Jan Mundo, who is a Somatic and Headache Coach, and Bodyworker just wrote a book, The Headache Healer’s Handbook, which was published by the New World Library. I’ve known Jan and her wonderful work with headache patients for many years and was happy to write a foreword to her very readable and useful book. Here is the foreword:
Headaches afflict close to half of the US population with 40 million suffering from migraines, which can be very disabling. Many books have been written for the general public, including two of my own, but Jan Mundo’s Headache Healer’s Handbook brings a unique perspective to this problem.
When I treat patients in the office, they are usually reassured by the fact that I am also a migraine sufferer and so it is with Jan’s book – she knows first-hand what it feels like to have a migraine. More importantly, she has discovered ways to relieve her own attacks and those of other countless migraineurs.
Like Jan, I am a big proponent of non-drug treatments and this is what she details in her book. I also like her hands-on approach, both literally and figuratively. Psychologists have proven that active treatments, where people are doing things to improve their condition, are much more effective than passive treatments, such as massage, chiropractic, and acupuncture, where things are done to them. This leads to the transfer of external locus of control to internal locus of control or in other words, a shift from a passive and helpless victim of external circumstances, to being an active participant in the events with a significant degree of control.
Jan begins with the basics – identifying your type of headache and finding possible triggers that make headaches worse. She does recommend at least one visit to the doctor to confirm the diagnosis. This is important not because a brain tumor or an aneurysm is likely to be found since those are very rare, but a routine blood test could detect magnesium or thyroid deficiency, anemia, or another medical problem that could be contributing to headaches.
Once your diagnosis is confirmed, with Jan’s help you can take an inventory of your diet, sleeping habits, your physical environment, and posture, and try to find triggers, which can be corrected. Then Jan recommends breathing exercises which to me had echoes of the Feldenkrais method – becoming aware of how you breathe and improve not only your breathing, but also the movements of your chest, spine, and the rest of your body.
In the chapter, Being still: Mindfulness and Headaches Jan describes another powerful tool in combating not only headaches, but many other physical and mental ailments. Yes, everyone is talking about the proven benefits of meditation, but it is surprising how few people actually practice it.
Posture, Ergonomics, and Sleep is followed by a chapter on physical exercise, which is proven to not only be good for you, but to specifically reduce the frequency and the severity of headaches.
A large portion of the book is devoted to the Mundo method, Jan’s unique hands-on therapy, which she has developed to treat her own headaches and which has helped many sufferers she has worked with. The healing power of touch is scientifically proven to dramatically improve outcomes in premature babies and without a doubt, can be also harnessed to relieve a variety of headache conditions. Just follow Jan’s advice and watch your headaches go away.
