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Does your phone feel like both your lifeline and your worst migraine trigger?
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Let's talk about how to use it without letting it rule or ruin your brain.
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Migraine Heroes is a podcast for chronic migraine sufferers who've seen countless doctors with
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Learn how to reduce your migraine attacks without endless medications or constant sacrifices.
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Hello, I'm Diane Ducarme.
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I've helped over 500 people break free from migraine, even after suffering for up to 60
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My mission in life?
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To bring this relief to a million people using a unique blend of Eastern medicine and Western
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In this episode, you will learn the exact ways smartphones and screens over-stimulate
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the brain, and how to contract them without giving up your online life.
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How to shape your day to reduce migraine risk from screen time, even if your job is fully
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Daily brain buffering habits you can build to stay productive without triggering pain.
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Stay with me till the end, we'll break down a work-friendly screen detox routine you
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Nowadays, the average adult spends over 11 hours per day engaging with screens for work,
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communication, and entertainment.
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And this staggering figure marks a dramatic evolution from just a decade ago, when screen
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time was primarily limited to office hours and evening TV.
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The rise of smartphones, remote work, social media, and on-demand content has blurred the
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boundaries between what is called productivity and leisure, making all of these digital interactions
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And so what was once a tool has become a digital environment we inhabit.
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It is shaping our attention spans, posture, mental health, and even our sleep.
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According to the American Foundation, this digital immersion is now one of the most common
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yet underestimated environmental migraine triggers.
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The constant flicker of screens, artificial blue lights, and prolonged eyestrain can
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overstimulate the brain's visual processing centers, especially in individuals overly
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prone to sensory sensitivity.
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Adds to that poor posture, reduced natural light exposure, and the mental fatigue that
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comes from non-stop digital engagement, and you have a perfect storm for migraine onset.
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What makes this trigger particularly insidious is its invisibility.
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Unlike strong smells or loud noises, screen time feels passive and often necessary.
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Yet for many, it quietly chips away at neurological stability, increasing both the frequency and
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severity of migraine attacks.
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As I've been researching this episode, I found myself wondering, do I really spend
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11 hours a day on a screen?
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This number is ridiculous.
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It's astronomical and almost absurd.
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And yet, when I start tracing hours, it adds up more quickly than I'd like to admit.
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I remember when WhatsApp first entered my life.
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I was on a road trip from Boston to Miami in Florida with my friend Caroline.
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And that was in between our two years of business school.
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And Caroline is one of those friends who just makes everything better.
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She's always laughing, always in a good mood, and has this easygoing energy that makes you
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feel like everything's going to be okay.
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Being around her is like taking a breath of fresh air.
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She's light, she's fun,
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you can count on her to lift your spirits without even trying.
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So we were heading together to Disneyland, and I recall feeling so irritated in the car
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that she kept checking her phone.
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She had this new app called WhatsApp, and she was a very early adopter of that.
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And she was telling me I should try it.
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And I was thinking she just wasn't fully present.
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If I was driving, she would text on the app, so I'd make her take the wheel so that she'd
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And now I am Caroline.
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WhatsApp isn't just for chatting for me anymore,
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it's how I manage friendships, playdates for my children, school updates, birthday parties,
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I even have a chat to myself where I can store a few important links for things I need later
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work on the computer, of course, with Migraine Heroes.
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I'm not much of a social media person, but in the evenings I love a cozy rom-com that
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starts well and ends well, or a quick stand-up comedy on a rainy day when life has been more
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difficult than I would have liked, and that I have little time to reboot my mind.
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Now let's translate 11 hours of screen time, or however much it is for you, into migraine
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What are we talking about?
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In 2024, there was a study published in the journal Headache that stated that over 70%
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of migraine sufferers reported screen-related symptoms exacerbation with strong links to
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duration of exposure, light intensity, and scrolling behavior.
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Research in cephalalgia showed that people with chronic migraine experience increased
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photophobia and neurological hypersensitivity after just 30 to 60 minutes of continuous
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screen use, especially on smartphones.
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And indeed, we know a couple of things.
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We know that blue light exposure reduces melatonin, disrupts sleep, and increases cortical excitability.
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A 2020 article in Nature Neuroscience showed how light-sensitive pathways in the retina
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overstimulate the thalamus, a key relay point for migraine pain.
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We also know that multitasking and notifications ramp up cognitive load, increasing emotional
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dysregulation and stress, which in turn sensitize pain circuits.
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And we know that most people work or browse from phones or laptops with their heads down,
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shoulders slouched, and this activates neck and jaw tension, which are known migraine
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Now, unlike our phones or apps, the human brain and body don't get yearly software updates.
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In fact, our last major evolutionary update was the development of wisdom teeth around
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35,000 years ago, when our ancestors needed extra molars to chew tough roots and raw meat.
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And by the way, I am an unevolved species, as I still personally grew them.
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Since then, our biology has remained remarkably unchanged, even as our environment has transformed
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beyond recognition.
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Fire was our first great tool, electricity the second, but now we're navigating a world
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of constant pings, high-speed connectivity, and relentless cognitive simulation.
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Our nervous systems, finely tuned for survival on the savannas, are now bombarded by glowing
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screens, algorithmic feeds, and digital overload.
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It is no wonder so many of us feel fried, foggy, or anxious.
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Evolution simply can't keep pace with the inventions, and our brains are trying to run
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21st century software on stone-age lovely hardware.
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So that seems bleak, but don't you worry, I'll bring you concrete hacks and solutions
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at the end of this episode.
