with the so-called excellent student syndrome, who are accustomed to always and everywhere being first, especially often suffer from headache attacks. If they are faced with a situation in which they did not win, it causes a strong reaction followed by headaches.

A child who adequately evaluates himself and with early age accustomed to respecting others, and also trained to have a certain level of independence for his age, he usually does not know what a headache is, unless, of course, we are talking about the flu, acute respiratory viral infection or another illness in which a headache is a side symptom.

Treatment

If a person has a disease that a doctor knows how to treat, refusing treatment seems unwise. For psychogenic headaches, medicine, alas, cannot give universal recipe, and taking painkillers every time you have a headache is harmful to the liver and kidneys. But there is treatment and you shouldn’t refuse it. It consists of identifying and eliminating emotional tension.

Researcher Louise Hay argued that the most the right way Getting rid of headaches is learning to relax. Relaxation should not only be physical and muscular. You need to learn to relax your inner world as well.

Canadian researcher Liz Burbo, who completed the table psychosomatic diseases, started by Louise Hay, argues that a child or adult with headaches has an excessive amount of responsibility and criticality, and getting rid of them will help quickly cope with cephalalgia. A severe headache is a clear signal from the body that the time has come to change something in your perception of the world and people, and you can no longer leave everything as it is. It's dangerous.

Allow mental reasons Psychosomatics helps with health problems. Headache is one of the problems that can appear suddenly, torment for a long time and, seemingly, for no reason. However, nothing appears without reason.

By headache we need to understand ordinary pain. If this is a migraine, then she already has others psychological reasons.

Before analyzing an individual case, try to express your condition. Examples:

You're giving me a headache.
I've been racking my brain for an hour now on how to get out of this situation.
These relatives fell on us like snow.
I'm already tired of banging my head against the wall because of you.
You talk to her, but she feels like peas against the wall.
I'm risking my head, and you're setting me up like this!
You make me go over my head.
She is so beautiful that I lost my head over her.

Does any of this sound familiar? If no situation suits you, then think about what is causing your headache? What do you feel like hitting yourself over the head with?

With such phrases and questions, you need to reach your key situation, which is causing the headache. As a rule, any pain in the head is provoked by an excessive desire to “punch a wall with your forehead.”

You have a problem, you cannot solve it with the help of the tools that you used to guide you, and you instinctively act by force. It's like you need to open a door, it won't budge, so you push harder.

Pain is tension, it always indicates that you are too aggressive where you need to go a different way, show more flexibility, wisdom, and ultimately find a new solution.

Give yourself time to look at the situation in a new way and identify new points of view. Sometimes it’s useful to take a couple of steps back, step back from the task, and then insight comes, and with it the headache disappears.

What to work with

The key character trait that gives you headaches is stubbornness. Our ego loves to prove that standing our ground is good and worthy of respect. If I tell you now that you are stubborn, you will not consider it negative trait character, although she is one.

Stubbornness is an attempt to follow a closed path, hence the desire to break through the wall with your forehead, but this desire lasts only as long as you do not see other paths.

Move away from the wall and you will see that there is a small door nearby, and it is already open for you.

The psychosomatic task of headaches is to teach you to be more flexible in your judgment. Become more patient and calmer. Believe that the solution already exists and that all you have to do to discover it is take a couple of steps back.

If you still have any questions in our topic “Psychosomatics: headaches,” then ask them in the comments. We will definitely answer.

In the causes of migraine, leading experts in the world trace a clear relationship between psychological factors and regular development of attacks. For several centuries now, psychologists have referred to psychosomatic diseases, believing that excruciating pain and neurological signs arise due to internal personal conflict. The psychosomatic theory of migraine is confirmed by the fact that in most cases drug therapy It only helps to ease the attack, but does not cure the disease. In this case, you need to look for the psychological causes of migraine development in order to use psychotherapy and self-analysis to get rid of the body’s pain reaction in the form of an attack to the provoking factor.

Personality type prone to migraines

After numerous studies and analysis of the psychosomatic causes of migraine, leading psychologists agreed: the development of the disease, as well as the intensity and frequency of attacks, are directly dependent on the type of personality and its characteristic psychological qualities.

Most often, migraine attacks affect people in whom intellect and rationalism prevail over emotions. These people are characterized by the following qualities and character traits:

tendency towards ambition;
heightened sense of self-esteem;
the desire to control the situation, to compete with others in business and personal life;
secrecy, restraint in emotions;
touchiness, rancor;
hidden claims towards oneself and the imperfect surrounding world;
painful reaction to humor;
dissatisfaction with the realities of life and, at the same time, a lack of desire to change everything for the better.

