A Piercing New Option

Lately, daith piercings (pronounced doth, like moth) have become a common fad as a possible treatment for migraine sufferers.

a daith piercing

 

I first heard about this a couple of years ago from my mom, who heard about it from someone else, and so on. At that time, I brushed it off as highly unlikely and not even worth being curious about. I was highly dependant on a prescription medication for my migraines that worked wonders, but seriously affected my ability to so much as think, so I got off of them and started some different treatments that didn’t do as much, but did enough.

Then about 6 months ago I heard about it again. And I had recently been going through a wave of worsening symptoms all around, and was ready to try anything with the hopes that it could work. So I started my research.

That “research” mostly consisted of reading a lot of blog posts about why it shouldn’t work, and a lot of other blog posts stating that for some reason, it did. So, with my heart full of hope, I gave it a shot. I did some research on recommended piercing and tattoo shops in my area, discussed it with my husband, and went to it.

And as for my personal experience, WOW. Yes, wow it hurts, but mostly wow because I sat up to switch sides, and immediately felt the immense difference. I had a migraine that day, so I was able to feel the difference from the other side of my head. It’s been about six months since then. I, personally, have to do a lot to keep my migraines under control and still be able to push my body beyond what I feel it can do, so that I can try to live a semi-normal life. So, no, this was not the end-all-be-all for me. I still get my botox treatments every 3 months, get semi-regular massage, and take muscle relaxants to try to ensure that I don’t end up in fetal position with my room blacked out.

But, it helped. A LOT. I don’t get pressure headaches. I’ve only had a couple of migraines since then, and that’s when it’s been over the three month mark between my injections. I still get migraine symptoms—light and sound sensitivity and nausea most commonly.

That’s my experience. But seeing as a piercing can seem like a huge commitment, let’s also delve into some facts.

More than 37 million Americans are plagued by migraine headaches.

These migraines can range anywhere on the scale from pain-in-the-neck to completely debilitating. In a poll of over 1,000 people, 63% have missed 4 or more days of work due to migraines in the last year.

The practice of earrings for treatment goes back to common practices of sailors, who used to put gold hoops in their earlobes, to improve their eyesight. The point of this lobe piercing is a known pressure point for improving eyesight.

Using the ears as a point of treatment for whole-body-wellness can be traced back to as early as 500 B.C. in ancient civilizations of Egypt, India, and China.

This idea is just now, however, being boiled down to a science. It’s called Auriculotherapy (or put basically, ear therapy). The idea is that our ear is a circuit board to our body, explained Dr. Robert Prather. Rather than traditional medicine, which simply treats symptoms (inflammation= anti-inflammatory, pain= pain medication, etc.)  auriculotherapy strives to solve the problems in our brain’s response to information.

a chart of auriculotherapy points.

 

It’s been said that the daith piercing doesn’t exactly match up with what’s been mapped as pressure points through ariculotherapy though.

This field is fairly new. We’ve been studying the heart for ages but there are hundreds of people whose doctors can’t actually tell them why their heart is going screwy (sarcoidosis, congenital heart failure in babies, Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome, etc). This goes to prove that even well-known fields of study lack knowledge.

Why, then, would we know everything there is to know about the ways that the ear can solve the body’s problems? Dr. Prather explained that there are literally hundreds of pressure points on the ear. It’s possible that there’s an extra few that haven’t been scientifically measured yet, no?

Just like any other treatment, these piercings may work miracles for some, may do nothing for others, and may even worsen symptoms in a select few. No other medical treatment is brushed away as nothing simply because it doesn’t work perfectly for everyone.

With something life altering like migraines, a little bit of hope goes a long way. And anything that can prevent even a little bit of pain is absolutely worth a shot.

I do, however, highly recommend that if you are planning on getting this done, to do your research on piercers in your area, talk to the piercer before you have it done, and be sure you know what is going on and be sure you trust your piercer to do it correctly.
Because when traditional medicine can sometimes do more harm than good, anything is worth a shot. Next time I visit a piercing shop, I’ll also be giving a conch piercing a try for chronic pain!