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So now let's turn east.
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Eastern philosophies may not speak directly of screen time, but their wisdom offers a
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clear lens through which to understand its effects.
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In the East, there is a belief that overstimulation can fragment the spirit, your shen, scatter
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the qi, your energy, your metabolism, and weaken the very foundation of health, especially
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at times when the body is most vulnerable.
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And so during what is called tsuo yue zi, the postpartum period, so after the mom delivers
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the baby, in traditional Chinese medicine culture, the mother is seen in that time as
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both incredibly fragile and profoundly important,
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she's the vital life source for her newborn. So society, rather than pushing her to bounce
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back, lose her ways, and welcome her in-laws, surrounds her with warmth, quiet, and rest.
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And even today in modern China, for those who choose to honor this tradition, the month
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is still observed without screens, not out of nostalgia, but out of wisdom, to protect
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the nervous system, preserve energy, and allow true recovery.
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Now I insist, this is very true, no screen time for a month after birth.
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In traditional Chinese medicine, the mind and body are not separate.
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The brain is seen as an extension of, namely, the heart and kidney systems, which govern
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mental clarity, willpower, and essence.
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And excessive screen use overstimulates the shen, the spirit, scatters the qi, the vital
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energy, and depletes the jing, core vitality, especially when there's little rest or natural
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connection to balance it.
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The constant visual stimulation, taxes the liver, which in traditional Chinese medicine
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governs the eyes, and is easily agitated by stress, tension, or overstimulation.
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And over time, this can create internal imbalances, eye strain, headaches, poor sleep, anxious
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thoughts, digestive disturbances, all signs that the nervous system is out of sync with
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the body's deeper rhythms.
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And in this view, screens are not inherently bad, but when overused without grounding,
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they disrupt harmony, pulling us further from presence, stillness, and embodied awareness.
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Then how to lead a better life, while not being ostracized, while not being excluded
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from the rest of society?
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Even though I use screen a lot, probably more than I should, I actually feel quite
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strong in this area. And
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that's because helping a million of you depends on one thing, that my computer serves me,
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and my phone serves me, and not the other way around.
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And so I've built some solid habits over the years that help me stay in control, and
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I want to share them with you, not because I'm perfect, but because they work, at least
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for me, and I hope they inspire you.
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So the first one is that I try to respect the natural rhythm of the body.
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A sleep cycle is about 90 minutes, 9-0,
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so I wait about that long after waking up, before opening my phone.
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That's just a routine of how my day-to-day,
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and I try to shut it down 90 minutes before bed.
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Now, that for me is at times harder, because of evening calls, I'm busy in New Zealand,
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in practice it's a bit less than 90,
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but when I don't give myself enough buffer, either morning or evening, I can definitely
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feel my mind becoming more scattered.
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So I invite you to observe that, and make the changes and the adjustments that you'd
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I also pay close attention to how I feel after consuming certain content.
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A rom-com leaves me feeling light, a stand-up comedy show helps me unwind,
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but a terrible headline?
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That can leave me anxious and low, especially when it's something I can't do anything
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about and I can't control.
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So I've learned to be quite selective,
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I read the news when I need to make decisions, literally,
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but I don't let it hijack my nervous system,
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and so as you can guess, I do not read them that often.
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One thing we have observed at Migraine Heroes, and it may be the topic of another podcast,
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is that during intense political events, migraines were on the rise and people would comment
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on their political concerns in their daily trackers of the Migraine Heroes app.
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Then I use filters on my phone to soften the visuals and reduce stimulation.
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So on the iPhone, for example, you can go into accessibility and then display and text
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size and make a few tweaks.
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Android phones have similar options under digital well-being,
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and for my laptop, I'm going to use apps that shift the screen tone throughout the day.
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But one of my favorite habits, I focus less on screen time and measuring it and more
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on real grounding.
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And every day I need to walk for about 45 minutes, that's something that has to be done
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and I'm decently good at it, I quite enjoy it.
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That's a long time.
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So I found a hack that works well, is I do actually what I call digital walks.
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I call friends or I call family, and I put my phone in my pocket and I just walk and
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I'm outdoors, I'm looking at the nature, I'm moving, I'm not staring at a screen.
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That's how I recharge in nature as an extroverted person who cannot always predict the time
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when I have some time off.
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And on social media, honestly, it either makes me more needy or more critical.
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I end up trying to reach between the lines, judging what's real, what's performative,
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and that kind of mental effort I find exhausting.
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So I set boundaries. I unsubscribe from anything I don't actually use. I delete new letters
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I actively try to clean the noise to just keep the things that truly serve me and the
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people that are very honest around me.
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Now another one that I've noticed that is quite migraine specific is when I do onboarding
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calls, I often notice that many people wear these yellow tinted glasses,
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and I think they're terrific.
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It's a non-invasive way to support your nervous system.
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It's such a simple tool, but it can make a real difference in reducing visual over-stimulation,
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especially if you're light sensitive or prone to migraine with aura.
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I even, the other day, met someone working on the retail floor who wore them all day
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I thought, bold and well done.
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It's small choices like that that show real self-awareness and courage in taking care
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of your health, even in public and working spaces.
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These aren't hard rules. They're little practices that may help you feel more like yourself,
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and I hope one or two might resonate with you.
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And remember, every small step you take moves you closer to freedom.
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You are powerful, you are resilient, and you are no longer alone.
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Keep rising, migraine hero.