Psychosomatic causes of migraine

From a psychosomatic point of view, the main provoking factors of migraine attacks are psycho-emotional instability and emotional distress. World famous psychologists Liz Burbo and Louise Hay wrote about this in their scientific works.

Canadian psychologist and philosopher Liz Bourbeau believes that the causes of migraines are physical, emotional and mental. In her opinion, physical signs of the disease develop due to a feeling of guilt towards loved ones, suppression of one’s own desires and psycho-emotional dependence on other people. To get rid of migraine attacks, it is enough to decide on your own desires, stop depending on other people’s opinions and devote yourself to achieving your goals.

American psychologist Louise Hay believes that the development of migraine attacks is facilitated by such feelings as hatred of coercion and doing uninteresting things, fear and dissatisfaction in life. sexual relations. In such cases, it is enough to relax, let go of the situation, and migraine pain will stop bothering you.

A migraine attack can be triggered by stress and psychological distress, as well as one of the following: psychosomatic disorders and states:

Is something bothering you? Illness or life situation?

suppression of internal anger and disruption of blood flow through the cerebral vessels as a consequence;
inflated demands on others and oneself, painful self-criticism and inability to forgive;
causeless suspiciousness and feeling of anxiety;
dissatisfaction with one’s own successes and “self-flagellation” about this;
complexes, phobias, sexual fears;
depression caused by melancholy and sadness.

Constant stay in this state leads to the development of migraine attacks, manifested in the form of painful headaches and neurological symptoms. In fear that the attack will start again, a person stops communicating with friends and relatives, attending public events, withdraws into himself and begins to focus on his feelings and fears. As a result, the patient ends up in vicious circle psychological problems, provoking migraine attacks again and again.

How to overcome the disease?

If migraine is caused psychosomatic reasons, That drug treatment will be ineffective. Tablets, sprays and injections will only temporarily relieve a painful attack, but will not eliminate the root cause of the disease. In this case therapeutic measures You should start with a visit to a psychologist or psychotherapist, as well as changing your own worldview. To do this, you need to start changing in relation to others, while following a number of simple recommendations:

Accept information about the imperfections of the world and yourself. Do not be upset if planned events did not take place on time or unforeseen circumstances occurred.
Reduce the level of demands on yourself and the environment. It is necessary to get rid of the idea that one’s own absence or inaction will lead to catastrophic consequences, and that the planet will then stop spinning around its axis.
Learn to recognize negative emotions and eliminate them. First of all, you should learn to admit to yourself that certain actions or factors cause anger, rage, and aggression. To adequately assess information about the situation that caused negative feelings, should be described on paper. This will allow you to understand the cause of irritation, find positive aspects in it and switch to them.
Recognize stress and prevent its transition to the chronic stage. Before starting psychotherapy, the cause of the occurrence should be eliminated or minimized. stressful situation. It is best to get rid of the consequences of nervous tension through physical activity, be it sports, active recreation or work in the country.
Communicate only with positively minded people. This will allow you to charge from them positive energy, strive for spirituality and personal development, experience positive emotions.
Love yourself and not adapt to the opinions of others. Don't get hung up on each person's opinion of themselves. You need to show all your qualities and skills, engage in your favorite pastime, while not forgetting about the rules of decency.

Migraines regularly leave ¾ of the world's population in a state of complete helplessness. Scientists have never been able to figure out the real reason the occurrence of unbearable migraine headaches. Why does this disease occur?

Migraine: nature of the disease

The name of the disease comes from the Latin hemicrania - “half of the head”: migraine pain occurs in one half or even part of the head.
The main psychosomatics - headache classifies migraine as a group of neurological diseases.

Approximately 10% of the planet's inhabitants, mostly women, experience painful migraine attacks irregularly 3-7 times a month, which lead to complete disability. Chronic migraine affects the patient's life in the same way as disability.

It has been established that migraine often occurs among members of the same family. This made it possible to put forward the version that this disease is transmitted genetically.

The disease is divided into 2 groups: with and without aura.

Aura is a kind of harbinger of migraine, which appears within half an hour before the attack. The migraine aura is manifested by tingling of the skin, darkening of the eyes ( dark spots, flickering), numbness of parts of the body.

Migraine: symptoms

The main manifestation of migraine is excruciating, unbearable pain, which is localized mainly in one half of the head. The pain is felt inside the skull, but even touching the skin at the location of the pain causes unbearable painful sensations. Some patients describe the attack as follows: a red-hot pin that turns in the head from time to time.

