Headaches And Sleep Problems

[missnbagels]

I have had a crappy week. On sunday i started getting terrible headaches and migraines that would not go away. My migraine medicine wouldn't help. went to doctor and he prescribed compazene and tylenol with codeine and they didn't help. went to ER next day and they did a CT and a spinal tap which were both fine. Headaches are continous and terrible. Also haven't been able to sleep at all these past couple nights. Maybe 4-5 hours max. I was wondering if any of it may be connected to Celiac? The neuorologist said i just have to talk to a psychologist about my "stressors" But i already have people to talk to openly. you know? Anyway any advice is much appreciated

thanks

[byrmanson]

I am a therapist and work under an MD who is very advanced (in my opinion) in connected the types of problems you're mentioning with celiac and gluten. However, I think that EVERYONE can benefit from professionally trained help to talk about "stressors," and my experience has been that talk therapy can unlock some hidden issues that may indeed affect our physical health. Don't be afraid of the stigma of therapy. Check your insurance and find a good counselor. I could point you in a direction of how to search for one online if you wanted. At the very least, find someone who includes a holistic perspective and has a clue about gluten sensitivity.

[BRUMI1968]

How's your liver? In Chinese medicine, the liver being stressed can wake us up earlier than need be; and cause headaches. Just a thought. Dehydration is another. But I've never had migraines. You're not eating aspertame are you? -- that's a known trigger. Wish I could help more. Good luck. -Sherri

[Guest lorlyn]

My 11 year old daughter has headaches and cannot fall asleep when she comes in contact with gluten. I beleive it comes from the nuro. problems Celiac people get

[aeshlea]

I have gotten pretty bad headaches being gluten free. Someone else mentioned on here it being connected to the liver. I have heard that a lot as well. There is a liver cleanse you can find directions for on the internet (it involves apple juice, epsom salts, and olive oil, its easy to goggle and you can find differen variations) that is short and not too terrible to do. It rids the body of gallstones (that sounds far fetched probably) but it really does work and has made a huge difference for me when it comes to headaches.

[mftnchn]

This sounds really awful, I am sorry to hear of this pain you are experiencing. Glad some really bad things have been ruled out via the CT though.

I am also a therapist, and while I agree with the other poster, I also am hugely respectful of how physical problems cause psychological ones. My eyes have been even more opened on this forum, with posts such as from parents with children with OCD who are fine once they go gluten-free. Also I am frustrated with how readily the medical community suggests somatic illness because they can't find the reason for the symptoms.

Just wondering how long you have been gluten-free and how strict you are. Could this be from cross contamination, a new food, or a food that you usually have found to be fine but has suddenly changed its ingredients and you didn't read the label? Any change in personal care products? Some people have become more and more sensitive to minute amounts of gluten the longer they are gluten-free.

Some people have reported more sensitivities developing after going gluten-free, so I wonder if you have tried going off milk and soy which are fairly common culprits on this forum. Beyond that, there could be other sensitivities to many different possible foods. This can be from various causes, but one result of celiac is leaky gut, where larger particles of proteins are able to get out of the intestine into the system which then forms antibodies to them--developing multiple sensitivities to foods.

Do you keep a food diary? That can help.

Another thing to consider, has the celiac led to malnourishment and do you need things like B12, minerals, etc. etc.?

Other ideas might to to check out the low oxylate thread, the threads about nightshades, the lyme disease thread, and/or post on the OMG thread. There are several threads on insomnia, and that is a problem that has been common to a number of people on the OMG thread. It's a long thread, so just jump in and post. They won't mind repeating something that might have been said before.

Please keep us updated on how you are doing.

[sickchick]

Wow, you are sleeping more that I am!

I am getting dreadful headaches this week for some reason.

I am wondering if since I just went gluten free on Oct 1st if maybe I am

having sensitivities to corn now. It seems to come on after I eat

corn. Am doing an elimination diet this week to see.

