Like elephants standing on your eyeballs.

Or a head-first belly-flop on an ice-cold lake? Maybe like a kiss on the forehead from a sledgehammer. Or, wait, this — wearing rubber bands around your skull while being Wile E. Coyote in any situation. No matter how it’s described, a headache hurts, and in “Splitting” by Amanda Ellison, you’ll get help to understand yours.

Pain is good.

If you’re the average human, you probably think that that’s an odd statement, especially if your head feels like a snare drum. It’s true, though: pain happens when your brain needs more than your circulatory system is giving your body and, long story short, that forces you to pay attention when something is wrong. Pain = good.

Knowing that, of course, doesn’t help your headache much, though, does it?

How about this: Ellison says that if your head hurts, it might be worthwhile to have a few glasses of water. Mere dehydration can cause headache pain. Easy-peasy.

But let’s say that it’s not your head that hurts, but your face. Ugh, sinus headaches aren’t simple to explain but suffice it to say that your body’s defenses, your trigeminal nerve, and general snottiness add up. Think nasal washes, antihistamines, antibiotics.

On the other hand, stress headaches are caused by the body’s response to the brain’s response to stimuli, especially of the negative sort. Emotion absolutely has a lot to do with those kinds of headaches but so do traumatic episodes; a stress headache can also “feed into” itself. Pass on the wine when you’ve got a stress headache; instead, meditate, eat chocolate, or go to bed (but not alone).

Finally, if you come to this book looking for migraine information, Elliott says that migraines go “beyond the headache component.” In her experience, she says, sufferers are “quite bad at spotting the first stage of migraine…” but understanding your yawns, oxytocin, genetics, and watching your diet could set you on the right path.

Poor punkin. Everybody can see that those noggin-throbbers are no fun, but at least “Splitting” is.

If you can imagine spotting a little humor in the midst of headache pain, you have an inkling of what you’ll find here from physiologist, neuroscientist, and author Amanda Ellison. In her loaded, scientific-but-not-too-much examination of what goes on in your head, she allows for a few gingerly-stated chuckles as she explains the different kinds of headaches and possible treatments.

Yes, though the pain may be the same on the scream-scale, home remedies might vary, and on that note, long-time sufferers may find new advice ranging from the very simple to the very complicated. The suggestions seem to be worthy, and while “See Your Doctor” isn’t blinking in neon anywhere here, Ellison makes it clear that further action may be necessary.

This is one of those books that you’ll want to read long before you need it, so get ready now. If you’re prone to feeling like your head is a golf ball at the U.S. Open (ouch!), “Splitting” is outstanding.

“Splitting: The Inside Story on Headaches” by Amanda Ellison
c.2020, Green Tree / Bloomsbury
$24.00 / $32.50 Canada
234 pages