Classic migraine (with aura) is manifested by the following symptoms:

any sounds and light are intolerable;
nausea, which often turns into vomiting;
weakness and drowsiness;
disturbance of visual perception - fiery figures or flashes pop up in the field of vision.

All symptoms - except pain - disappear within an hour.

Migraine without aura has similar symptoms:

weakness;
intolerance to light and loud sounds;
nausea with vomiting;
pain.

With a migraine, the pain continues for several days and intensifies with the slightest physical activity.
All the patient needs during an attack is to be left alone in a quiet dark room and lie there waiting for it to finish.

Migraine: causes

Accurate scientific justification There is no migraine. There are several generally accepted hypotheses.

Psychological problems

Psychologists are confident that psychosomatic migraine is associated with personal problems. They explain this version by the fact that migraines occur in 80% of people from time to time. The disease always begins in similar circumstances associated with experiencing life's difficulties and failures.

Disruption of the normal functioning of cerebral vessels

According to one version, pain is caused by narrowing of arterioles, which leads to a decrease in blood supply to the brain.

According to another version, pain occurs as a result of uneven expansion of the blood vessels in the brain.

Biological brain abnormality

It is believed that if the production of such chemical substance, like serotonin, headaches occur. Also, a lack of serotonin negatively affects mood, normal sleep and human life activity.

Headache: possible causes

Migraine is not the only cause of headaches. You should not self-diagnose migraine. In order to diagnose the disease, you must undergo an examination and long time be observed by a neurologist.

What causes headaches?

Stress
When experiencing negative emotions, a person “wilts” - this can be seen in his posture, the position of his head, and his dull gaze. Negative experiences are a common cause of severe headaches. Extremely discomfort: Burning, aching, or throbbing may be felt in the head, neck, or face.

Muscle tension in the head and neck

Staying in one position for a long time with the head or neck leads to dull ache as if the head were being held in a vice. Muscle tension can be associated with a monotonous body position, for example, when working at a computer; with being in a state of emotional stress or depression.

Arterial hypertension

Pain when high blood pressure causes a feeling of a bandage that squeezes the head in the morning. By evening the feeling of squeezing goes away.

Cluster pain

The vast majority of people who suffer from seizures cluster pain – smoking men. The symptoms of cluster pain are reminiscent of a migraine: excruciating pain localized in the head - throbbing, burning, boring. The disease differs from migraine in that with them either one nostril becomes blocked or begins severe runny nose- also on one nostril. The attack lasts about 20 minutes, but can be repeated many times during the day. The pain occurs suddenly and may stop for several months.

Menstrual cycle

Origin of headaches associated with menstrual cycle, is as mysterious as the cause of migraines.

Physical activity

The occurrence of pain at the slightest physical activity: tilting, turning the head, even coughing or laughing - dangerous symptom, which manifests itself with a tumor or aneurysm of the brain. You should consult a doctor as soon as possible.

Inflammation of the arteries

Inflammatory processes in the arteries of the head and neck lead to pain of terrifying intensity. Temporal arteritis – extremely rare disease which occurs in patients over 50 years of age. Without treatment, arteritis leads to paralysis or blindness.

Blockage of the paranasal sinus

The cessation of drainage of bodily fluids caused by blockage of the paranasal sinus leads to infection and inflammation. The result is excruciating pain in the head.

Malocclusion

An uneven line of teeth and friction resulting from anomalies in the dentition leads to dysfunction and pathology of the temporomandibular joint. Joint pathology causes severe headaches.

Hangover
Excessive alcohol consumption leads to dilation of blood vessels in the brain. An increase in the lumen of blood vessels in the brain causes throbbing pain and nausea.

Caffeine addiction

The habit of constant consumption of caffeine-containing drinks: coffee or tea - leads to a certain physiological dependence. If the body does not receive the usual dose of caffeine for a long time, it reacts by dilating blood vessels, which is always painful. A cup of coffee or tea causes blood vessels to normal condition and soothes pain.

Hunger
When the body is deprived of food for a long time, blood sugar levels decrease, which leads to dilation of blood vessels.

Injury
A blow to the head often results in migraine-like pain. Such pain torments the patient every day and rarely responds to traditional treatment.

Severe psychological trauma

A headache may occur as a result of a difficult experience. More often, symptoms occur in people who cannot part with painful memories and accumulate negative emotions: anger, resentment, hatred.

