My neurologist recommended I get a few books about migraines and the first one I started with was Heal Your Headache: The 123 Program for Taking Charge of Your Pain. I was admittedly skeptical, as I always am about something that says it will “cure” me. But when I started reading, I soon realized that even though I may not find a “cure”, I could still gain some good knowledge from this book. The first step is to get off any medications, as many of them (especially painkillers) could actually be exacerbating the migraine. The second step was to go on an elimination diet to weed out migraine triggers. The third step was to work with your neurologist and get on preventative and management medication. As medication doesn’t really work for me and I wasn’t on any painkillers, I focused on Step 2: The Diet. Within the elimination diet, there are a ton of things that you have to avoid, including:
- Onions
- Tomatoes
- Citrus
- Cheese
- Nuts
- Chocolate
- Freshly Baked Bread
- Processed Soy
- Certain Beans
- Red Wine, Red Wine and Balsalmic Vinigar
- Dark Liquors
- Processed meats
- Yogurt
- Bananas, raspberries and avocado
And that’s just a few. I jumped in, full force, probably because I was excited to have something I could actually control. It was definitely not an easy diet to follow. The hardest ones to avoid were onions, tomatoes and citrus. Once you have to eliminate those, you realize that they’re pretty much in everything. I did the diet for 4 months, although the book recommended 3. Maybe it was because I was under a lot of stress at the time, but I didn’t really notice that much of a difference in the way I was feeling. With a diet that strict, you end up cheating on just about everything (sometimes on accident, sometimes because your other choice is to go hungry). The only trigger I was able to identify was processed soy. But it was still a worthwhile diet because it made me really look at every single thing I was eating.
Know What’s In Your Processed Food. Then Stop Eating So Much Processed Food
This diet really forces you to look at ingredient labels. Dried onion is in most flavored snack foods and processed soy is in just about everything as a preservative (soy lecithin). Once you start reading ingredient labels, you start to realize all the junk you’ve been putting into your body. Read the ingredients of your favorite pretzels, peanut butter and bread. Are there things in your food that you’ve never heard of and you can’t even pronounce? You probably shouldn’t be eating that. Find brands with minimally processed foods, such as Pretzel Crisps (there’s about four ingredients) or Theo Chocolate (yes, I know you can’t eat chocolate on this diet, but it’s good chocolate!). Stores like Whole Foods and Central Market often have good options for buying healthier processed foods such as peanut butter (you really don’t need sugar in there, by the way) and freshly baked bread, and although you may end up spending a little more, you are being much kinder to your body and eliminating unnecessary stuff in your food. Other downside is that usually these products don’t stay fresh as long due to lack of preservatives. But I’d rather not be eating those anyways.
There are many times when we eat processed foods but we actually don’t have too, especially in the case of fruits and vegetables. Canned vegetables usually have a few extras thrown in their, for color or “freshness”. Some ingredients may surprise you (high fructose corn syrup in canned fruit), others may disgust you (like the fact that lard is in cans of refried beans. Ew.) Start buying more fresh produce as it is better for you and actually tastes better, too. I’m on a corn kick right now. In the past, I always bought frozen or canned corn. Then one day, I bought fresh corn, easily sliced the kernels off the cob to mix in with some zucchini, and realized how delicious fresh vegetables could be!
Eat Local and Don’t Trust a Restaurant That Can’t Tell You Every Ingredient In their Sauces and Soups
When you’re on the Migraine Diet, soups and sauces are the enemy – you just don’t know what’s in there! You find yourself asking the ingredients of everything when you dine out, and hopefully you have a patient waitress. Most places have an allergy guide that can tell you simple things like whether or not an item has soy or nuts, but it’s harder to find places that can tell you whether or not something has onions. I found that by going to local restaurants who make everything from scratch in-house, you were more likely to find out what was in your food. Chains had a bit of a harder time because much of their food is pre-prepared. I started judging the quality of a restaurant by whether or not they could tell me the ingredients in their sauces and soups, which is a pretty good way to judge quality regardless. A tip for asking your server: I always just explained that I was on a strange diet to weed out migraine triggers upfront. And sometimes apologized for the inconvenience. Once people know what’s going on and that you’re not trying to be difficult, they go out of their way to help you. Realize that patience on both sides is required!
Processed Soy is in EVERYTHING.
And I mean everything. Did you know that Vegetable Oil is 100% soybean oil? Then why not just call it soybean oil? That makes things so much more difficult because vegetable oil hides in baked goods. I’ve started looking up nutrition facts for restaurants (many will state whether or not soy is present in their items) and also be wary of baked goods where I know soybean oil is probably present. Soybean oil is used in many breads, muffins, and cakes. In terms of baked desserts, cookies are usually a safe bet, but if it’s a “drop cookie” (i.e., not refrigerated dough that is then cut into shapes), it might have vegetable shortening, which of course is processed soy. This includes chocolate chip cookies and my favorite recipe for ginger cookies.
The moral of the story: know what you’re eating! Although I wasn’t able to identify more than one trigger this time around, I was able to become more aware of what I am eating and cut out some items that I am definitely better off without.
#headwallslam 