Migraine

Migraine is an incredibly common yet misunderstood illness. In fact, roughly 15% of adults in the U.S. have had a migraine in the past three months, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

There is a lot of confusion about what a migraine actually feels like, why it occurs, and how to manage the condition, so it’s no wonder that a common misconception about migraine is that it's simply a really bad headache. Misconceptions like this don’t just diminish or dismiss someone’s experience, they can also prevent people from seeking out a diagnosis and treatment plan for the neurological disorder.

As migraine differs for each person, having as much information as possible—as well as the guidance of a medical professional—can make it easier to treat, manage, and even prevent future migraine attacks. Here’s what you need to know about migraine, including common symptoms, triggers, and what you can do to manage the pain.

Giacomo Gambineri

Migraine is a neurological condition that can cause a variety of symptoms, most notably, very severe headaches. It’s not fully understood what causes a migraine, but it’s thought to be related to nerves surrounding your blood vessels that send pain signals to your brain, causing inflammation.¹ However, headaches are not the only migraine symptom, nor does every migraine include a headache. (We’ll get to the other symptoms in a bit.) People between 18 to 44 years old are most likely to experience migraine,² and migraine attacks usually become less frequent as people age, according to a 2019 review of studies published in the American Journal of Managed Care². That said, anyone can get a migraine at any age.

David Dodick, M.D., a professor of neurology at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine in Scottsdale, Arizona, tells SELF it’s helpful to think about migraine holistically as a medical condition rather than a series of isolated symptoms to be treated individually. That way you can develop a plan that helps you possibly reduce the occurrence of future episodes and targets your symptoms when you get an attack.

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Migraine pain can be highly variable. People experience the condition in different ways, and migraine attacks can feel different each time you have them. That said, headaches are one of the most common migraine symptoms. The pain can be moderate or severe, and occur spontaneously or be triggered by a particular event, such as a stressful week or even the weather, according to Dr. Dodick. Migraine pain is often described as a pulsing or throbbing sensation that usually affects one side of your head. However, the pain can shift from one side to the other or include the front or back of your head, according to the Cleveland Clinic. You may also experience migraine pain in your neck, jaw, stomach, or around your eyes or sinuses.

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