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Is your stiff neck more than just pain?
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This might be the culprit behind your migraines.
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Welcome to Migraine Heroes, a podcast for people living with chronic migraines with
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years of pain, misunderstanding and lack of answers.
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I'm Diane Ducarme, I've helped more than a thousand people reduce the burden of migraines
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and feel more in control.
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My mission in life?
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To help a million people.
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Each episode brings you grounded insight into what your body might be asking for and
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what can truly help.
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Just to keep you fully supported, this podcast is educational.
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For diagnosis or medication, always work with your doctor.
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Now take a breath and let's dive in.
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In this episode, you will learn how tight neck muscles can spark a full-blown migraine
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and why it's not just in your head, the powerful role of the brainstem and cervical
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spine and how even small changes in posture can help, and what Eastern medicine has known
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for centuries about stuck energy in the neck and two soothing daily rituals to start today.
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Stay with me till the end, because the link between your neck and migraines is more than
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mechanical and the most effective solution may not be what you expect.
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I remember doing a podcast with a former customer.
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She was a journalist and even though podcasts and journalism were her second nature, she
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was a little tense and so she stood up and did some yoga postures and came back to sit
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next to me and shared it with one of her hacks to avoid a migraine.
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She had become really skilled at it.
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We're now iterating the Migraine Now button of the Migraine Heroes app and this is one
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of the updates to expect.
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Please be kind and indulgent.
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This is a big road to adjust to all of us and for all of you.
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We've seen lots and lots and are trying to translate that in insights for all.
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So meanwhile, let's give you the knowledge and the tools.
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Let's begin with the basics.
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So what's the link between neck tension and migraines?
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While migraines are often thought as a purely neurological, an increasing body of evidence
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points to cervical spine, especially the upper neck, as a key player in triggering attacks.
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And this part is what's called cervicogenic migraine, where pain is going to start in
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the neck and then it's going to radiate to the head, mimicking a classic migraine, although
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I have to say there's no such thing as a classic migraine, but anyway, let's say one that starts
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So what is the anatomy behind the pain?
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The trigemino-cervical complex is a network of neurons in the brainstem where sensory
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information from the neck and head converge.
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If your upper cervical spine, so think of your C1, C2, C3 vertebrae are misaligned,
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inflamed or under chronic stress, the area becomes hyper excitable.
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And so according to a review in the Journal of Headache and Pain, stimulation of the upper
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cervical nerves activates the TCC, which can lead to migraine pain.
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And so in simpler terms, your brain can't always tell the difference between neck pain
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and a migraine trigger.
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So it sounds the alarm anyway.
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So as you can see here in the West, we're trying to find where is the pain originating?
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Is it originating in the brain or is it originating in the neck?
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And so which one is the primary cause of the head pain that is felt later?
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It's a little bit like we were discovering the gut-brain axis for the first time and
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discovering that digestion imbalances can create migraines.
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And sometimes the migraine can create digestive imbalances, that bi-directional relationship
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between the head and the rest of the body, here the head and the neck.
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So it's like the West is discovering, hey, I can have a structural neck tension that
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structurally gives me head pain, even though the pain naturally doesn't initially come
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I hope that makes sense.
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And so over the years, I've met a lot of people with cervical issues that really dated
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back from typically an accident.
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It would be sort of a very violent form of accident, a car accident usually, but not
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always sometimes a sports related injury.
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And those would sometimes involve a whiplash or at least a very strong shock.
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They usually remember vividly, usually, sometimes they have a doubt.
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And so if this is you, you can try to remember how the shock impacted you and see if you
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can correlate it with where your pain is.
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You will see that it's usually surprisingly similar.
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And if that's the case, it will put you in a little bit more at ease to know it's not
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coming out of nowhere.
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When it comes to migraine, your intuition is paramount.
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So that's going to feed your intuition.
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Now, top it off with posture, stress, and modern life.
