In one of my other posts, we spoke about how muscles and trigger points in that muscle, specifically the upper trapezius, could be the cause of headaches. Another reason could be circulation. If we look at a healthy circulatory system what we see is oxygen entering the lungs, from the lungs it enters the bloodstream and moves to the heart. From the heart, the oxygenated blood circulates out to the entire body and to every cell. With this, the body is happy and healthy and has no real cause to be in pain. However if for some reason the oxygenated blood is not reaching the final destination that means that the tissue, the cells are starting to become compromised. This is what we call ischemia. If this is temporary and we are able to restore circulation and oxygenated blood back to the tissues and organs then we might feel some discomfort but it is often not a huge cause for concern. However, if this continues and the oxygen supply is limited then the next possible outcome is injury. The cells and tissues that the cells are providing nutrients to become injured because of the lack of oxygen. If this is remedied and we restore oxygen supply then that is ok but if this continues we move onto the next step which is cell death. In the same way that if we are deprived oxygen our bodies would not survive, our cells also will die if it doesn’t have enough oxygen.

When we are experiencing a headache it may not be as severe as cell death, but with acupuncture one of the ways that we would look into and address your headache would be to see if it is an issue with circulation. There is a major blood vessel that rises up from the heart, supplies the brain with blood and then descends back down, this is the basilar vertebral artery.

So rather than constantly taking Advil or Tylenol and providing temporary relief, what if you could uncover the root cause of your headache and work to alleviate that? What if by treating your circulation it helped you to become healthy overall?