Friday, December 19, 2008

You Can Heal Your Life or Migraine Brain

You Can Heal Your Life

Author: Louise L Hay

Louise L. Hay, bestselling author, is an internationally known leader in the self-help field. Her key message is: "If we are willing to do the mental work, almost anything can be healed." The author has a great deal of experience and firsthand information to share about healing, including how she cured herself after being diagnosed with cancer.

An excerpt from You Can Heal Your Life:

Life Is Really Very Simple. What We Give Out, We Get Back

What we think about ourselves becomes the truth for us. I believe that everyone, myself included, is responsible for everything in our lives, the best and the worst. Every thought we think is creating our future. Each one of us creates our experiences by our thoughts and our feelings. The thoughts we think and the words we speak create our experiences.



Migraine Brain: Your Breakthrough Guide to Fewer Headaches, Better Health

Author: Carolyn Bernstein

You know that your migraine isn't just a headache. But you may not know that migraine actually is a neurological disease. Affecting one in five women, one in twenty men, and one in twenty children, it's a debilitating, complex, and chronic condition that manifests in a combination of symptoms that can include excruciating head pain as well as other distinctive physical and emotional effects. Yet it's also a disease that you can get control of, improve, and manage, as Dr. Carolyn Bernstein has discovered in her seventeen years as a Harvard Medical School faculty member and practicing neurologist.

Praised for her excellence and compassion, the founder of the Women's Headache Center near Boston, and a migraine sufferer herself, Dr. Bernstein has helped hundreds of her patients get better. Now, with The Migraine Brain, the most comprehensive, up-to-the-minute book on migraines ever written, you will be able to do the same -- reduce the frequency and intensity of your migraines, learn how to prevent and curtail them and how to recover from them more quickly, and mitigate migraine's effects on every aspect of your life: in the workplace and at home and during sex and travel. Every migraine is different because everyone who gets a migraine has a distinctive "Migraine Brain" with its own sensitivities and triggers. That's why it's so important for you to develop a personalized wellness plan to radically reduce the number and severity of your migraines.

Dr. Bernstein also explains why migraines happen, why they are so often misdiagnosed, and why so few people get the right treatment for them. She reveals the latest research that shows that Migraine Brains share ahypersensitivity to stimuli -- the Migraine Brain can actually look different from others on a brain scan -- and is more likely to experience a cascade of neurological reactions that give rise to the common clusters of migraine symptoms. This breakthrough medical knowledge makes treatment and recovery possible with new migraine-specific drugs as well as with complementary treatments such as yoga, biofeedback, and an exercise regimen.

With the extraordinarily thorough recommendations of The Migraine Brain in your hands, you will be fully equipped with all the latest information you need to understand migraines and to help your family and co-workers understand that migraine isn't just a headache: it's a serious, yet treatable disease.

Publishers Weekly

Bernstein, a neurologist who suffered her first migraines in her 20s, teaches at Harvard Medical School and is on staff at the Cambridge Health Alliance, where she founded the Women's Headache Center. With journalist McArdle, she presents a clear and comprehensive analysis of the migraine brain. Noting that there are about 30 million migraine sufferers in the U.S., Bernstein reveals that migraine is a complex neurological disease that affects the central nervous system. A severe headache is just one of its symptoms: others may be nausea, vomiting, visual changes or sensitivity to light or sound: the authors help readers identify the triggers that can bring on an attack (such as stress, insufficient sleep, menstrual periods or a host of other factors). Bernstein then helps the "migraineur" develop a personalized plan to "prevent, abort, or rescue." The authors include research on the new "triptan" meds, which can interrupt the neurochemical reaction of an attack and halt a migraine in its tracks, as well as info on preventive medications (i.e., beta-blockers and antidepressants) and such alternative methods as biofeedback and acupuncture. Bernstein approaches the reader as she might patients-"creatively, scientifically and sympathetically"-offering a range of tactics and treatments to help migraine sufferers control and mitigate their pain. (Sept.)

Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Elizabeth J. Eastwood - Library Journal

The significant number of migraine sufferers in the United States indicates that this up-to-date book will be a highly valued guide, as it offers the realistic message that having migraines is a neurological and biochemical occurrence that individuals cannot cure but can learn to treat proactively. Bernstein, herself a migraine sufferer, is a practicing neurologist and the founder of the Women's Headache Center at the Cambridge Health Alliance, and these credentials make her an empathetic authority. In this empowering book, simple definitions of medical terms increase understanding for lay readers and deflect feelings of isolation, as does the use of quotations from those with migraines. Informative chapters on what migraines are, pinpointing your personal triggers, living with a migraineur, work and traveling, and finding the right doctor (including what your doctor should not do) complement sections detailing both conventional and alternative health care and practical suggestions, e.g., keeping a headache diary. This would be a good replacement for Christina Peterson's 1999 book, The Women's Migraine Survival Guide. Recommended for public and consumer health libraries.



Table of Contents:
Introduction-"I'd Rather Die Than Get Another Migraine"     1
Migraine Quiz     7
Part 1
Is Yours a Migraine?     13
The Migraine Checklist     21
Or . . . Is It a Tension Headache?     27
Mixed Headaches     28
Sinus Headache-Migraine in Disguise?     29
Other Kinds of Headaches     32
Kinds of Migraine     34
When to Call a Doctor-Beware of Change     37
The Migraine Brain: How It's Different-and What That Means for You     40
Cortical Spreading Depression-the New Science of Migraine     41
Questions for the Doctor     45
The Trigeminal Nerve     46
Migraine and Seizure     48
The Genetic Link     49
The Heart-Migraine Connection: "PFO"     49
Your Migraine Brain May Change Over Time     50
What Migraine Is Not     51
A Strange, Fascinating Disease     52
Migraine Lore, Famous Migraineurs, and More     54
The Four Stages of a Migraine     58
The Four Stages     59
Prodrome     60
Aura-Visual and Other Changes     62
The Main Migraine or Pain Phase     66
Postdrome, orthe Migraine Hangover     69
Building Your Migraine Profile     70
Your Migraine Triggers     73
What's Your List of Triggers?     73
The Headache Diary     77
How to Avoid Your Triggers     80
My Personal Top Ten Migraine Triggers     97
Female Hormones and Migraines Through the Life Cycle     101
The Role of Female Hormones     102
Are Your Migraines Related to Menstruation?     105
Migraines During Your Life Cycle     115
Planning for Pregnancy     115
Pregnancy     116
Perimenopause     122
Menopause     123
Men's Migraines     124
Important News for Men with Migraine     129
Men: Taking Care of Your Health     134
Part 2
Measuring Your Migraine: The Best Self-Tests     139
Your Migraine Toolbox     141
How to Find the Right Doctor     145
What Kind of Doctor Should You Choose?     148
How to Find a Headache Specialist     149
If You Can't Find a Headache Specialist     151
The First Appointment     152
Medicines That Work     160
A Variety of Migraine Medications      161
Prevent, Abort, Rescue-the Three Types of Drugs     161
Preventive Drugs     162
Abortive Drugs     171
Rescue Drugs     176
Over-the-Counter Drugs     177
Surgery and Other Options     181
When You Have to Go to the Emergency Room     183
How to Make Your ER Visit Successful-A Signed Doctor's Form     187
What to Take with You to ER-Your ER Kit     188
If You Are Admitted to the Hospital     189
Recovering from Migraine     190
In-Patient Treatment for Migraine     192
Complementary and Alternative Treatments     193
Biofeedback     198
Other Relaxation Techniques     200
Acupuncture     201
Yoga     204
Meditation     206
Massage     208
Ice Massage     209
Magnesium     209
Riboflavin, Coenzyme Q10     210
Herbs and Herbal Supplements     210
Energy Healing     213
Your Personal Wellness Plan
Introduction     215
Eight Steps to Wellness for Your Migraine Brain     218
Exercise, Sleep, Nutrition, Relaxation      219
Exercise     219
Sleep     229
Healthy Eating     236
Relaxation and Stress Reduction     242
Family, Home, Sex, Mental Health     246
Living with a Migraineur     247
How to Make Your Home Migraine-Free     254
Sex and Migraines     259
Mental Health and Migraine     261
Migraines, Work, and Travel     273
Work     273
Travel     284
Migraine Makeover: Creating Your Own Personal Migraine Plan     295
Migraine Makeover: My Personal Treatment Plan     310
Appendix     319
Index     337

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