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You can add in posture, hello phone, hello neck, jaw clenching, stress, and even sleeping
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And you've got a recipe for chronic tension in your neck muscles, and especially the suboccipitals,
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tiny muscles at the base of your skull that have direct neurological connection to the
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A 2020 study in cephalalgia found that people with migraines had significantly reduced neck
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mobility and increased muscle stiffness in the suboccipital region compared to controls.
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It's a vicious cycle.
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The pain causes the tension, tension increases neural sensitivity, and sensitivity fuels
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And so it feels like you're stuck, but you're not.
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In the East, they've understood this connection for thousands of years.
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Where Western science focuses on nerves and anatomy, traditional Chinese medicine is going
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to look at the flow of qi, the flow of energy through the channels called meridians.
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And when that qi, when that energy gets stuck, particularly in the neck, the head is going
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From this lens, the neck is a crucial gateway.
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It's where, for example, the bladder meridian runs, a pathway associated with the nervous
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system, the brain, and emotional processing blockages in this meridian, especially in
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the occipital region, are often linked with headache, eye pain, and dizziness.
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Now here's where it's fascinating.
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In traditional Chinese medicine, you pay your doctor as long as you're healthy.
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So if you had your first migraines at age 13, that's where your doctor would have been
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on the hook to restore that balance before your symptoms even began.
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And unlike in the West, where migraines are isolated and labeled, in the East, your body
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is seen as one set of interconnected systems.
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So treatment for migraines often begins not in the head, but in the neck, in the digestion,
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and in the breath.
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And so today we really want to emphasize on the neck component.
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Now you have cupping, gua sha, acupuncture, genital qigong movements that are used to
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release blocked energy, improve circulation, and reduce nervous system overactivation.
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And by the way, Ayurveda echoes this view, particularly the role of the vata imbalance,
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which governs movement and nervous system.
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This is vata can lead to tension, dryness, and neurotic pain, often settling in the neck
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So very similar here as well.
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So regardless that you're turning into meridians or modern science, one thing is clear.
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Your neck is not a side note,
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it's the center stage.
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So I want to give you two advice today.
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I want you to try two different exercises.
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The first one is that you lie flat on your back.
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You place a tennis ball on either side of the base of your skull, and you gently rest
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there for five to 10 minutes.
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You breathe slowly, you let your jaw relax, and this mini release helps calm the suboccipital
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muscles, reduce brainstem sensitivity, and invite your body out of flight or fight.
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Try it before bedtime or anytime your neck feels full.
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Now you can do another one, a bit like the journalist.
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You can sit comfortably in a chair or cross-legged on the floor with your spine tall and your
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shoulders relaxed.
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You place your hands gently on your thighs or your knees, palms down for grounding.
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And then step by step, you're going to first inhale deeply, gently lengthening your spine
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Imagine a string lifting you from the crown of your head.
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You're going to exhale a second and slowly tilt your right ear towards your right shoulder.
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Keep both shoulders relaxed.
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Don't let the left one hike up.
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And then three, you're going to deepen it.
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You're going to gently rest your right hand on the left side of your head, adding that
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softest pressure to encourage the stretch.
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Your left hand can reach slightly towards the floor to increase the opening.
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And you're going to hold there for five to eight slow breaths, letting the muscles melt.
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Imagine exhaling tension from the side of your neck.
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And then you're going to inhale to lift your head back to the center.
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And you're going to repeat it on the left side.
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Now there's an optional variation.
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If you want to target the back of your neck, after tilting your ear to shoulder, slowly
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rotate your gaze onward as if you're looking into your armpits.
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And then you breathe into the space at the base of your skull.
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Again, by no stretch of imagination am I saying that a tennis ball or a few year postures
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are going to undo years of pain.
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You might be at home and in absolutely excruciating pain.
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All I want to do today and in every single of these episodes is to give you some control.
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Gentle things that you can do without having to rely on others to feel some sense of relief
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wherever, whenever.
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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, Margarine Hero.
