How to Get Rid of Brain Freeze

Brain freeze, or the intense pain you feel in your head when eating or drinking cold food items, is caused by capillaries in the roof of your mouth dilating rapidly. This tells your brain that something isn't quite right because of the extreme temperature change. Your brain then swings into action, causing the blood vessels in your forehead to swell. This is similar to what happens when you have a migraine, although much shorter-lived.

To cut this phenomenon short press your tongue firmly to the roof of your mouth. This will help heat up the area, thereby sending your brain the message that your head is not, in fact, freezing so there's no reason to increase blood flow to warm up the body. While you may still experience some pain from a brain freeze this will shorten its duration.

To avoid a brain freeze you should eat or drink more slowly and try not to allow the cold foods and drinks to have much contact time with the roof of your mouth. This will lessen the chance that your nerves will send the "freezing" warning to the brain.