In most cases, there is an obvious cause of the leak, such as a spinal tap, spinal surgery, or trauma to the head or neck. Cases where postural headaches develop shortly after an obvious potential cause, diagnosis is usually easy to make. Subtle cases can be trickier to diagnose. There may be no obvious precipitating event, or perhaps the leak was caused by a sneeze, a violent cough, or some other unrecognized minor trauma. Some patients – particularly those with hyper-flexibility of the joints – may be born with meninges that are more susceptible to tearing with relatively small degrees of force.