Have you been wondering if there is a possible connection between tragus piercing and migraines? Well, yes, there is and a big one.
A tragus piercing doesn’t only provide an attractive slot to your body to flaunt trendy jewelry. It could even help you get relief from a serious ailment, such as migraine.
Before getting to the point how tragus piercing helps in curing migraines, it’s important to know if you actually suffer from migraine or not.
What is Migraine?
Migraines is a condition wherein a person suffers chronic headaches. It usually occurs only on one side of your head.
Sometimes, a migraine attack could be so severe that the pain may disable you. Migraine pain can stay for few hours or even days. While the causes of migraine are completely identified, it may occur due to hormonal changes, stress, depression or anxiety.
Stages of Migraine
Migraines can begin at any age be it childhood, adolescence or early adulthood. There are four stages of migraine: Prodrome, Aura, Attack and Post-drome.
It is not necessary that you’ll have to experience all the four stages a migraine can be cured to a great extent, if not completely healed.
1. Prodrome
This stage provides you early warning signs of a migraine attack which could gradually intensify with time. You may observe subtle changes, including:
- Constipation
- Neck stiffness
- Mood changes, from depression to euphoria
- Food cravings
- Frequently feeling thirsty
- Frequent yawning or need to urinate
2. Aura
Most people experience migraines without going through aura stage. Aura includes nervous system related issues, such as visual disturbances, such as flashes of light or wavy vision.
Sometimes, sensory disturbances like touching sensations or verbal disturbances (like speech issues) may also happen. This is primarily because your body muscles may become weak. Key symptoms of migraine aura include:
- Visual phenomena (for instance, triggers of bright spots or flashes of light)
- Vision impairment
- Needle sensations in limbs
- Weakness or numbness in face or one side of the body
- Difficulty in speaking clearly
- Hearing noises or music
- Jerks or other unintentional movements
3. Attack
A migraine usually lasts from about four to 72 hours, if untreated. The frequency of attacks vary from person to person. Migraines may be rare, or could possibly strike several times a month. During a migraine, you may experience:
- Pain on one side or both sides of your head
- Light headedness, sometimes followed by fainting
- Pain that feels throbbing or pulsing
- Sensitivity to light or sound
- Nausea and vomiting
- Blurred vision
4. Post-drome
The last phase, known as post-drome, occurs after a migraine attack. One may feel drained or washed out, while some people feel elated. For about 24 hours, you may also experience:
- Confusion
- Dizziness
- Mood swings
- Weakness
- Sensitivity to light and sound
How tragus piercing help with migraines?
Ever heard of acupuncture? For many, it’s like a breeze of fresh air on a painful day. It is a well-accepted fact that acupuncture helps in migraines as it improves the body’s functions and promotes natural self-healing process.
This happens as the specific “acupuncture points, or acupoints” get simulated which act as pain killers. As for the migraine, the theory is linked with the vagus nerve.
Vagus Nerve is the one of the longest nerves in our body connecting your brain to rest of the body. It is believed to cure depression, epilepsy, fatigue, anxiety and brain fog.
Vagus nerve resides near diath, an important area in your ear. An acupuncture in this area could provide a big relief from headaches and even avoiding a stroke. This nerve is not too far from tragus. Thus, a permanent acupuncture by having tragus piercing may cure the migraines naturally.
However, there is no proven evidence that tragus piercing can permanently cure migraines but may provide more of a placebo effect.
Placebo effect, in simple terms, mean something which is not real but only a belief or expectation. Higher the expectations, better the chances of fast recovery from headaches.
Daith piercing is also good for migraines relief so is tragus piercing.
Which side of tragus should be pierced for headache relief?
While there is no scientific data backing this answer, but the general perception is to have the tragus pierced on the side which remains more affected during a migraine attack.
The simple logic is that closest the point of acupuncture, more effective would be the results on headache.
If you are extremely fortunate and the pain clusters at a point closer to the pierced tragus, you might get successful in killing the pain at point of inception itself.
Cure for migraines or headaches along with tragus piercing
A tragus piercing could be really helpful in providing relief from the worst of headaches like migraines. It would not be enough in most of the cases.
You may follow the below precautions to reduce the severity and frequency of migraine attacks:
- Drink plenty of water and include fluids in your diet as much as you can. You may go for fruit juices or vegetable juice.
- Green tea is one of the best beverage you can have to naturally cure headaches or migraines. A good quality of green tea powder should be used to prepare green tea for two to three servings a day.
Recommended Organic Green Tea (works best for relief from headache)
- Coconut water is another excellent beverage as it has high antioxidant properties as well as deliciously hydrating. Having coconut water daily may provide huge relief from headaches.
- You may also have caffeine based drinks once a day like coffee or tea.
- Sleep well – ‘early to bed and early to rise’ is what your head needs to remain peaceful. Lack of good sleep is known to cause headaches and may likely aggravate the severity of migraines.
- Do not skip meals frequently as it is extremely important to maintain a good metabolism to cure migraines. Your diet should have good quantities of Vitamin A, Vitamin C, Zinc and other minerals such as calcium and magnesium.
- Meditate to reduce your stress levels. You can also take a head massage to relax your nerves and feel rejuvenated. Use organic and good quality of Argan Oil for the best head massage if you are looking to help your migraines.
One of the best natural Argan Oil (does wonders for headaches)
- In case of severe pains, you may use ice packs for quick relief. A cooling touch to your head is expected to help in relieving the pain.
Risks of Tragus Piercing in case of migraines
There’s an old saying which goes like this “No risk, No gain”. Every treatment has its own pros or cons and may not work for everyone.
Similarly, tragus piercing may help in migraines for many but could also trigger risks for some. Tragus piercing is a painful process and takes a considerable time to completely heal. Also, since tragus form the outer part of ear canal, it is almost inevitable to isolate the freshly pierced area from being touched.
During the time pierced area is under process of healing, if you experience migraines attack, severity of pain may increase.
The pierced tragus may possibly trigger higher levels of pain instead of curing the headaches. This is because the effect of acupuncture may get overpowered by wounded tragus which is not yet healed. People have experienced that piercing has triggered migraines pain for them.
Avoid metal!
It is recommended that metal is not worn in the piercing before it is completely healed. This is because metal may turn the area into an antenna and hence more prone to radio wavelengths and other signals floating around.
Metallic jewelry may prolong the healing process and cause sharper pains in case of migraines or severe headaches.
You may wear metallic jewelry once the tragus has completely healed. Read our guide on tragus piercing jewelry here:
Detailed Guide on Tragus Piercing Jewelry – Tips & Trends
Conclusion
With risks come the rewards! So far tragus piercing and migraines are concerned, the risk reward ratio is quite good. In most of the cases, piercing near tragus should help in reducing or curing headache during migraines attacks.
The risk of fresh piercing may or may not worsen the headaches before it’s completely healed. In any case, you’ll have to bear some level of pain if you get tragus piercing done irrespective of migraines condition. The difference, if you have migraines as well, may not even be noticeable but the benefits due to acupuncture could be highly rewarding.
Thus, its recommended to give tragus piercing a try specifically for relieving your headaches or migraines pain. However, do consult your physician before you decide to experiment.