Exciting changes at The Daily Headache!
I know you haven’t heard from me in a while—my advocacy work has taken me in other directions over the past few years, but I’m back and excited to announce some changes to The Daily Headache.
I’m welcoming Holly Harding, Lisa Benson, and Nancy Harris Bonk as contributors. We met through migraine advocacy, became close friends, and have spent years supporting each other through the full weight of life with chronic illness. That friendship isn’t incidental to this project — it’s part of what makes us such a good team. The four of us share a core belief that people living with migraine and headache disorders deserve honest, compassionate, real-world insight.
The push to make this happen came from you. After we all stopped writing for a site where we’d been contributors, readers reached out to each of us separately asking where they could find our work. That felt like a clear signal. The Daily Headache was the natural place to bring those voices together.
Holly Harding has been living with migraine since age six and has spent decades turning that experience into action. She is the Executive Director of the Carolina Headache Foundation, where she works to expand education and access to care for patients and providers. Her writing is grounded in empathy and practicality — she has a gift for meeting people where they are.
Lisa Benson brings a perspective unlike anyone else in this space. A visual artist and storyteller, she has spent years working to dismantle the stigma of invisible illness through creativity. She is the author of two books, including Dear Migraine, a collection of essays, poems, and art from 64 contributors. Lisa has also facilitated mindfulness and creativity events for Miles for Migraine and spoken at Retreat Migraine. She will tell you that balancing art, parenting, and chronic illness requires equal parts precision, patience, and cappuccinos — and she is not wrong.
Nancy Harris Bonk is one of the most dedicated patient leaders in the headache community. Her journey with chronic migraine began after a traumatic brain injury in 1996, and she has channeled that experience into more than two decades of advocacy. She founded the Western New York Migraine and Headache Disorder Support Group in 2011 — one of the first in-person migraine support groups in the country — and has served on the boards of the Alliance for Headache Disorders Advocacy, the National Headache Foundation’s Patient Leadership Council, and CHAMP.
And in case you don’t remember who I am, I’m Kerrie Smyres. I started The Daily Headache in 2005 as a creative outlet when chronic migraine became too debilitating to work. My advocacy passions are writing about the emotional experience of chronic illness and translating medical research into language that’s actually useful. I am also the co-founder of TheraSpecs, which makes precision-tinted glasses for light sensitivity management.
We each bring different perspectives and experiences to the table, but we share the same core belief: that people living with migraine and chronic illness deserve honest, compassionate, and genuinely useful information. That’s what The Daily Headache has always tried to be, and with four voices instead of one, there’s more we can offer.
I’m glad you’re here.
