Take two Tylenol before listening to Tom Zeller and The Headache

Did you know that chronic head pain, from blinding migraines to severe headache disorders known as “clusters,” affects 40% of the population? And that science, largely, shrugs over the cause? Many suffer in silence, afraid of being chided as “merely” having a headache, when in fact this is a horrifically debilitating disorder. If you are one of them, or know someone who is, this is a book for you. In The Headache, science journalist Tom Zeller reveals the struggling science behind a group of disorders that is as much a curse as a cultural punchline, and leads to key insights into the nature of pain itself.Guided by his own decades-long struggle with cluster headaches, Zeller gives the inside track. He visits cutting-edge clinics; interviews dozens of doctors, neurologists, and fellow headache patients; participates in clinical trials for multi-million-dollar new medicines; and even experiments with psilocybin in search of relief. Along the way, Zeller traces the longer arc of mystery around headaches, from prehistoric skull surgery to Virginia Woolf’s assertion that, in the throes of a migraine, “language runs dry,” to reveal how headaches became one of the most under-researched afflictions in medicine—and how that is slowly starting to change. Join us to talk live with Zeller about all things headache, and take a journey into the inner workings of the human nervous system.

Episode was recorded live August 13, 2026.

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