Mental illness
Headaches often occur in people with mental disorders.

Migraine: treatment

Since the causes of the disease are unknown to medicine, there is no treatment for migraine.

Doctors give the following advice.

When the first attacks appear, try to fall asleep - perhaps the attack will pass during sleep.
Take a painkiller tablet at the beginning of an attack. If a migraine is accompanied by vomiting, doctors advise using painkillers in the form of suppositories.
Acupuncture massage or head massage, yoga classes.
Healthy lifestyle: good nutrition, 8 hours night sleep, daily walks, exercise classes.
Quitting smoking, alcohol, coffee.

Migraine and psychology

Psychologists are confident that the causes of migraines and any other headaches lie in the psychological problems that the individual experiences. It is believed that headaches always occur during periods of acute dissatisfaction with one’s life, when a person is forced to give up fulfilling his needs.

Headaches indicate that a person needs to find his own path in life and a way to realize himself in what is near and dear to him. Living at someone else's orders, surrounded by strangers, doing something you hate, lack of success - these are the reasons that lead to psychosomatic pain in the head.

How to get rid of psychosomatic migraine?

Understanding that there is a psychological problem is the first step to solving it. In order to understand your problems, experiences and even feelings, you need a psychologist or psychotherapist. After several sessions, a person begins to understand what reasons prevent him from living in harmony with himself.
What psychological causes cause psychosomatic headaches?

Dependence on other people's opinions

The desire to live in accordance with imposed stereotypes and to gain approval for one’s actions leads to loss life path. For example, the choice of profession or place of work should depend on the desires and personal qualities of a person, and not on the opinions of parents or friends.

Striving for Excellence
There are no ideal people - only a robot can be perfect. If you are late from time to time, do not have time to complete all the planned tasks, or do something “C+”, this is normal. In the pursuit of perfection, you can lose the joy of life, family and friends and acquire many chronic “sores”.

Suppression of emotions
It is better to express sadness or joy, resentment or anger right away. Suppressed emotions poison our body no worse than poison.

Negative thinking
If you constantly keep grievances, hatred in your head, sad memories, they cause the appearance of psychosomatic diseases, including headaches.

Medicine has not found the causes of migraines. It is quite possible that the path to recovery should be sought in solving the patient’s psychological problems.

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When your head hurts, sometimes you don’t care about anything. There are many causes of headaches, and some of them are mental problems. Article – psychosomatics of headaches

Psychosomatics of headaches using a body-oriented approach opens up reliable ways to solve this problem. Naturally, going to the pharmacy is faster, but this method does not eliminate the cause. Therefore, once or twice a month they go for analgin and something stronger, and poison their body with the help of modern NSAIDs. I'll change the block a little:

Night, street, lantern, pharmacy,
Pointless and dim light.
My head has been hurting for a quarter of a century...
Everything will be like this. There is no outcome.

But there is a way out!

Each of us has encountered a headache in our lives, which prevents us from doing business, prevents us from communicating with friends and family, and distracts all our attention. This headache changes all plans, desires, takes away its piece of life. Sometimes they help to cope with severe headaches medicines a number of NSAIDs. Sooner or later, the pain returns, maybe once a month, or depending on the weather. What's her possible reasons?

Let me note that this is important: headaches due to poisoning, meningitis, organic lesions brain, if your head hurts from sinusitis and sinusitis, inflammation of the middle ear and glaucoma, only a doctor can treat it. We do not cover this in the article and can hardly help in these cases. In such cases, it is imperative that you consult a doctor.

In this text we are interested precisely psychosomatic headaches, periodic and irregular, due to stress or “weather”, as well as pain of unknown origin. This is where a psychologist can help. The client himself may also assume psychosomatic reasons.

How do we feel a headache?

The nature of headaches lies in the sensations that come from the receptors of spasmodic blood vessels, receptors meninges. The brain itself does not feel pain. I didn’t believe it, but when I entered the psychology department of Moscow State University seven years ago, he gave us lectures on the structure of the brain Vyacheslav Dubynin, and I often prevented him from doing this with my questions from the seat. I found out: everything is so, there are no pain receptors in the brain tissue itself.

A medical meaningful interpretation of the causes of pain in the head is at the end of the article. Briefly in one paragraph, there is also a link to the author. We are talking about our own things, about what depends on the psyche.

If something is spinning in your head intrusive thought, or the massive content of internal conflict is processed like a computer, the result is an overexpenditure of resources, and there may simply not be enough glucose and oxygen in the blood to the neurons, the vessels receive a signal to increase the blood supply to the brain.

