What is Intracranial Hypotension?
Intracranial Hypotension is a condition in which the spinal fluid levels of the body are lower than normal. Spinal fluid cushions the brain and spinal cord, so if levels are low, your brain is left to sag within the skull. While spinal fluid leaks can spontaneously occur in some individuals, they are often caused by trauma to the outermost layer of the tissue that surrounds the spinal cord.
Symptoms Include:
- Headaches that are typically worsened when upright and relieved when lying flat
- Heaviness of the head
- Nausea
- Impaired cognitive skills
- Dizziness
- Change in hearing
- Eye pain
- Vision changes
- Back pain
- Neck pain
What it Feels Like:
- Like your skull is being crushed
- Like there is a massive sharp boulder in the place of your brain that sinks deeper every time you stand up
- Like your brain is functioning at half capacity
- Like your eyes will rip apart from your head if you look around
- Like vomiting in public wouldn’t even be embarrassing because you don’t even feel all there
- Like your neck cant support your head
- Like your back cant support your own body weight
- Like you’re going to go crazy from all of the sounds within your head
- Like heaven – when you can finally lie flat
What Can Be Done:
While spinal fluid leaks can often heal themselves in time, blood patches are often performed.
Increased amounts of fluids and caffeine are also said to speed up the healing process.
For You formed my inward parts; You covered me in my mother’s womb. I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Marvelous are Your works, And that my soul knows very well. My frame was not hidden from You, When I was made in secret, And skillfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed. And in Your book they all were written, The days fashioned for me, When as yet there were none of them.
– Psalms 139:13-16
If you believe you may have Intracranial Hypotension, please seek a medical professional for a proper diagnosis and treatment plan.
If you have or feel you may have this condition, regardless of whether or not you have been diagnosed, please feel free to reach out to us.
For information on Intracranial Hypertension (high levels of spinal fluid), click here.
Postpartum Headaches & Backpain
Read more about how this condition can develop following an epidural for childbirth.