From 3 migraines a week to 1 in 6 months: How I found my hidden triggers and got my life back.
Two years ago, I was having migraine attacks three times a week. Almost every other day, I was completely out of commission.
At the time, I was working for an MNC and grinding for a promotion. The lifestyle was a perfect storm for chronic migraines:
Terrible work-life balance with late-night calls.
Constant, high-level stress.
No proper sleep cycle and zero exercise.
Heavy stress-eating (I was eating buckets of ice cream and way too much junk food).
After months of this grind, I had a sudden realization: my manager had absolutely no intent of promoting me for the next year. That was the moment I dropped the rope.
I decided to take my work lightly for two weeks and put all that energy into getting myself back on track in terms of my life and health. As someone who was overweight at the time, I made some drastic but necessary changes:
- I cut out sugar and sugary drinks completely. No junk food, nothing packaged, only home-cooked meals.
- I only ate rice on alternating weeks to cut down on my carbohydrate intake. Consumes Jowar roti or Ragi roti instead.
- I started walking for 15 minutes before and after every single meal, and eventually started going for jogs.
After those strict first two weeks, I allowed myself to occasionally eat out, but I kept the junk food cut down to a fraction of what it used to be.
Today, I'm at a 24.5 BMI. safely back in the normal range.
While the lifestyle changes helped immensely, I still needed to figure out exactly why the migraines were happening. I started tracking my trigger foods and discovered a major culprit: Preservative E282 (Calcium propionate). Any product (usually breads, packaged) I consumed with this preservative triggered an attack. Surprisingly, this is also naturally found in cheese, which explained why cheese was another major trigger for me.This preservative is restricted/banned in most countries but India allows it.
I eventually quit my job and moved abroad for my Master's degree.
Between the lifestyle changes, dropping the toxic job, and avoiding my trigger foods, my migraine frequency has plummeted to just 1 attack in the last 6 months.
For context on my current baseline: I am a pure vegetarian, I don't smoke, and I don't drink alcohol.
Along the way, I also learned that imbalances in minerals like potassium and magnesium can contribute to headaches. To combat this, I devised a specific breakfast smoothie recipe packed with the right nutrients to keep the headaches at bay.
I’ll post the exact smoothie recipe in the comments below, if anyone is interested!
I hope my story helps someone else out there who is stuck in the chronic migraine cycle. It takes time, but figuring out your triggers and putting your health first is worth it.
Trigger foods:
I found that this preservative is used in almost all breads.
Pizzas, burgers, etc.
I found that only Pizza 4Ps didnt trigger headaches, while everything else did, pizza hut, dominoes. Burgers too: KFC, Burger King etc. And every packaged bread too. Recently found most of them have this preservative in them.
Cheese apparently has this chemical naturally in it. This too when taken in more quantity triggered a headache.
Skipping meals
Indigestion.