Sorry bout your head.

lovelove

sickchick

[Butterfly619]

I have had a crappy week. On sunday i started getting terrible headaches and migraines that would not go away. My migraine medicine wouldn't help. went to doctor and he prescribed compazene and tylenol with codeine and they didn't help. went to ER next day and they did a CT and a spinal tap which were both fine. Headaches are continous and terrible. Also haven't been able to sleep at all these past couple nights. Maybe 4-5 hours max. I was wondering if any of it may be connected to Celiac? The neuorologist said i just have to talk to a psychologist about my "stressors" But i already have people to talk to openly. you know? Anyway any advice is much appreciated

thanks

Hello well if you are female it could be hormonal, withdrawal from caffiene? The only thing that has helped me with severe migraines is something that targets the blood vessels like Imitrex or Excedrin migraine. I have severe insomnia too and never sleep. It's not fun. I hope you are feeling better

[RiceGuy]

The fist thing that comes to mind is MSG. Another poster mentioned aspartame, which does basically the same for those sensitive to Free Glutamic Acid. It is often hidden in foods, even when the food is labeled "no MSG added". Ingredients derived from yeast are the typical method being used today. This includes yeast labeled along with words such as extract, dried, hydrolyzed, nutritional, etc.

Make no mistake about it, manufacturers do attempt to hide this, and sad to say, foods which are supposed to be more healthy are even more commonly spiked with MSG. Especially low fat, low sodium, low sugar type foods. Anything that might otherwise have less flavor than the "naughty" junk food they emulate I would consider suspect.

See www.truthinlabeling.org for more than you may want to know.

Other than that, if you recently changed or dropped a supplement, that might be something to look into. I've also read about compact fluorescent lights causing migraines, along with the usual things like gas leaks, carpet/upholstery fumes, etc. Even high frequency equipment like cell phones, cordless phones, large TVs, microwave ovens... The list can go on and on, so hopefully it is something you can narrow down relatively easily.

[tarnalberry]

Migraines can also often be caused my muscular tension - and that tension doesn't have to be caused by emotional stress, it can be caused by physical stress. One of my triggers is a forward head posture that creates significant strain on the SCM (sternocleoidmastoid) muscle that runs from the sternum (and clavical) to the mastoid (just behind the ear). It helps rotate the head, but also pulls it forward (and down). A lot of us who work at computers all day (or many of us in general), have a forward head posture, and this causes the muscle to shorten, and become tight. Working with my chiropractor has helped this, but I can still trigger my migraines if I'm not diligent about maintaining a good neck posture throughout the day.

You might want to consider finding a good, structurally based, chiropractor to investigate whether or not spinal and/or muscular issues are at play. Be careful about getting much in the way of high velocity adjustments done on the neck - those can be the more dangerous ones - but there is a lot that can be done to improve cervical spine and muscle issues without that type of adjustment. (Well, traction sucks, but it helps me a lot! )

[Beagle]

I have had a crappy week. On sunday i started getting terrible headaches and migraines that would not go away. My migraine medicine wouldn't help. went to doctor and he prescribed compazene and tylenol with codeine and they didn't help. went to ER next day and they did a CT and a spinal tap which were both fine. Headaches are continous and terrible. Also haven't been able to sleep at all these past couple nights. Maybe 4-5 hours max. I was wondering if any of it may be connected to Celiac? The neuorologist said i just have to talk to a psychologist about my "stressors" But i already have people to talk to openly. you know? Anyway any advice is much appreciated

thanks

I don't know if you still read this Missnbagels, but here is the information I have:

Sleep-

I have celiac disease and had a problem waking up 2-3 times a night, but I have found a fabulous solution - melatonin. I take 2-3 mg before I go to bed and get wonderful sleep! My husband takes the same amount, but his daughter takes 6mg, so everyone is different. It is a natural hormone & anti-oxidant (no other hormone in a persons body is both) produced in the pineal gland, located in your brain. The fact that it is also an anti-oxidant means it helps build the immune system, not just aid in sleeping. Some people produce less of this hormone than others, therefore getting less sleep. I don't know if this low production is caused by celiac/gluten intolerance problems, but I do know it helps me sleep.

My husband went without melatonin for two nights in a row and realized it was because he had forgotten to take melatonin. He hasn't forgotten since. I buy it at my local health food store, but it is available at grocery stores as well. I buy 1mg tablets (it also comes in 3mg & 5mg) and for 120 it costs me just under $7.00. I believe it would be well worth the money, considering how much time and effort it takes to narrow down what is causing it. It may just be a low melatonin production due to having celiac disease, since so many of us have a problem sleeping, but that is just my hypothesis.

Please read the book, "Your Body's Natural Wonder Drug - Melatonin" by Russell J. Reiter Ph.D. and Jo Robinson. It retails for about $23. A friend of mine, who is a fellow celiac, suggested it to me and I will be forever grateful.

