Headaches: Not to be ignored

Headaches are something I know well. Beginning in my early teen years, I had frequent and often severe headaches. Somewhere along the way, those evolved into migraines.

My 20’s and 30’s were marred by frequent and sometimes debilitating headaches. Being self-employed for most of that time, I had to work. No choice. 

There were days when I would hide in a dark room, come out long enough to see a patient, and then retreat to my darkened sanctuary. For years, you would never find me far away from Excedrin. I always (always) had several in my pocket.

I tried other medicines. I saw several specialists. Nothing stopped my headaches. I learned to deal with them. Most of the time, they would hit in the middle of the night. My routine became to get up, take an Excedrin, get in a very hot shower, get out, eat something, take 2 more Excedrin, and go back to bed.

That usually helped enough that I could eventually get back to sleep.

Here’s the problem with headaches—they’re invisible. There is no outward sign that someone has a headache. More than once, I was told that they were “all in my head.”

Yeah…they were. My left temple to be exact. Almost always.

About the time I turned 45, my headaches began to subside. Some decided it must be male menopause. Maybe. We know that men undergo hormonal changes about that age too. Certainly not as drastic as women but still there.

I’m just thankful that I very rarely have those really bad headaches any more. I still have headaches from time to time but milder and far less frequent. I still always have Excedrin within reach but I haven’t emptied the hot water heater from my hot showers in a long time.

What about headaches in athletics? What does it mean?

A lot of people get “exertional” headaches. A really hard physical effort that results later in a headache. We see those often in sports. It is likely that those have to do with blood vessels dilating and constricting in your head and usually respond to anti-inflammatories.

Still, no headache needs to be ignored. Especially in a teenager or an athlete. If headaches are severe, persistent, or frequent, athletes should see a sports physician, and in Blount County, that is Dr. Ben England at ETMG.

And don’t forget hydration. Being dehydrated can also lead to or at least contribute to headaches.  Not to mention the sports performance side of hydration.

If a headache happens after a blow to the head, it cannot be ignored. Any blow to the head that results in symptoms (headache, dizziness, blurred vision, confusion) is a concussion until proven differently.

We don’t play around with those things. I have a friend that had a concussion in a car wreck that was still having headaches from that concussion two years later.

The long term effects of improper care following a concussion can be catastrophic. It used to be that if you got your “bell rung” that once you were coherent, you were back in the game.

Not so, anymore. That’s because we know better. We know what can happen. That means that if you have a headache after being hit in the head, it is incredibly important not to get hit in the head again. It’s that simple.

New Beginnings

One morning early this week, I fell in behind a U-Haul truck pulling a car, going somewhere. I can only imagine where. A new town. A new home. A new job. Somewhere.

I remember those days. In 1977, my U-Haul truck was filled with all we owned and parked outside the MidSouth Coliseum in Memphis where I was graduating. We walked out of graduation and drove to our new home in Maryville.

We made a couple more of those U-Haul truck moves, to Bluefield, West Virginia then back home to Maryville to stay. Each time, the trip was filled with change and adventure.

Now this is how my brain works—I wondered how that could become a column, a lesson for this space.

And I thought about high school juniors at the end of their season. The next time they are in games, it will be their senior season. They will be the leaders. This will be the year that they always dreamed of.

The best of those start immediately. I can remember when you worked out in the summer before school started in the fall and that was about it. Not anymore.

When the season is over, take a day, maybe two. At most a week. And then get started in preparation for the next go-round. That’s where success is bred.

It’s a new journey. A new adventure. Just like that U-Haul truck headed out.

A new opportunity to get things right. I can remember retired MHS football coach David Ellis telling his young charges in the last week of the season, usually the week of the state championship game, that they had one more chance to get it right.

They would then go through the same drills that they had been doing for weeks, months even. It was still all about footwork and execution.

What a lot of people don’t see is all the time and effort that happens when people aren’t looking. The practices. The many hours in the weight room. Early mornings on the track. A thousand free throws in an empty gym.

It didn’t used to be that way. Back in the dark ages, when I was a teenager, a few of us lifted weights but most depended on farm work to get strong. Shoveling grain and lifting bales of hay. We called it “country strong” and it worked pretty well.

But anybody that thinks we were bigger, stronger, faster, and better trained back then is merely foolish. Kids today have better training, better nutrition, and greater opportunities than we ever had.

Take my tennis playing grandson for example. I played a lot of tennis growing up but there weren’t even public courts in my hometown. The owners of the two private courts in town allowed us to play in their backyards.

All we had to do is keep the noise down and sweep the courts from time to time. We could only dream of an actual tennis lesson. We were our own teachers.

My tennis player has played all winter, going to Knoxville for practice in indoor courts there. He has the benefit of excellent coaches and a granddad that will take him out a couple of times a week just to hit a hopper of balls.

Others have travel teams and position coaches and opportunities that we never even dreamed of. They are on a journey that hopefully leads to happiness and success. Just like those folks in that U-Haul truck.