This signal acts for a short time and if the task is processed by the brain and solved, a state of peace and comfort sets in, and if not, and the task is “processed” for days, vasodilation is followed by spasm and increase pain. There are pain receptors in the blood vessels, and they communicate these signals to the brain, which are recognized as pain.

The headache can be throbbing, or it can be dull and squeezing. We say: “my head is pounding.” Psychosomatics of headache distinguishes between symptoms such as acute or dull, squeezing or throbbing pain. You can “treat” a headache of psychosomatic origin with the help of emotional imagery therapy: The therapist will help you explore and describe all the sensations without addressing their causes, and in doing so, the pain gradually passes or disappears immediately. Analytical approach, where possible causes are explored based on what is expressed by the client, is also effective for psychosomatic headaches.

But migraines are very difficult to respond to such psychotherapeutic effects. Spasms and the mediator disturbances they provoke in the conductors of the sensation of pain are so strong that a person does not perceive anything except a terrible attack, what images, conversations and analysis of conflicts are there! The causes of migraines are a whole range of factors that are still being researched.

It is known that if after a puncture 10-15 milliliters of cerebrospinal fluid are taken and a person gets up and walks, pain in the head is inevitable. The brain “floats” in fluid, any deficiency or excess of it signals to the receptors of the membranes of the brain and blood vessels: the brain is “dry”, or vice versa, there is an excess of fluid and intracranial pressure is increased.

The second reason for the sensation of headache is a violation of the volume or transportation of fluid washing the head and spinal cord, cerebrospinal fluid.

There is a way to help here too.

A Body-Centered Approach to Relieving Tension Headaches

based on the biological premises included in the concepts of Reich and Lowen, divides spinal column into several segments that are responsible for the innervation and reception of sensations in certain areas of the body. Surprisingly, the biological approach is informative; we, chordates, are not so far removed from fish and animals in ontogenesis. We just have a consciousness that, when not working properly, causes this psychosomatic headache.

Have you noticed that with acute respiratory infections, when the pharynx swells and the throat hurts, you may get a headache? There is a “plumbing” in the brain that flows around the cortex, connects to the ventricles of the brain, and descends into the spine. They also constantly take punctures from that “plumbing”, in the series about Dr. House.

The swollen throat presses on the narrow place of the “plumbing” - it is above the upper cervical vertebra, from the back, just below the base of the skull. Difficulties arise with the “sewage”, and therefore with the “cleaning” of metabolites. Receptors of blood vessels and membranes can signal this with pain.

With a migraine, the pain pulsates “behind the eye” or “encircles the head”, and there may be a feeling of squeezing. The condition immediately improves if another person (preferably a psychologist with experience in a body-oriented approach) slightly covers the area of the eyes and temples, the upper belt (segment), with their palms, according to Reich-Lowen. An external weak touch, and the warmth of the hands, and in the case of migraines, in combination with a “head pill” - the result is in half an hour, the migraine goes away and the person can be left alone to get some sleep.

Stiffening of the pharyngeal-cervical girdle (segment), the “muscular armor” in this area, can also become a prerequisite for habitual headaches.

If a person is all purposeful, “businesslike”, “tadpole” and denies the connection between the body and the head, does not allow “the pain and joy of the body into thoughts”, does not act with his body in accordance with his feelings, his cervical-pharyngeal level is spasmed with muscles like a shell, and in the same way it worsens the circulation of cerebrospinal fluid, as with swelling and sore throat due to acute respiratory infections. No acute respiratory infections, but my head hurts!

Regular dependent pose, chin up. Leveling up! And who will give and what will feed? Chin up, neck muscles clamping the throat and the same “plumbing”. Down your eyes! Everything you need is on the steps under your feet, it’s time to go and get it!

If in the process of mining a person has forgotten himself, overworked himself and left little time for sleep, he has stress and irregular nutrition, and his head periodically hurts from lack of nutrition. The brain is a fairly powerful processor; it can “heat up” to about 50 watts. If you take into account the volume and “heat removal” only by blood and cerebrospinal fluid, can you imagine the problems with “overheating”?

What happens if you drive your computer in the heat in the summer? It throws out a blue screen or dramatically slows down programs.

As she told us neurobiologist Svetlana Zvorykina in the lecture, the main reason that a neuron performs its functions lies in its need for nutrition. Neuron hedonism: every neuron “wants to eat.” If he is fed poorly and irregularly, forced to work more than he should, the neuroglial cells supplying him with nutrition, and behind them the arterioles, higher up, the arteries and surrounding membranes become overfilled with blood, and then in some places the vessels spasm and can signal pain, due to lack of nutrition , oxygen, water, increased CO2 content in the blood. These are pains from exertion of activity.

