Effective Natural Headache Remedies: Holistic Relief

I get what are called "ice pick" headaches several times a year and they are very hard to deal with.

After trying several things with no luck (zapping, eft, theta healing), I finally woke up and looked on Earthclinic. I used the suggestion of putting a small amount of cayenne papper on the tip of the tongue, waiting about 30 seconds, and then drinking 12 or so ounces of pure cool water.

It worked like a charm and a few hours later a very slight headache reappeared, but I did the cayenne again and it stopped the pain immediately!

Your child may just be thirsty! The first thing I do when I feel a headache coming on (which is almost never as I eat well and stay very hydrated) is drink at least one huge glass of water. It may take several glasses to catch up. If your pee isn't clear you are dehydrated. Often after sleeping all night is when we are most dehydrated. Please try this. I hope it helps!

I discovered a couple of years ago that whenever I got a headache and I drank a few cups of water, it almost always went away. I've been doing that ever since. I rarely get headaches these days since I try to drink at least 12 cups a day now.

Leaking gas in a home is a common cause of headaches, though it's not well known. Hulda Clark talks about it in her book: Cure for all Diseases. I was very sick for years, with Chronic Fatigue and constant headaches. Finally I bought myself a gas detector ($150 on Amazon), and discovered that the water heater was leaking propane, and had been for a long time. When the water heater was replaced, my headaches disappeared within days, and my energy increased dramatically! Propane and Natural Gas can make you very sick, but the big gas companies don't want you to know about it! Check out gasleak.org for another story about a family who were very ill because of leaking gas.

Then I moved, and began to have headaches again. My gas leak detector quickly identified the gas kitchen range as the source of a leak. Again, after turning off the gas to the stove, my headaches quickly went away. Chemical sensitivities also cause headaches, for example: strong smelling cleaners, air freshners, and insect sprays. By the way, 100% of my friends and family's houses that I checked with the detector also had gas leaks somewhere in the home!

I think that MOST headaches have to do with your bowels. When the poisons leak out of stopped up bowels, you get headaches. If you get colonics and take enemas and also add to your diet castoria and syrup of figs, then that may help you tremendously. Hope this helps all of you that have headaches. I do not get them because I have always eaten a diet rich in figs, dates, fiber and things that push stool out easily. I also do castor oil packs and I get a colonic about once every 6 months.

I suffered from headaches as a child and as an adult. Someone told me to cut out eggs from my diet and rub magnesium cream on my forehead everyday. Lo and behold, the headaches are gone completely. They come back if I eat eggs or soy (all chinese food). The magnesium cream is from Bioinnovations- Dr. Becker's products.

I agree peppermint oil works wonders. I have also drank peppermint tea as well, which also seemed to work well.

I soooooo agree! It's amazing. Works awesome for nausea. I rub it on my tummy and throat and it's gone in minutes. But for headaches it's AWESOME!!!! I put it not only on my temples but totally across my fore head and wow, it's almost instantaneous! And if I feel sinus pressure on my cheeks I put it there too!

I keep a bottle of Peppermint Oil (essential oil) in my pocketbook. You dab the oil on your index finger and middle finger. Then rub it on the same two fingers of the other hand. Close your eyes so the fumes don't irritate your eyes. Rub, in a circular motion, on either side of your head at your temples. Don't be afraid to press hard while rubbing. I haven't taken a headache medicine in years. I am 58. You can get the oil at a health food store.

Just make sure you don't take your daily Vitamin with the 5HTP (take the 5HTP with dinner) because the 5HTP will metabolize with your vitamin and go into your blood stream, you want it to go to your brain. It increases the serotonin levels, hence the popularity between 5HTP and users of club drugs such as MDMA or Amphetamines. Thanks for your time, good luck with your headaches. ~ Caleb

BETTER BUT WITH SIDE EFFECTS

I have to say that the cayenne pepper worked, but it burned like HELL!!!!!! I WON'T be doing this again! I spent the last 10 minutes running around the house screaming like a maniac for water. I think next time, I'll just use aspirin.

Hi Hlw, Could you tell me what kind of pain will be helped by half a dropper full of oil of oregano under the tongue? My mother (aged 77) has tardive dyskinesia (involuntary movements of the tongue, causing pain and discomfort). Her doctors can do nothing to help. She says she would be willing to try the oil.

Thanks, Sasha

CHRONIC HEADACHES

Wild oil of oregano... because the oils generally come with a dropper, you only need a very small amount dropped on your finger; rubbed into temple and base of neck for severe headaches. less than 10 minutes the pain is gone. oftentimes the pain radiates from the trapesius muscle-- a dab of the oil of oregano won't hurt. gently massage into muscle, then apply pressure. keep away from the eyes. not for the faint of heart: 1/2 dropper full under the tongue will kill any pain. or a small amount dropped onto finger and rubbed on the gums will relieve a toothache.

