Does using painkillers daily cause headaches?

[SunFlowerRose]

I take Naproxen and highest dose cocodamol daily to control TMJ pain, alongside 4 x Amytryptyline per day.

Recently I feel as though they are not touching the pain anymore, but I now have a constant headache on top of the pain.

Does anyone have experience in this? I am now on my 4th day of having a headache, feeling sick and TMJ pain.

Do I need to take a break from the painkillers and try and cope with the pain for a couple of days?

I can't try and contact my GP until Tuesday and this is making me feel miserable.

Yes it can Medication Overuse HeadacheDownload PDF
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Medication overuse is defined as a headache which is present for 15 days or more per month and which has developed or worsened while taking regular symptomatic medication

Short answer: yes. Been there, done that. The only way is to break the cycle and that means enduring a headache/headaches for a few days. Keep well hydrated, too!

Yes - especially when it comes to opioids. After a few days of co-codamol use I always begin to get really nasty headaches. Maybe try going without that (if you can manage) to see if it helps

Tmj?

Yes codeine definitely causes headaches and nausea.

for me, yes definitely. I take them knowing full well I will feel rough the next day, so it has to be really worth it

I have managed.last Night and tonight without and have now take ibuprofen in hopes it at least takes the edge off ☹️

Yes, I had to come off all painkillers for a few months to resolve it. Speak to your GP before stopping anything though.

I think they are called rebound headaches

Could also be postural - you pushing your head forward and straining your neck muscles. The particular muscles that get strained can cause dizziness and nausea as well as worsening your TMJ.

Do you have an ergonomic pillow to make sure that your neck isn't bent at an angle when you sleep?

Something else that might help if it is the muscles is cold packs on the back of your neck.

Oh, and it could be something else like sinus inflammation. Those headaches are monstrous - trying pseudoephedrine/Sudafed, cold packs and rinsing with body temperature-warm sterile saline can help with those.

Yes, definitely. I had this. I think you'll need to stop the ibuprofen as well.

Mine took a few days of worsening headaches, and then a week of decreasing ones until it finally went. The first couple of days I could barely sit up in the morning due to the pounding in my head. Tiger balm helped take the edge off.

I'm now really careful with painkillers and only take them when I really need to. Generally I get bad headaches before my period, so I take painkillers one day a month for that.

How many days break would you say is needed? And will it come back as soon as I start taking them again?

I have highest dose cocodamol and also naproxen. Do both cause the headaches or would just taking the naproxen work out OK?

I'm in a lot of pain. The high up constant headache is gone but tmj is meaning my jaw and teeth are super painful and it is radiating up to my nose and eyes.

It feels like I have to pick which type of pain to have to deal with for the rest of my life 😕

I think try with the naproxen + maybe even paracetamol alone, the codeine in the co-codamol is probably the headache causing culprit - after a few days on it I always find myself developing migraines.

Ibuprofen causes overuse headaches too.

I took a 3 months complete break from all painkillers, and then don’t use them more than two days a week after that to prevent the rebound headaches returning. I was advised if I went back to taking them every day then the same cycle would start again.

And it was naproxen and paracetamol I was on, I had to stop ibuprofen too. Could you speak to your dr to see if there’s any preventatives that can be increased so you can reduce the painkillers?

Are you taking the highest dosage around the clock, ie every 4-6 hours or just once a day? I've had periods of taking painkillers once a day and had no issues with rebound headaches. Once the stress/illness/hormones go away, there would be 2 weeks where I have no headaches at all.

You might want to talk to your doctor about trying triptans. Even though they target migraines, I find they're quite effective for other types of dull, all-over headaches too. They basically widen blood vessels so blood can flow freely and the effect lasts much longer than painkillers.

Yes I was taking full dose every 4 hours sometimes not during the night but sometimes I was.

I have ordered cbd gummies from amazon to try.

Have you tried a plate from the dentist? Its made a big difference to my TMJ. Get all sorts of bad reactions from painkillers so can rarely take them. I cycle on and off a high dose of the NSAID Celebrex when particularly desperate. Can't use Naproxen anymore. Once I start getting bad reactions to a particular medication I can't use it anymore even after 6 months break. My bodies pretty messed up though.

Do you mean a mouth guard? Ive been referred to a tmj consultant who will most likely do me one.

They can't tell me how long the waiting list is though.