From Feeling Lost to Finding Hope: 3 Shifts That Can Change Everything

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What changes when you start seeing migraine differently?

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Welcome to Migraine Heroes. For anyone living with migraine and wondering why nothing has fully

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worked yet, I'm Diane Ducarme. In seven years of working with people with migraine, I've learned

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that no two migraine stories are the same and none of them are simple. But your migraine has

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its own patterns. Here we look at them from different angles so you can start recognizing

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them for yourself. A quick note, this is educational. For diagnosis or medication,

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please keep working with your doctor. Now take a deep breath and let's dive in.

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In this episode, you will learn why feeling lost with migraine makes sense,

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and how to replace self-blame with a much more useful way of thinking.

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Why looking for one single cause can leave you going in circles, and how to start seeing the

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bigger picture, and how to find a way forward when you've tried so much already.

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Stay with me till the end because I want to show you how to start exploring your migraine

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differently and where you can find ideas that may be relevant to your own experience.

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In the last seven years, I've probably had more than a thousand hours of conversation with people

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who've spent years, if not decades, trying to understand their migraine. They had seen doctors,

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tried medications, changed their diets, monitored their sleep, questioned their hormones,

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eliminated foods, tried supplements, done acupuncture, and followed advice from so many

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different people and experts. And despite all of that effort, they were still having migraine

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attacks. And eventually the question became, what am I doing wrong? Because on top of the migraine

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itself, there's often the weight of not being believed, not being understood, or feeling that

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you should somehow be coping better. And after a while, those outside voices, they become your own.

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A small lagging voice that is like, I should become stronger, I should have figured this out

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by now, I shouldn't have cancelled again. And perhaps the hardest one of all, maybe this is

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just going to be my life forever. And I want to spend a moment here because I know how heavy that

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thought can be lingering and can be. You know, maybe you've stopped telling people how bad it

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really is because you don't want to explain yourself again. Maybe you've become an expert

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at smiling through discomfort, cancelling plans gracefully and pretending you're okay when you're

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absolutely not. And maybe you've watched people around you move forward with their lives while

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you feel as though yours keeps being interrupted. And maybe you've stopped looking forward to things

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quite as much because you've learned how painful it is to get your hopes up and then have to cancel.

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And maybe after trying so many things, even the word hope starts to feel exhausting.

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I really, really understand why. Because migraine does not just take hours from your day. It can

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take spontaneity, confidence, opportunities, relationships, your personality really,

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and sometimes pieces of the person you remember being before migraine became such a big part of

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your life. And I don't want to minimize any of that. And I certainly don't want to tell you

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that changing your mindset will somehow make your migraine disappear. Migraine is incredibly

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complex because it's incredibly diverse. We use one word, migraine. But behind that one word,

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there are so many different processes happening inside the body, interacting in different ways

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and different people. Your migraine may have very little in common with the migraine of the

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person sitting next to you. And yet we often talk about migraine as if it were on one single problem

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with one single explanation, waiting for one single solution. So think about the position

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it puts you in. Here you are, you're trying to solve one of the most complicated puzzles in

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medicine, often with fragmented advice, conflicting opinion, and people pulling you in different

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direction. And everyone has an opinion. But then you're the person, you are the person who has to

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live with the consequences of those decisions. And you know some of them, if poorly chosen,

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can bite back so much. You're the one who has to reorganize your life. You have to try something

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new. You have to deal with the disappointment when it doesn't work, and somehow find the energy

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to start again. That impact is enormous. So when you're struggling to parent, to work, to socialize,

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or simply to get through an ordinary day, we're not talking about a minor inconvenience. We're

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talking about a neurological condition that science is still trying hard to fully understand.

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That's why this podcast goes east and west, because we need both to have an as full picture

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as possible. But it does leave us with a reality, a good reality, is that no one else has the

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complete picture of your migraine. Your doctor sees you during a consultation, and a specialist

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may focus on one aspect of your condition. And a treatment may target one biological pathway.

