I believe my 4-year-old son just had his first migraine. I've been dealing with migraines for 20 odd years, and I'm so disappointed that my son might be afflicted with them too.

I've read anecdotal research suggesting a connection between highly sensitive people (many of whom are also gifted) and migraines. Does anyone else out there have young children who suffer from migraines? Does anyone know of any research or have any insight on this issue?

Thanks in advance.

My DD15 began having migraines at around 11 years old. My husband suffers from them also. She was not nearly as young as your son, but she was missing quite a bit of school from them. I am so sorry to hear that as we have gone through quite a bit from them.

I developed migraines about 3 years ago. I would hate to have them develop in my children. I have had to go on a daily preventative; my quality of life had become extremely poor. One thing that I do know is that stress, certain foods, and posture play a role for me.

Thankfully I don't have migraines often, but I find mine are generally triggered by excess light or caffeine.

My son has a rare migraine disorder. It manifested when he was 1 month old. He gets horrible migraines, vertigo and cyclic vomitting because of it. I suffered from migraines as a young child. I didn't have his disorder but it is hereditary. Many thing giftedness is as well.

Interestingly when my son had a spinal tap to look at neurotransmitter levels (while the neurologists were trying to determine his diagnosis) they found him to have low dopamine and serotonin levels. Lately a lot of research has been done about serotonin and it's link to migraines.

On this blog a few months ago I came across someone posting the New York Times article on prodigies. It mentioned they have seen a link of low dopamine/serotonin levels in the brains of prodigies. They didn't give a reason why.

It caught my eye because of my son's condition. Anyways he was recently tested 160+ iq. My daughter did not inherit the same migraine disorder and while she is very intelligent she is nothing like her brother in his extreme abilities. I often wonder if the migraine issue with him was another way his brain is wired different.

However it all could be genetics. My Brother and Father have both been tested 140+ Iq but neither suffered migraines. It ran more with the females in the family.

To clarify my boy is not a prodigy by any means. I just thought the link in intelligent behaviors were interesting. Also his particular form of migraine disorder is so rare by time they officially gave it a name in the 70's only 50 confirmed cases had been found. So it is not a mainstream issue. However the strong migraines accompaning it are.

My DD was diagnosed with migraines at age 6. Hers are triggered mostly by anxiety but it seems more typical triggers affect her as well (lighting, lack of sleep, weather, etc). DH and I both have very significant migraine history - as does DH's father and the female line on my side. Every doctor just kind of nods and says it was basically inevitable - DD was pretty much destined to have them because of heredity.

She takes a daily low dose of Elavil and it has really helped. She will occasionally get into a bad migraine cycle but it's not constant like it was this time last year. (I discussed it on here so if you search you may be able to find the thread.) I can tell by looking at her when she has one even if she doesn't say anything. Her cheeks flush bright pink (think clown makeup) over pale white skin. Her eyes become glassy and she seems "out of it." If they get bad she develops dark circles under her eyes, appears discoordinated and and moves very slowly. We have found that getting her outside into fresh air can help as can ibuprofen. Most important is trying to keep her school anxiety under control. She takes swim lessons at a physical therapy center so the pool is very warm. When the migraines were at their worst she said swimming in that warm water was the only thing that made her feel "all the way better" - at least for a while.

Hope this helps. Feel free to post any specific questions I may be able to help with.

Thanks everyone. I suppose I'm surprised that kids so young can get migraines. We have a doctor's appointment tomorrow (coincidentally). His headache lasted about 4 hours and went from mild to severe, with vomiting and sensitivity to bright lights. He had no fever, no other symptoms and is perfect today. Pemberley, I'm pleased to hear that there is medication kids can take should this happen again. I've read that triptans aren't approved for kids, yet these are the only drugs that work for me (my migraines are quite regular and bad). I will do some more research and let you know if I have more specific questions. Thanks again.

Triptans don't work for me at all, interestingly. I just went off Elavil after a trial (it was not sufficently effective) and switched back to Topomax, which works very well, but has side effects. Elavil made me extremely groggy in the mornings. Both of these drugs can affect mood.

