What Causes An Ice Cream Headache ?

We've all had an ice-cream headache: Imagine it's the middle of summer, and you stop with your friends at the local ice cream place to get some ice cream so you can cool off. You are all tucking into your ice cream when suddenly someone calls out "brain freeze!" and stops eating to clutch their head and stop in pain. They may even bend over and groan shout a little -- an ice cream headache can hurt for a little while.

So what causes a typical ice cream headache? Why does something as wonderful as ice cream give you such pain? Have you ever noticed that you can get an ice cream headache when eating or drinking anything that is cold and you are eating or drinking it too quickly? There is a reason for that and it is a genuine medical reason. Let me give you the real truth behind an ice cream headache.

You can get an ice cream headache from drinking a really cold drink on a hot day, guzzling an ice cold bottle of water, or in fact anything cold that goes into your mouth and touches the roof of your mouth. The thing is this: in the roof of your mouth there is a set of blood vessels that is connected to the blood vessels in your head. A headache usually happens when the muscles around your skull contract or when the blood vessels around the skull expand and contract more than usual.

You normally feel a headache behind your eyes, because this is where your primary blood vessels are that respond to this reaction. Also the muscles around your eye sockets become very sensitive when the muscles around your skull begin to contract. It is like filling the front of your head with water and then pulling back on your hair so that your skin is real tight. I think you understand me.

What on Earth is Happening in my Head?

An ice cream headache happens because the cold ice cream (or whatever cold item you are consuming) hits the roof of your mouth at a rapid pace and the blood vessels in the roof of your mouth try to compensate for the extreme cold by expanding to keep the brain warm.

This shoots all the way up the front of your head and sits right behind your eyes, causing the classic ice cream headache. So what can you do?The answer is to stop eating the ice cream so fast, and just let your system correct itself natuarlly. Don’t try to warm yourself up again because that could just make everything worse. It doesn’t take long to get better.

Just take your time and enjoy your ice cream -- it isn't a contest! Well, not usually.