The other day there was an earthquake in Japan. It made me sad. It also made me worried. For the people, for their buildings and infrastructure… for their nuclear reactors. In my typical “domino thinking” manner, that thought led to another: ‘normal’ brains are like coal-based power-plants, whilst migraine-brains are like Nuclear Reactors.
The power stations in both cases fuel our city-bodies. They give us the energy to get up and go. But even though their output might be the same, their sensitivity to external stimulus is very different.
+ The barometric pressure drops… Coal-Power-Plant shrugs, but over at Nuclear-Reactor a small red ‘caution’ light flicks on: Ding!
+ The ambient temperature rises a few degrees higher than forecast for the day. Coal-Power-Plant doesn’t seem to notice, until it gets much hotter than anticipated, by which stage three ‘caution’ lights have gone off over at Nuclear-Reactor… Ding! Ding! Ding!
+ Something falls on the floor, it creates an instant shock-wave that sends tremors through the floor and into everything standing on it. Coal-Power-Plant takes in it’s stride, but Nuclear-Reactor finds itself pushed to a nervous limit… it doesn’t just flick on another caution-light, it decides that it’s moving into the ‘danger zone’. Fight-or-flight modes are being initiated in the background, biological and chemical staff-members are assuming their positions, things are getting serious behind the scenes – no one on the ‘outside’ is aware of it, but Nuclear-Reactor is getting ready for a worst case scenario…
+ And then it happens. One more thing (any old thing – a bright light, dehydration, whatever) and Coal-Power-Plant is still working away, sweaty but unbothered, whilst Nuclear-Reactor has decided enough is enough – there aren’t enough mental and physical resources at the station to keep going safely – the only thing to do is SHUT ITSELF DOWN.
Migraines occur when your triggers increase and your threshold to those thresholds is reduced (as I’ve written about before (here)). If enough things ‘go wrong’ the migraine-brain worries that it doesn’t have the capacity to safely guide you through a fight-or-flight situation, so it does what it thinks is right – it shuts YOU down.
It’s not hard to imagine – the annoying flashing lights, the incessant wailing siren sounds woop-wooping, the giant concrete and steel doors that come crashing down with bone-crushing intensity, the water rising up like nausea… the “shut down” procedure isn’t quiet or pretty – it’s big, bold, messy and super dramatic.
And so there you are in bed – nursing your sorry head, all befuddled by your bad migraine, whilst your migraine-brain is congratulating itself that it did the right thing; it effectively evacuated you into your safe-place-bed where there’s no need for fighting or flighting… it kept you ‘safe’ from the dangers it perceived were everywhere in life.
Meanwhile, all the Coal-Power-Plants around the country are looking over at Nuclear-Reactor, wondering what happened.
“Someone dropped a pot on the kitchen floor” says one of the Power-Plants.
The other Power-Plants all look at each other and resist the urge to roll their eyes or giggle.
“Imagine!” one of them eventually laughs out loud.
“Please do” thinks Nuclear-Reactor from their place of deep dark silence, “just try to imagine it from my point of view”.
Take care taking care all you powerful people, Linda xx
The Mindful Migraine 
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