Please consider these options. You will notice a difference the very first night. Some people require more than others, so experiment on what works for you. Oh yeah, there is no toxic amount of melatonin, so don't worry about how much you have to take.

Headaches-

These may be caused in part, by your lack of sleep. From what I have read for a natural remedy for headaches is to use salicin. It is the main ingredient in aspirin and is the active component in white willow bark.

I hope you and others with these problems see this and find some relief.

Good luck and sweet dreams.

[AliB]

It does seem as though you might have developed an intolerance to another food. That can happen. I see quite regularly on the forum where ones have said that they felt better for a while then started to get sick again.

Sometimes we can be intolerant of not just Gluten but carbohydrates in general. when we go gluten-free we tend to try and compensate by having lots of different carbs and can sometimes find that we also end up becoming intolerant to those too.

You could try going to very plain food for a while to see if that helps. Nothing processed, or with additives - just 100% meat, fish and poultry, fresh veg and fruit and a little honey and plain yogurt if you can tolerate it, to see if that makes any difference.

One or two have mentioned the liver. Eating plain food gives the liver a bit of a rest, too as it doesn't have to deal with any toxins. Detoxification can trigger short-term headaches as the body clears out but it usually goes within a few days.

A liver cleanse is a possibility but it can be a bit drastic. I took Milk Thistle instead which is a good gentle liver support, and I am sure that it cleaned my gall-bladder out as I remember seeing something in the loo which looked like stones (actually they looked like peas, but I hadn't eaten any!) and when I had an ultrasound a while later my GB was empty - that would be amazing enough if I was 15 but it is a miracle at 50! A few days after I started gluten-free I felt my liver clear out. I could feel stuff going down the tubes which was weird! My liver was a bit sore for a couple days but it was ok after that. Talk about a Spring Clean!

One great benefit of the Milk Thistle strengthening my liver was that my hair stopped falling out! I think it's a brilliant herbal support. The liver is so important to the health of the body - it needs looking after. We are bombarded with so much rubbish that the poor thing just gets overwhelmed at times and our health then suffers.

[Family Spectrum]

It's Mother's Day and my son gave me the usual overnight gift of no sleep. He suffers from tremendous headaches. He's autistic and can't tell me more than Head Hurts. Usually, he falls to sleep about 10 P.M., after laying in bed for an hour. He, then, wakes up somewhere in the 3 A.M. time period and cannot fall back to sleep until about 6 ish, if at all. He gets incredibly giggly, as he has no other coping skills for it.

Both my children are Gluten-Free, Casein-Free, Yeast-Free, Soy-Free, Egg-Free, Tomato-Free and we wind up rotating corn, because it's in EVERYTHING. Unfortunately, their Dad feeds them healthier foods laden with most of it, two days a week, since the divorce. Their health has finally come back to the point that 5 days with me is not enough to pull them back to a better normal. In a custody fight, currently, to save them, but am having to prove the whole food sensitivity and toxic body thing to a court in Mississippi. tough work.

Anyway, my Autistic son has had nocturnal headaches that keep him awake. I'm pretty sure it's from the food he eats at his Dad's house. Can't narrow it to a single thing. Also may be linked to the body's response to the pollen count at different times of the year, which, in turn, can trigger the autoimmune response to other things. My sons, both, have increased behavioral and biological problems in the spring, when the pollen is higher.

I'm a massage therapist, with a B.S. of Pharmacy. What is being said about muscles and stress is true. What is being said about willow bark seems accurate.

I believe that muscles hold our emotions until we are able to deal with them. If we are overloaded, then our body will manifest the 'dis-ease'. However, my son seems to be going through what you have described about yourself. I believe my 10 year old autistic son doesn't have the stress, as much as a biological reaction to something. Unfortunately, he can't speak well enough to tell me what he's eaten or when the symptoms begin. He usually wakes me up, singing to himself, drumming on something, or giggling.

I have no suggestion for you, other than keep searching. AND don't let people talk you out of what you feel to be the problem. I've been fighting those kinds of people for 10 years, on behalf of my son. You know who you are but the lack of sleep will make you doubt yourself. The gut and the brain are intimately connected. If doctors and scientists haven't helped, then Go with your gut and save your brain!

[Leslie C.]

Thanks for the tips about headaches. I get shooting pains up the back of my head sometimes. I think it may be because of my posture at the computer. And when I exercise at the gym, I look UP at the TV screen - probably not a good idea. I also think that some foods trigger headaches.