Can Craniosacral Therapy Help with Migraines?

We all know what a headache feels like but it’s a whole other level when suffering with migraine.  It can feel like a persistent, relentless and never-ending experience, even with targeted medication to ease the symptoms.

I remember a young woman who came to see me at my clinic not long ago. She arrived exhausted and visibly stressed. She had suffered from long-term migraine aura for years, and every time it manifested, her life came to a grinding halt.

It always started the same way: a shimmering light would emerge in the corner of her eye, shifting slowly across her vision. Then, the intense, pulsating headache and nausea would follow. Her only solution was to retreat to a dark room and wait until the world stopped spinning. She was tired of just "managing." She wanted her quality of life back.

Why Do Migraines Happen?

It’s always a complex question. People with migraines often have a hypersensitive nervous system, rooted in a mix of genetics and environment. Common triggers include hormonal changes, stress, fatigue, diet, lack of regular exercise, neck tension, back pain, sleep patterns, over-stimulated senses and certain medications.

While her mother and grandmother also suffered from migraines, she admitted to a life-long pattern of anxiety and tension. Her neck had felt stiff for years, and her desk job only added to the physical strain.

As we spoke, a clear picture began to emerge. She felt like she had no space in her life—no room to breathe. I could see it in her tight voice and her clenched jaw.

How Craniosacral Therapy Works

Before we began the treatment, I explained that I would be working gently, making light contact on different areas of her body and supporting her system through subtle listening and specific touch and dialogue.  Every journey is unique, but our primary focus would be to shift the nervous system from a stressed 'fight or flight' state into a restorative 'rest and regenerate' mode. By gently working with the jaw, neck, and cranial pathways, we could also begin to release potential physical congestion that often triggers migraine pain. On opening up these internal spaces, the body finally has the room to breathe and flow again.

I also explained that people often settle into a deep place of relaxation during the session.  They may experience different body sensations, such as tingling, pulsations, heat, cold and fleeting aches and pains.  This is all normal experience as the body enters a process of release and realignment.

In our first couple of sessions, she began to settle and her nervous system took the journey into deeper states of rest and stillness. I worked with constrictions in the spine and shoulders and addressed chronic tension patterns in her upper neck vertebrae.  In between sessions, her sleep improved, her energy levels rose but she was still getting migraine, though less intensely.  Then, in her third session, as her jaw began to realign and release, she unexpectedly burst into tears.

Years of pain and exhaustion simply poured out. In that moment of quiet contact, she realized that her migraines were a physical mirror of the constriction in her life. Once she dried her eyes, she took a deep, clear breath, sighed, and laughed at how obvious it all suddenly felt.
By finding physical space in her body, she had finally found the room to breathe again.

About the author

Sarah is a RAB-registered biodynamic craniosacral therapist and has been working as a physical therapist for 20 years in the UK and Denmark.
She works with a wide range of conditions including: chronic neck and back pain; migraines and headaches; digestive disorders; stress and anxiety; chronic fatigue; trauma; concussion and post-operative recovery.
Sarah also runs a clinic offering sessions for mothers and babies, children and young adults.  She works in Roskilde and Lejre.

Looking for help with migraine?
If you are struggling with persistent migraines or chronic tension and want to explore how Craniosacral Therapy can help, you are welcome to get in contact (click on the button below).