Not only does this work, but it's been enhanced with the use of a device known as the Cryotron, only some dr's have it so far, but it works great!

My aunt taught me this form of accupressure for a headache. I works and feels really good once the pressure is off.
Take one your thumbs and place it just above the nose where it goes into the forhead. Not on the nose,but directly between the eyes of the sufferer. Next, take your other thumb and place at the base of their skull in the back. The soft spot just below where the skull ends at the top of the back of the neck. Apply firm and even pressure for the count of ten. When you reach ten SLOWLY release the pressure to the count of ten. Most people I have performed this on have been amazed at how "delicious" this feels. I use my middle fingers to apply the pressure as this is more comfortable to me.

Brilliant.

Deirdre - how about a page for the funniest posts. I'd definitely nominate this one along with ouchy mcnumbface for earache and BC boy from smithers for canker sore. I often go back to those two when I've had a bad day. Wonder if they aren't the same person.

Cayenne pepper for headache

First of all, I'd like to give praise to Earth Clinic for such a fabulous website! I have tried many remedies from the site and they ALL worked...with the exception of the cayenne pepper for my headache! I had a headache behind my left eye and decided I'd snort some of the pepper as I'd read that it cured many a headache. Not too familiar with snorting foreign substances up my nose, I wasn't sure how to do it. So I grabbed a spoon, dug out some pepper (mistake number one) and sniffed. My first thought was that the synapses in my brain were misfiring when I decided to try this method. My second thought was that I wondered if this is how it felt to stick a blowtorch up my nostril and light it. Before I looked in the mirror, I seriously wondered if my left eyeball had shrunk to the size of a raisin and fallen into my now empty eye socket. (It hadn't...my eyeball, albeit on fire, was thankfully intact)! In my haste to grab a tissue and blow this fireball out of my nose, I ran into the open cupboard door (this REALLY happened)and smacked myself square on the forehead...(mistake number two). After a minute or twenty, the pervasive burning had dissipated, but a new, equally as fun sensation was happening....the cayenne was dripping from my nasal cavity into my throat. For pete's sake, I was now TASTING the pepper! I drank a tall glass of water and decided that i had had it....and took an ibuprofen. Unfortunately, the cayenne did not take my headache away. Although, who knows what would have happened had I not ran headfirst into the cupboard! So, this will be my very first "Nay" post on the site...with a gentle reminder that if you decide to try it, do NOT use more than a teensy bit of cayenne and for the love of God, shut all cupboard doors FIRST!

Massage cured my headaches

I began having headaches, often debilitating ones, and even a migraine, the day after a bout of vertigo. I went to several doctors and tried all sorts of remedies over several very trying weeks, to no avail. Finally I went to a neurologist who figured out that I was having "tension headaches" caused by tightness in my neck and shoulders. The tightness was likely a way to avoid the vertigo. Within minutes of massage and gentle head movements to relax the muscles, the headaches melted away. The immediacy of the result was stunning. I followed up with several professional massages.

I too used to drink Gatorade often for headache or fatigue or just feeling really ill. However gatorade is not the healthiest drink so I tried instead:

1/4-1/2 tsp. Sea salt (celtic seems to need less)
and 1/4 of a lemon or sea salt plus 1 tsp molaasses or raw honey
stir into 8 ounces of cool water

Molasses is rich in minerals as is the sea salt and honey is full of medicinal qualities...If I believe I am more dehydrated I will try the molasses or honey first and if I believe I am toxic I will use the lemon.

Headaches!

I often use earthclinic to cure common family ills. Tonight my dd and I had headaches so I logged on because I forgot what we used the last time, which was ACV and that worked! However, she did not want the ACV so I found a post where they used coconut oil because the brain is made of fat!

Instead, I used Cod Liver Oil, 1 tsp., and she drank OJ with hers. Both of our headaches went away and we both had them prior for hours!

Thanks again!

This is for someone who may have tried EVERYTHING. My daughter had a 2 1/2 year long headache. She lost ages 11 1/2 - 14 because of constant pain. And I do mean constant. It NEVER STOPPED OR ABATED. The headache would be a 3-4 on the pain scale ALL THE TIME but would 'spike' several times daily to 7-8-9. We had CT & MRI which showed nothing.

Believing in alternative care we had her seen and treated by two chiropractors, one being our regular who knew this child's body well, a cranio-sacral massage therapist, theraputic massage, acupunture, and in addition was seen by her own GP, 2 neurologists, was given drugs that did not work: for blood pressure control (hers was fine, but they were throwing spaghetti at the wall to see what would stick), muscle relaxers, vasoconstrictors, migraine meds, OTC remedies, hot packs, cold packs, had her eyes checked, had her dentist look at her, consulted with her orthodontist, had Hashimoto's diagnosed and treated by a specialist, even went through the biofeedback program at Seattle's Children's Hospital. NOTHING worked. She dispaired for her life and we found that she was cutting to relieve the pain.