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But you, you are the person living inside this experience every single day. You're the person

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who knows what happened before the attack, how you felt the previous morning, what changed in your

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sleep, how your energy shifted, whether your digestion was different, whether something felt

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unusual before the pain even began. Now that doesn't mean you're supposed to diagnose yourself,

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or become your own doctor, but it means you have a role that nobody else can fully, fully play.

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You have the keys to your brain. You have to become an active participant in understanding

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your own health. And I know that can feel unfair, right? That's someone else's job.

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And because when you're already exhausted, the last thing you want is another responsibility.

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You want answers. You want someone to take you through all the pieces, put them together,

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and say, here, this is what's happening, and this is what we're going to do.

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Wouldn't that be wonderful? So I'm going to introduce you to our first shift, from fighting

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yourself to listening to yourself. You've lived with migraine for a long time. It's easy to start

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treating your body like it's an adversary. You get angry at it. Maybe you stop trusting it,

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like you feel betrayed when an attack arrives on the day you really need it to be well.

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You're going to make plans and wonder whether your body is going to cooperate.

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And after enough disappointment, you can almost start living in opposition to yourself.

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But what if, instead of constantly fighting your body, you start to become curious about it?

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Not in an obsessive way, not monitoring every single thing to do, but gently asking,

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what am I noticing? What have I not understood yet? And that brings us to the second shift,

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from searching from one cause to understanding relationships in between those causes.

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We're often encouraged to look for triggers. Chocolate, wine, stress, sleep, weather.

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And sometimes those connections are genuinely useful and they can genuinely save you days of

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your life. But migraine does not follow a simple formula, as you may have figured as much. You can

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have a terrible night's sleep and wake up perfectly fine, then sleep beautifully and still develop a

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migraine. You can have an incredibly stressful week without an attack, only to get to the moment you

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can finally relax and bam, it hits you. So you can start wondering whether any of it makes sense.

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But perhaps the problem is that we're looking at things too separately. Maybe the question isn't

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whether stress triggers your migraine. Maybe it's how you can increase your resilience to stress

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and meanwhile, what triggers will add to that same load, to that same pattern. Maybe it isn't

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about identifying one guilty ingredient. Maybe it's about understanding the relationship between

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different parts of your brain and of your biology. So curiosity can make your life more open,

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not more restricted. You should not have to become afraid of food or exercise or travel,

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socializing or every unexpected change in your routine. The objective is not to control every

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variable. It's to understand what may matter for you and what may not. Which brings me to our third

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shift, which is from forcing change to cultivating change. And so I love this idea because it takes

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some of the pressure away. When you've been struggling for years, there can be this enormous

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urgency to fix everything. You find a new treatment and you want it to work immediately.

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You change your diet and you look for results. Then you try a new routine and after a few weeks,

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you're wondering whether you've failed again. And I really understand that urgency. When you're in

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pain, of course you want relief. Of course you want your life back as fast as possible. But

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building a better understanding of your migraine is often a process of observation, experimentation,

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adjustment, sometimes letting go of ideas that didn't turn out to be useful. You don't have to

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overhaul your entire life to make progress. Maybe you begin by noticing the difference between your

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energy on a working day and a day off. Maybe you explore a connection you've never considered

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before. Maybe you realize that something you've spent years avoiding doesn't actually seem to

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make much difference to your migraine. Small insights can change the direction of your

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search. And they're valuable even when they don't lead to immediate symptomatic relief.

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Because there's a difference between constantly trying to fix yourself and gradually learning how

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to work with the reality of your own body. One creates enormous pressure and the other creates

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room to explore. And I know that asking you to take a more active role in understanding your

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migraine may sound like I'm giving you yet another job. But I see it differently. It's about giving

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you back a little of the influence that migraine may have taken away. It's about no longer assuming

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that because a treatment failed, you failed. It's about recognizing that the explanations you've

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been given so far may be incomplete rather than concluding that nothing can help. And most

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importantly, it's about understanding that there is a huge difference between taking responsibility

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of your health and taking the blame for your illness. You did not choose to have migraine.

