GOING FOR THE GOLD: What Migraineurs can learn from Olympic Athletes
With the eyes of the entire world on the Olympics, we marvel when we think of the stamina and perseverance it must have taken to win the opportunity to compete at such a level. If you have frequent migraines, you likely can’t imagine what it would be like to persist in anything sustained without being disrupted by pain.
Athletes experience pain during their training and competition. Of course, the cause of athletic pain seems as though it would be very different from migraine pain, but is it? It has been shown that when an athlete keeps injuring him or herself, one of two things is happening – either the athlete is not paying attention to something that her body is trying to tell her, or she is somehow resisting the training.
It can be the same for a migraine sufferer. It becomes very frustrating when migraines recur again and again despite much research and effort to treat them. Many times we try various meds and
trigger- elimination strategies to little avail. When that is true, take a step back. Your body is trying to tell you something that you are not hearing. Pain is an excellent warning sign, but when it becomes chronic, it is of no use and actually become destructive.
Here are a few steps that Olympic athletes take to avoid injury and pain. It seems to be very good advice for migraineurs as well.
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- Be in proper physical condition. For migraineurs, this means right diet and exercise. You don’t have to spend a lot of frustrating energy eliminating dietary triggers if you take the time to research an optimal diet for yourself. Switching to an optimal diet eliminates many triggers and improves your health over all. Optimal diet also means supplementing your body with vitamins and minerals you may be missing. For migraineurs, this can be magnesium and B-vitamins.
- Rest. This is two-fold – get adequate sleep every night and relax from stress.
- Avoid playing when very tired or in pain. When you have a migraine, or if you have an aura, or are in unavoidable migraine-producing circumstances, stop and rest. Don’t keep going. Stop and readjust your thinking. Rest in a darkened room. Breathe deeply. Meditate. Relax.
- Train often. Our bodies were not designed to do well without exercise. Get some kind of concerted exercise every single day. Exercise both with weight for resistance and aerobically. For your aerobic exercise, spend 90 seconds at a moderate pace and then increase to a very challenging pace for 30 seconds. Work up to doing this cycle 6-8 times, 3 days a week. Learn to exercise the smart way, and be persistent with it.
- Go for the gold. Olympic athletes make willing changes in their lifestyle in order to have what they desire. If you desire to rid yourself of the bane of migraines, can you afford to do anything less? Seeking ways to abort the headaches while continuing to do what you’ve always done will simply result in more pain and confusion. The real key is in preventing your pain which requires willingness to implement big changes from how you’ve approached it in the past. MigreLief is an effective supplement which supplies the body with essential nutrients. You deserve to go for the gold—to compete in this race called life without debilitating pain.
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