Thankfully we homeschool and she wasn't under stress of public school's rigid structure. One school year she did nothing more than read 8 books and turn in book reports to me. Yet her year end SAT (require testing) were above average and she isn't an 'A' student!

We didn't do food allergies as we saw no correlation there. After Thanksgiving when she was 13 1/2 the headache level went to an 8-9 all the time with spikes of 10 (or 12 as she put it!). She began throwing up. Over the next 2 weeks she had an urgent care visit with some sort of injected pain killer that didn't help at all. Then an ER visit that helped marginally. During that 2 weeks she ate little, drank little and slept even less as the nausea was everpresent. At the end of that 2 weeks, and on the eve of our final conference with the biofeedback doctor she began throwing up again. She couldn't stop and after a sip of water would egress more than she ingested.

We were so pleased with Children's Hospital's ER staff. She was attended by 4 neurologists including the dept head and was eventually admitted. Morphine did not help; Dilauded helped marginally. She was nearly dilusional by this time, terribly hungry, dehydrated and sleep deprived. It took 4 days of IV Zolfran to calm the nausea to where she could take her thyroid meds and not barf them up.

After about 3 days of constant flow of neurologists, p-shrinks, etc, they came to a diagnosis: "Chronic non-progressive headache w/o migraine". I thought it was a garbage can diagnosis. But they told us they were going to try the anti-depressant "Amitriptyline" with a low dose as they'd found that it raised Serotonin levels in some patients and alleviated the headaches. We even had a neurologist asked us if we'd investigated food allergies and when we said 'no' he retorted "Good! You wouldn't have found anything!"

After 6 1/2 days in the hospital she was released and found that this prescription began to work. Within 4 months her pain was down to a 1 or 2 on the pain scale. They upped the dose slightly and she began living with NO pain. Two days of not getting to the pharmacy for a refill, however, produced the 7-8 pain again for a whole week!

After about 16 months of faithful use she was able to wean off and for 5 months now has had no recurring headaches.

So, yes, this site is about alternative methods, which we tried. But the remedy for this was rather obscure and all alternative methods failed. Doctors were clueless though compassionate while attempting to help with the exception of one neurologist who, after her sample prescriptions didn't work (and had consultated with us for 20 minutes on the 2nd visit) told us that she "had no magic pill...you need to take your daughter to a psychiatrist". We left and never returned.

I submit this for the one or two desperate persons out there who are reading this headache page dispairing of finding something that works because they have exausted all other avenues yet still have themselves or a family member incapacitated. Maybe our child's story will help them find another avenue to pursue. And yes, I may be contacted by email if someone wishes more information. Thanks for this great site. It has been a help to me and I only found it last week.

I HAD A BAD HEADACHE , SO I THOUGHT I WOULD GIVE THIS A TRY . IT WORKED ! I SOAKED MY FEET ABOUT A HALF HOUR IN HOT WATER AND MY HEADACHE STARTED GOING AWAY IT WAS INCREDIBLE . THANK YOU

Try putting your feet in hot water (not scalding hot) but as hot as you can comfortably stand it. Sometimes with a very bad headache it will stop the pain instantly and sometimes it takes a few minutes. It doesn't seem to work as well with sinus/congestion type headaches.

Cayenne Pepper relieved my cluster headache! I had been suffering from absolutely debilitating cluster headaches- they seemed to have been taking over my life! I stubled across this website today after spending the day alternating between rocking back and forth in pain and looking up clinics in my area. I didn't have any powdered cayenne on hand, so I crushed up a seed of a dried cayenne pepper that I had from last summer's yield, and snorted that. Lo and behold, I am now able to type this with about 90% of the headache gone. I took the pepper seed about ten minutes ago, and plan to try more in a minute.

I can't believe how well it works! I am bookmarking this site asap!

Thank you all so much!

Cayenne Pepper relieves my husband's cluster headaches. He had horrible time with headaches for over 15 years till we started to use the cayenne pepper. Now when he feels one coming on, he just snorts a tiny bit (maybe 1/4 of a teaspoon) up his nostril on the same side where he feels the headache. Yes he feels a sharp burning in his nose briefly (along with his eyes watering) but it relieves the headache within 15-20 minutes at the most. He was taking strong pain pills before that often didnt help and he would be sick for hours, with vomiting and extreme pain. Cayenne Pepper has alleviated all that. Just the "red pepper" that you buy in spice section at the store, for 3 or 4 dollars. If the headache is on both sides, snort a tiny bit up both nostrils.