Topomax has worked for my DD15, but we had to beg the doctor to prescribe at her age (13). She had missed so much school and was in so much pain.

Ultramarina, have you tried propranolol? This has worked quite well for me, in terms of reducing the intensity and frequency of my headaches. The side effects are minimal.

YMMV - when I was prescribed propanolol - not for migraine - the side effects were intolerable. (It lowers blood pressure; mine was already low; I couldn't function!)

My 14-year-old son and I are both highly sensitive and we both get frequent migraines. I didn't realize his headaches were migraines until they got worse around the time he turned 11. I noticed that he usually got them within 30 minutes of when I got mine even when I didn't tell him I was getting one. We usually get them when there are weather changes like extreme temperature changes, high winds, barometric pressure changes, etc. or if we didn't get enough sleep combined with stress.

Before a migraine starts, we both get a really tired feeling and I usually have visual disturbances like when I look at the something with vertical lines they appear to vibrate. This causes problems when we try to do geometry. When I get a migraine it affects my speech and words sometimes don't come out right but it doesn't affect my son that way. The headaches absolutely slow us down when we do algebra (we homeschool) or anything that requires thinking. It is not a good idea for us to take a timed test with a migraine. I become very sensitive to cars changing lanes anywhere near me when I am driving. I sometimes have to stop and wait for the headache to pass at the nearest place with a caffeinated beverage. If I drink coffee and take an Excedrin Migraine it usually takes about 20 minutes for the worst of the headache pain to go away.

A neurologist gave my son a prescription for a migraine medication a few years ago and the base pharmacist refused to fill it saying it should not be taken by kids but the pharmacist didn't have any trouble filling the prescription for amitriptyline (an antidepressant that is sometimes used to prevent migraines) and it made very tired and his personality changed so he stopped taking it. He found that an OTC cold medication that contains sudafed helps enough that he can function but does not take all of the pain away. I take Excedrin Migraine. I tried propranol years ago and it helped with the headaches but it caused a very fast unwanted weight gain so I had to stop taking it. I talked to family members who also suffered from migraines and they said all the other migraine medications they tried didn't work for them either so they just went back to using excedrin migraine. Unfortunately, it contains aspirin so kids can't take it.

Thanks for this everyone. I guess I've been lucky with propranolol! Fingers crossed that my son's experience doesn't recur again soon.

I have not tried propranolol, but I have idiopathic low blood pressure (95/55 is not uncommon) so that's probably why they haven't suggested it for me. I know there is one more med they're mentioned that I can try. Topamax makes me irritable and stupid, but it's better than the migraines. I do have one painkiller that works for me--Fioricet. I have been given all kinds of things--I could have a black market painkiller business if I wanted to--but it's the only one that works. Unfortunately, it has addictive potential. I was needing to take 2-3 a week on the Elavil, which is why I went back on the Topamax, which beats them back to where I only need 2-3 pain pills a month.

One of my cousins got migraines at 5. After several years and doctors it was determined that her cocyx etc were not fused and the spinal cord was being affected. See the doctor if it happens again just in case.

I don't have any research to provide, but just wanted to chime in with some personal experience. I am also a migraine sufferer, mine started around age 15 and I still get them. My DD got her first migraine when she was around 2 years old. Her pediatrician told me that they can be genetic and if one parent suffers from migraine's then the likelihood of the child having migraines is significantly higher.

When my DD had her first migraine, she was too young to really communicate to me what the problem was, but she started screaming like something was really wrong and this clear liquid squirted out of her nose. It scared me so badly, I took her into the ER to make sure everything was OK with her.

The ER did not diagnose it as a migraine and neither did her pediatrician at that time. Her next migraine happened when she was 4 years old and oddly, we were right outside the pediatrician office at the onset, so I took her in and the pediatrician got to witness the full onset and attack. At that time she told me that it was a classic migraine, she said even the clear fluid coming out of the nose is a huge symptom.

For children, the only remedy (and thankfully it seems to be effective) for a migraine is to give them Ibuprofin and let hem sleep for a couple of hours.

