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Are your migraines actually a side effect of perfectionism?
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Let's talk about the painful link between the pressure to control everything and chronic migraine attacks.
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Migraine Heroes is a podcast for chronic migraine sufferers who've seen countless doctors with no results.
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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 years.
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My mission in life? To bring this relief to a million people using a unique blend of Eastern medicine and Western science.
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In this episode, you will learn how
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perfectionist tendencies can create a constant state of neurological stress that triggers migraines.
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Why your need for control may be linked to deeper emotional patterns and how releasing them can reduce pain.
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And simple action tools from both neuroscience and traditional Chinese medicine to help you loosen control without losing your sense of self.
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Stay with me till the end because you'll make new links and uncover simple techniques that go far beyond willpower.
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Tools that rewire your brain and body for relief.
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Let's start with this.
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Perfectionism isn't just a personality trait. It's a chronic, low-grade, stress response.
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In a 2021 study published in the Journal of Behavioral Research and Therapy,
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researcher Flett and colleagues found that maladaptive perfectionism was strongly correlated with chronic stress and burnout.
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Now, let's try to connect the dots. What is perfectionism?
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Psychologists defined it as a tendency to set
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unrealistically high standards
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accompanied by harsh self-criticism and an overwhelming fear of failure.
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This isn't just about neat handwriting or high grades.
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It's about a constant inner tension that tension sends a steady stream of stress signals
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through the nervous system.
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When your body perceives constant threat,
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even internal ones like not being good enough, it activates your sympathetic nervous system.
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That is your fight-or-flight mechanism. And over time, this disregulates the
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hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis,
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HPA axis, which controls your stress hormones like cortisol.
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Several studies, including a 2020 paper in Headache, the Journal of Head and Face Pain,
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have shown that chronic HPA axis activation is directly tied to migraine frequency and intensity.
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There's also a brain-based component.
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Neuroimaging studies have found that people with perfectionist traits show increased activity in the anterior cingulate cortex,
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a region that constantly checks for mistakes and can amplify pain perception.
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Basically, the more you ruminate, the more your brain keeps the pain alarm on.
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Add to this link between control and trauma,
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many perfectionists have learned early on that being perfect is the only way to avoid rejection or chaos.
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This leads to chronic hypervigilance, which neuroscientist Dr. Portes explains as part of the
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dysregulated polyvagal system, meaning your body never feels safe enough to relax.
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So what do we get when we mix perfectionism, control, and this chronic overactivation?
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A system on constant high alert, increased pain sensitivity, and a brain that never gets the signal to calm down.
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Now, let me say this.
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Many people have been led to perfection not by vanity, but by survival.
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Somewhere along the way, life taught them that being careful, being right, being flawless was safer
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than being seen as messy, slow, or wrong.
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Maybe they grew up needing to hold things together, or maybe chaos around them made order feel like peace.
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So they learned to excel, to anticipate, to never disappoint, and while that perfection brought them success,
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it also came with a quiet exhaustion, the kind that whispers you can rest now, but they no longer know how.
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Perfection was never their flaw, it was their armor, and
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beneath it lies a tender wish to simply be loved.
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Not for what they do perfectly, but for who they truly are. In Eastern philosophy,
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perfection is not something to be achieved, but something to be released.
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The Thaist view teaches that life is already in harmony.
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It is we who resist its flow. When you try to perfect yourself, you separate from the natural rhythm
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that is already whole. Like polishing a mirror that was never dirty, you create effort where there was once clarity.
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And so the more you strive to be flawless,
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the further you drift from the peace that comes from simply being.
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The path of the middle, or called the middle way, as described by Buddha, is the art of balance.
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It's not about indulgence or deprivation, success or failure, but the wisdom of not clinging to either.
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In this space, you stop measuring yourself against ideals and instead return to presence.
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The quiet knowing that you are neither behind nor ahead, neither broken nor complete.
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You begin to see that life is not a problem to be solved, but a flow to be lived within.
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When you walk the middle path, you start to trust imperfection as part of the design.
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The cracks, the pauses, the undone moments, they are where your humanity breathes.
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In Eastern philosophy, perfection is not the absence of flows, it's the acceptance of all that is.
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The middle way invites you to soften your edges, to act without forcing,
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to do your best without needing to prove it.
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In that balance, you don't lose your drive, you find your freedom.
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And I'll be very honest here, I don't have it.
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I run myself quite hard.
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I'm learning the middle way.
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Every day, I work tirelessly to help people across the globe to feel better.
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I do, I really do.
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I feel my life is so finite and that I should make the most of it.
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And at times, I have to catch myself pushing my own boundaries for that of others.
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I think this is part of being human.
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I'm human as well and I'm finding my middle way.
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My children always will pull me back when they tell me something
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and they can see I'm lost in my own thoughts.
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They say loading, loading, loading to attract my attention,
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that I meander and I laugh, they quote me.
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It is a difficult apprenticeship, that of letting go and of accepting imperfection.
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I try to be joyful and iterative in all things
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and to fall asleep looking at what went right every day
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with immense gratitude for the things that sometimes we can take for granted.
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So you don't have to let go of control all at once.
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You can start by creating safe spaces, physically, emotionally, energetically,
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where your nervous system can rest, where your liver can move freely
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and when your brain is no longer scanning for the next threat,
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the next frustration or the things you did wrong.
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As you know from me, a good romance has always been a kick of energy
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and recently we've had the joy of serving a librarian in the US, in Minnesota,
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who is making beautiful progress and seeing less pain in her life.
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At least I see that and it makes me so joyful
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and I don't know if it's a coincidence or something deeper
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but it led me back to reading, really reading and rediscovering,
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honestly, I'm just going to be very honest here,
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discovering the quiet joy of it and I'm loving it.
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Somehow, when I put my book down, my mind feels clear
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as if the stories have swept away the noise.
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I can more vividly see what life is asking of me in this podcast, in this role,
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in the solution that I'm developing for those who suffer.
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And so I hope in your home today you can find something that you can cling on to,
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that breathing room for imperfection and for looking at the day in the very present.
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And remember, every small step you take moves you closer to freedom.
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and you are no longer alone.
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Keep rising, migraine hero.
