How do I know if my headaches are migraines?

Migraine is more than a bad headache: typically one-sided, throbbing, moderate to severe, worsened by movement, with nausea or sensitivity to light and sound, lasting hours to days. Some get warning auras of shimmering vision. Tension headaches, by contrast, band the whole head without the trimmings.

If headaches make you seek dark quiet rooms, that alone leans migraine, and it is underdiagnosed and undertreated everywhere.

Effective specific treatments exist beyond generic painkillers. The thunderclap kind, sudden worst-ever pain, or headache with fever, stiff neck, weakness or confusion, is an emergency, not a migraine question.