My daughter seems to want to sleep when she has one, so that is what I do and when she wakes up, they are usually gone. She has only had one other migraine when she was in Kindergarten. Her kindergarten teacher called me at home and said my DD started screaming in pain and clutching at her head and I needed to come and get her because they couldn't calm her down. I knew right away what it was and I went right up and got her home, gave her the Advil and put her to bed. When she awoke, two hours later she was fine.

Thankfully they are not frequent for her, but when they hit, there is no mistaking them.

I was first diagnosed with migraines when I was 6 and had the classic symptoms of nausea and severe pounding head pain, usually behind one of my eyes, sometimes also accompanied by some pain at the base of my skull. I have only had visual auras once, but light usually bothers me, as does movement (like people talking with their hands) and loud noises, sometimes hours before I actually get the migraine.

My DS14 had his first migraine just before he was 2 when we were at an outdoor concert in warm, humid air and eating strawberries and grapes and cheese, which are all stereotypical triggers. I didn't put it together at the time that it was a migraine, but when he was 4 we were traveling and he started crying in pain and he said it felt like he had "bugs running around inside his brain" and then he threw up. He has had them off and on ever since and we now keep acetaminophen in the school nurse's office so that, even if they have to call us to come get him, he can start to get some relief as soon as possible.

What we have found works for us is hitting it hard with both acetaminophen and ibuprofin at the same time, sleeping in a dark room, and placing a warm moist compress (we use a Bed Buddy heated in the microwave) over our eyes and the bridge of our nose. [BTW: it says on the Bed Buddy packaging not to use it on the eyes, but it works best this way for us so we take our chances. It also helps just to use it on the forehead or on the back of the neck.]

We have found that the best way to avoid migraines is to keep our routine as regular as possible: not too much or too little sleep, not too much or too little exercise, not too much or too little food, etc. Our triggers, other than change in routine and sleep habits, seem to be humidity, barometric changes, and higher-intensity exercise. Also, we tend to get them at special occasions such as weddings and fieldtrips, even when the events themselves are in no way stressful.

I am one of those people who hates to take medicine very often, but migraines are something you have to hit early and hard. So, needless to say, we have medicine with us at all times.

Also, for what it's worth, I've tried Imitrix, and it did not work at all for me.

I've gotten them for years - particularly auras. Tonight DD10 just had her first aura, which prompted me to search these threads and leave this comment...

I always start with auras, that last anywhere from 20 minutes to an hour. They start small and then grow and spread to the point where I have very little functional vision - I can't read, drive... anything like that. I've gotten them while driving home from work and had to pull over and just wait.

Sometimes there's no pain, and sometimes there's a dull aching, usually accompanied by nausea. They usually come in clusters... I'll have none for months and months and then get three or four in one week. I haven't figured out a trigger yet.

After DD10 complained about her zig-zaggy lights, she came back out of her room a few minutes later and said her head hurt, so I gave her Tylenol. Hopefully she won't be too badly afflicted in the future...

I had migraines in high school and a bit of college; I noticed a pattern when I was stressed, as soon as a test, or other thing I was freaking out about was over, my headaches would go away. Stress seems a huge player with migraines; mine were certainly not the worse I've heard of but I did spend many afternoons in bed with pillow over my head and lights out trying not to hurl. Basically outgrew them, though not sure how that worked, perhaps my epiphany about stress helps me cut them off at the pass a lot more often.

Hi Chris,
To cure migraines in young children engage them in regular physical activities because they will increases blood flow and allow more oxygen to their brain. Limit chocolate and cheese and removal of tyramine from the diet has been found most efficacious in curing migraines. Taking migraine vitamins have been found efficacious in curing migraines and avoid bright light and use hat and goggles in sunny days.

My DD10 started getting migraines a few years ago, around the same time I began to suffer from a severe migraine disorder. Determined not to live on medications, I began pulling as much as practically possible from our diets that is not natural food and all forms of soy. Now, I am not obsessive about it when we eat out, just careful. Neither one of us has any headache or any other sympton any longer. She may get a headache is she has the perfect storm of circumstances (lack of sleep, loud noises, hungary, and flashing lights) but that is it. Exercise, Sufficient sleep, and eat real food with reasonable carbs intake)