What is your migraine trigger: alcohol or dehydration?
September 7, 2010.
Why did I put both alcohol and dehydration, two known migraine triggers together?
It's because effects of alcohol on the body can be misinterpreted as a migraine trigger, when real cause of migraine is dehydration.
I write this only from personal experience, what I have learned a hard way.
I don't consider myself alcohol consumer, and we all know that alcohol abuse has negative effects on your body,
but occasionally, I like to drink a glass or two of beer or white wine. I avoid red wine because it is a well known
headache trigger because it contains tannin, and once I got a really strong headache while drinking it(there was no confusion what caused my migraine on that particular occasion).
I always blamed alcohol when migraine occurred after alcohol consuming, but now I think different.
Alcohol is diuretic, which means it makes you urinate. So, when drinking alcohol, and not drinking water, you dehydrate.
And one of known dehydration symptoms is headache! Do you see now the connection between alcohol and dehydration?
If you consume alcohol, than be sure to drink enough water. Symptoms of dehydration that I usually feel are (in this particular order):
- dry mouth
- dark urine
- fatigue and/or weakness
- tightness or pressure in neck and head
The last dehydration symptom(tightness or pressure in neck and head ) I usually interpret as a pre-migraine symptom. That symptom is a direct consequence
of dehydration, and dehydration is a direct consequence of alcohol (if consumed).
I hope that this article resolved some issues between headaches and (alcohol) dehydration.
