The Rebound Effect

I reached a point where I got so tired of having bad headaches all the time that I complained to my doctor again, during an annual physical exam. The last time I made a big deal out of my headaches, my doctor referred me to a neurologist who wanted to put me on anti-depressants. I considered it, but once that particular headache I was having subsided, I bailed on the idea. I figured taking meds every day would only lead to more problems. This time around, my doctor referred me to the radiology department to get a brain MRI. Then I was sent to have some blood work done to check hormone and blood-sugar levels. When both of those avenues turned up nothing to write home about, I was referred to a neurologist once again. I had a pretty bad headache on the day I went to see him, and overall it was not a pleasant experience. The guy was distant, and aloof, and condescending, and kept me waiting alone in his exam room for a very long time. The one thing that I did come away with though was the concept of rebounding. That is - if you take too many medications (aspirin, ibuprofen, etc.) too often, your body gets used to it, and your headaches come back even more painful than before. It takes more and more medication to squelch a headache, and the headache becomes more and more resistant to being calmed down. So you end up taking pills and getting little to no relief. Plus you end up with monster headaches, worse than you ever had before. It's a downward spiral.