12/02/2025
Migraines are not simply headaches. They are storms that rise from the deepest architecture of the nervous system, electrical, vascular, and emotional, all at once. To the person inside the storm, it can feel as though the world is tightening, pulsing, and collapsing inward. To the outside eye, nothing appears different. This is the quiet cruelty of migraines, and the reason our hands, presence, and understanding matter so profoundly.
Inside the skull, the brain behaves like the weather. A wave of electrical activity known as cortical spreading depression can sweep across the surface like lightning rolling across a horizon. Blood vessels constrict and swell in response. The trigeminovascular system, which links the dura and cranial vessels to the trigeminal nerve, begins to send alarms. The brainstem, keeper of light and sound, nausea and pain perception, becomes exquisitely sensitive. None of this is imagined. It is biology in motion.
There is so much living beneath the surface of this work that it deserves to be explored slowly, layer by layer. So let us begin with one of the quiet places where the body hides its truths.
At the base of the skull lies a place where the body whispers its oldest stories. A small, hidden meeting point where deep muscles touch the dura mater, the membrane that cradles the brain and spinal cord. This quiet connection is called the myodural bridge, and though it is often overlooked, it shapes the way a person carries their head, their thoughts, their protection, and their pain.
Anatomically, the myodural bridge links the suboccipital muscles to the dura. These muscles are tiny, intricate, and sensitive to even the slightest shifts in posture or emotion. The dura, by contrast, is a vast sheath of protective tissue rich with nerves that respond instantly to tension. Together, they form a living conduit between the musculoskeletal world and the central nervous system. When the neck stiffens, the dura feels it. When the dura tenses, the whole head responds.
For many clients, this is where headaches are born. It is where migraines gather like storms. It is where the body braces against stress without conscious permission. Long hours of screen work, unresolved emotional load, old whiplash injuries, shallow breathing patterns, and chronic sympathetic activation all feed tension into this tiny meeting place. The result is a pressure that is both muscular and neurological, both structural and emotional.
This is why, when bodyworkers place their hands beneath the head, something profound can happen. Suboccipital release does more than soften the muscles. It eases the pull on the dura itself, giving the membranes around the brain a moment of relief. Gentle traction at the occiput invites space into the cranial base, allowing cerebrospinal fluid a smoother rhythm. Craniosacral holds can soften the bracing reflex around the brainstem, creating an opening where the nervous system can finally breathe.
Clients often describe the shift as a warmth spreading behind their eyes or a slow release deep inside the skull. Some feel their breath drop into their body for the first time that day. Others experience a quiet emotional unbinding, as if the mind has been gripping something too tightly for too long. These moments are not accidents. They are the result of easing a structure that sits at the crossroads of sensation, pressure, memory, and protection.
The myodural bridge is not just a piece of anatomy. It is a translator between the spine and the brain, a tension bridge between past and present, a sentinel that reacts to our stress long before we can name it. When it is softened with skill and intention, the entire system recalibrates. The head lightens. The neck lengthens. The nervous system steps back from the edge.
As Body Artisans, this is one of the most sacred places we touch. Here, beneath our palms, the physical and emotional selves meet. Here, the body reveals how it has been holding the world. Here, a new story can begin to unfold.
When the myodural bridge softens, the whole person softens with it. The head finally exhales. The spine listens. And the nervous system remembers what ease feels like again.