Can we say that headaches from working too hard are due to mental reasons? Yes it is, the reasons are there! What, you, a galley slave, can’t stop and rest? Who controls you and drives you to victories over yourself and headaches?

As a psychosomatic symptom, headache appears as a result of the brain processing an excessive amount of data: unconscious experiences, unmet needs, unexpressed feelings, unconscious emotions. All this requires oxygen and glucose, the work of the enzyme apparatus and energy from the cellular bodies of mitochondria. Our “computer” is overloaded, it is difficult for the vessels to supply additional blood with nutrition and oxygen.

Because along with unconscious conflicts and all of the above, cyclically circling in thoughts, there are also daily affairs and work, relationships and responsibilities.

Pain, like an annoying mosquito, tells us that we have missed something, very important, valuable. The psychosomatic cause of headaches can be emotions and feelings that at some point in the past swept us into their whirlpool, but were not realized in action.

Since childhood, we have been well taught to repress the “excess”. Through an effort of will, we can suppress many emotions, feelings and experiences, but they do not leave us anywhere, “remain in our head”, in the unconscious, and manifest themselves at certain moments. Emotionally charged thoughts that were not expressed, presented at the right address, and often not even noticed by us, remind us of themselves with renewed vigor at the wrong moment, with painful sensations.

Also, headaches can be a consequence of internal tension, characteristic of insecure and anxious people. Insecure people are in constant conflict. On the one hand, they have desires and needs, on the other hand, they have a fear of satisfying them, uncertainty that they can or have the right to do so.

Anxious people suffer from constant waiting negative consequences, coming up with all sorts of horrific scenarios of failure and tragedy. All this is suppressed by an effort of will, but does not disappear, but remains in memory, periodically reminding itself of pain when a person finds himself in similar situations.

If the psychosomatic headache is acute, analgesics and NSAIDs for headaches help relieve or dull it. You used to go to the pharmacy for them a couple of times a month. Unfortunately, mental reasons they are unable to cure the occurrence of pain. A psychologist-psychotherapist helps to cope with psychosomatic causes.

Even short-term therapy can relieve constant tension, and not only removes pain, but also reduces the likelihood of its recurrence. With long-term psychotherapy, deeper problems are resolved, allowing you to cope with feelings and experiences in such a way that headaches psychosomatic nature no longer appeared and did not spoil life.

If a severe headache is accompanied by an attack of nausea, and this is not uncommon, it is worth inducing vomiting. Spasms are relieved, and after vomiting, the headache immediately decreases.

Sessions with a psychologist help to “shake” psychological defenses a little, in a safe environment, to realize the conflicts hidden in the psyche, to come to a certain choice, and to do something in reality: communicate with significant person, express what was hidden in your head. Maybe even enter into an open conflict and resolve it amicably. If this is not possible, react to the feelings in a safe environment. By resolving internal conflicts and acting out unexpressed feelings, you can cope with the cause of your headache. If you implement your choice, choose a psychologist and work, then it is very likely that the headache will go away.

And it’s not migraines that will control you a couple of times a month in “bad weather,” but your smarter brain and smarter body after therapy. Believe me, your brain doesn’t need your headache.

Symptoms of psychosomatic origin that can be addressed using a body-oriented approach:

Even minor losses of cerebrospinal fluid (about 20 ml) can provoke headaches, especially in vertical position body, since the buoyancy of the brain changes, and when the hydraulic cushion decreases, they become irritated pain receptors its shells.

On the other hand, excess cerebrospinal fluid and disruption of its outflow during hydrocephalus, cerebral edema, swelling during intracellular hyperhydration, congestion of the vessels of the meninges caused by cytokines during infections, local volumetric processes also provoke the “most common complaint” - headache, so how this increases the mechanical effect on the pain receptors of the structures surrounding the brain. General principle the localization of headaches is such that occipital pain often reflect irritation of the nociceptors of the vessels and meninges under the tentorium, and supralatal irritants and stimulation of the upper surface of the tent itself are manifested by fronto-parietal pain.

Headaches of psychosomatic origin, including pain from mental and physical stress, from insomnia, as a result of disputes and scandals, and other reasons related to the psyche.

In any case, if your head hurts often and you are out of commission periodically - consult a doctor, and only then a psychologist.