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You cannot control every attack. You should not have to carry the guilt of every treatment that

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did not work. But you can continue to ask questions. And you can continue discovering

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things about your body. And you can challenge assumptions, including your own. And you can find

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people who listen. And you can give yourself permission to change direction when something

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isn't helping. You're not at the end of your story just because you haven't found the answer yet.

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Perhaps today, hope isn't believing that everything will suddenly get better. Perhaps

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it's simply asking a different question. Not why can't I fix myself? But what haven't we

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understood yet? Not why am I still struggling when I have tried so hard? But what might be

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worth exploring differently? And not what if nothing ever changes? But what if there are

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still possibilities I haven't considered? That's a different place from which to move forward. And I

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want you to do exactly that. So if there's one thing I'd love you to take away from today,

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it's this. Less self-blame. More curiosity. Less forcing. More understanding. And you may not have

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all the answers yet. But that doesn't mean there's nothing left to discover. And you don't have to

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stop living while you explore. I say that with just so much love. It's funny because you have

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hope for yourself. And in so many ways, I have hope for you. For you too. You know, I want to

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share something personal with you. I'm 43 years old. And today, sorry, I have a runny nose. My son

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came back from school with a runny nose. So we moved from New Zealand to Europe. And different

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germs. Also a complete change of season. So I'm adjusting. But I'm showing up today anyway. We

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don't mind. I'm just sorry that my voice sounds different. So I'm 43 years old. And I've spent the

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last seven years of my life working on migraine. Seven years. And that's a significant part of my

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adult life. And I think about that sometimes. About how much of my life, my energy, my heart,

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I've put in trying to understand this incredibly complex condition. And how much progress we've

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made. And some days, I feel so full of hope. I can barely continue. Just yesterday, for example,

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a woman sent us a message to our team through the app. She had downloaded it, entered her symptoms.

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It's the Migraine Heroes app. The green one with the yellow love heart in the brain. And she

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discovered her pattern. It's easier to go, by the way, on MigraineHeroes.com. Just remember,

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MigraineHeroes.com. Then you can discover. And you can do your analysis. It's important you

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analyze us before you meet with us fully. Anyway, she discovered her pattern. And she started making

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changes with what she was eating. Based on those insights. Just adding food. It's not changing her

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diet. Just adding food. And really, honestly, a small commitment. Like 39 years daughter. Cancel

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anytime. No trap. And then she just sent this beautiful message. This is completely anonymous.

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So I'll indulge. She just says, I just want to share how ridiculously well I'm feeling. And how

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little this cycle has impacted my mood or my energy. I even went for a full run today. Huge

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thank you to the team for all your support and encouragement. So when she says the team, it's

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because there's real people reading the trackers and making adaptive changes inside the app. Like

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we're a real team with real people. And I read that and I thought, oh wow, so cool. These moments,

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they matter enormously to me because they show me what's possible. So she's just saying thank you.

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And I have probably 2000 notes like hers in my phone. And I hang on to them because this is my

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hope. But if more people can understand their patterns, make informed changes, and begin to

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find their way forward on their own terms. And then almost at the same time, life reminds me

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how just complicated the work really is. I'm going to read you another one. This one dates back from

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a month ago, but it's quite gorgeous. Thanks Tia. And it's been an incredible transformation. And

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I'm beyond grateful for all that you and your team have done. Not only do I feel able to start

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reducing my medication, but I'm also now looking for a new job. Something I thought

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may not be possible again when I was so low a year ago. It speaks volumes that I now get a

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bit frustrated when I have a bad day. But the bad days are nowhere even close to how they were

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six to nine months ago. You're incredible and you're doing something wonderful to help people

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like me. And then there's this emoji with two love hearts in the emoji and a little prayer.

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So that's my hope. That's my hope. I have a hope for you too. I have ambition for you too.

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Ambition of life. Ambition of love. Ambition of work. Start with the first step. Start with trust.

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So I have one simple thing you can do today. Well, a couple. You can go on margarineheroes.com

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because I think you should get to know us. That's all for today. I hope this episode helped

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you notice some new things. If you'd like to keep exploring your patterns, you can find us on

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margarineheroes.com. Your body has a story to tell. Let's keep listening. I will be back with you soon.