Treatment

In some cases, your first sex headache may also be your only one. Some sex headaches improve rapidly, so the pain is gone before any pain reliever can work.

Preventive medications

If you have a history of sex headaches and there's no underlying cause, your doctor may recommend that you take preventive medications regularly. These may include:

• Daily medications. Beta blockers, for example, propranolol (Inderal, Innopran XL) or metoprolol (Lopressor, Toprol-XL) — which are used to treat high blood pressure, coronary artery disease and migraines — may be taken daily to prevent sex headaches. They're recommended only if you have frequent or prolonged attacks.
• Occasional medications. Indomethacin (Indocin, Tivorbex), an anti-inflammatory, or one of the triptans, a class of anti-migraine medications, can be taken an hour before sex to prevent headaches.