Learn Hardcore Norwegian: Når jeg har hodepine, legger jeg en kald klut på pannen og hviler. - When I have a headache, I put a cold cloth on my forehead and rest.

If a subordinate clause comes first, you put a comma between it and the main clause.
- Når jeg har hodepine, legger jeg en kald klut på pannen og hviler.
If the main clause comes first, you usually don’t put a comma before the subordinate clause.
- Jeg legger en kald klut på pannen og hviler når jeg har hodepine.

Why do you use når here, and not da or om?

Norwegian distinguishes between several words that can translate as when or if:

når
- Used for:
  - present or future time: Når jeg har hodepine, … (Whenever / when I have a headache)
  - repeated or general situations.
da
- Used for:
  - single, specific events in the past:
    - Da jeg hadde hodepine i går, la jeg en kald klut på pannen.
      (When I had a headache yesterday…)
- You cannot use da with present tense here.
om
- Often means if:
  - Om jeg får hodepine, legger jeg en kald klut på pannen.
    (If I get a headache, I put a cold cloth on my forehead.)

So in your sentence, når is correct because it’s a general / habitual situation in the present.

Why do you say har hodepine and not something like er hodepine?

Norwegian uses å ha (to have) for this type of symptom, just like English:

Jeg har hodepine. – I have a headache.
Jeg har feber. – I have a fever.
Jeg har vondt i ryggen. – I have back pain / My back hurts.

Saying er hodepine (am headache) would be ungrammatical. The typical patterns are:

å ha + symptom-noun: har hodepine
å ha vondt i + kroppsdel: har vondt i hodet (have pain in the head)

Why is there no article before hodepine? In English we say “a headache”.

Norwegian often treats hodepine more like a mass noun (a kind of pain), so the natural everyday phrase is:

Jeg har hodepine. — literally I have headache.

You can say Jeg har en hodepine, but:

it sounds less neutral and more like:
- a specific, maybe unusually strong headache, or
- metaphorical: Dette prosjektet er en hodepine. (This project is a headache / a pain.)

For simple “I have a headache”, Norwegians strongly prefer Jeg har hodepine.

Could you also say Når jeg får hodepine instead of Når jeg har hodepine?

Yes, but the meaning changes slightly:

Når jeg har hodepine, legger jeg …
- Focus on the situation while you have the headache (habitual state).
Når jeg får hodepine, legger jeg …
- Focus on the moment you get (start to get) the headache, and what you do then.

Both are grammatically correct.
The original sentence describes what you do during a headache.

Why is it en kald klut and not et kaldt klut?

Because klut is a masculine noun in Bokmål:

indefinite singular: en klut (a cloth/rag)
definite singular: kluten or den kalde kluten
plural: kluter, klutene

Adjectives agree with gender and number:

en kald klut (m.sg.)
et kaldt håndkle (n.sg. – a cold towel)
kald(e) kluter (plural)

So the correct combination is en kald klut.

What is the difference between klut and håndkle?

Both can be translated as cloth or towel, but they’re not the same:

klut
- Usually a small cloth, rag, or washcloth.
- Often used for cleaning, wiping, or in this case as a compress.
- Example: vaskeklut (washcloth), oppvaskklut (dishrag).
håndkle
- A towel, typically larger, for drying your body or hands.
- Example: badehåndkle (bath towel), håndkle på badet (towel in the bathroom).

In this context, a small cloth used as a cold compress is naturally called a klut.
You could say et kaldt håndkle, but it gives more the feeling of a towel than of a small cloth.

Why is it på pannen and not i pannen? Both can be translated as “on the forehead”.

Preposition choice matters:

på pannen = on the surface of the forehead.
- A cloth rests on your skin: en kald klut på pannen.
i pannen = in the forehead, literally in(side) the forehead area.
- Used with things like hitting, wounds, or being located in that part of the body:
  - Han fikk et sår i pannen. – He got a wound in his forehead.
  - Han ble skutt i pannen. – He was shot in the forehead.

So for something that lies on top of your forehead, på pannen is correct.

Why is it pannen and not just panne or panna?

The basic noun is (en) panne – a forehead.
The definite form (the forehead) is:
- pannen (standard Bokmål)
- panna (more informal/colloquial Bokmål, and common in speech; also Nynorsk)

Because we are talking about your specific forehead, Norwegian uses the definite form:

på pannen – on the forehead
(understood as my or your forehead from context)

You could also see:

på panna – very common in spoken Norwegian and informal writing.
Both pannen and panna are acceptable Bokmål, but pannen is more formal/neutral written style.

Why is the word order legger jeg and not jeg legger after the comma?

Norwegian main clauses follow the V2 rule: the finite verb must be in the second position in a main clause.

In your sentence:

First comes a subordinate clause: Når jeg har hodepine, …
Then the main clause starts. The first element of the main clause is the whole subordinate clause (treated as one block).
Therefore, the verb in the main clause must come next:

Main clause:

First element: [Når jeg har hodepine]
Second element (finite verb): legger
Then subject: jeg
Rest: en kald klut på pannen og hviler

So:

Når jeg har hodepine, legger jeg en kald klut på pannen og hviler. ✅
Når jeg har hodepine, jeg legger en kald klut … ❌ (breaks the V2 rule)

Why don’t you repeat jeg before hviler (why not … legger jeg … og hviler jeg )?

Because both verbs (legger and hviler) share the same subject (jeg) within one main clause:

Full, but heavier version:
- Når jeg har hodepine, legger jeg en kald klut på pannen, og jeg hviler.
More natural and compact:
- Når jeg har hodepine, legger jeg en kald klut på pannen og hviler.

In Norwegian (and English) it’s normal to omit the repeated subject when:

the subject is the same for both verbs, and
they are joined with og (and) in the same clause.

So … legger jeg … og hviler is perfectly correct and idiomatic.

Should it be hviler or hviler meg?

Both forms exist:

å hvile (no reflexive) – to rest
- Jeg hviler. – I rest.
å hvile seg – literally “to rest oneself”
- Jeg hviler meg. – I rest (myself).

Meaning:

In everyday language, hvile and hvile seg are very close in meaning in this context.
hvile seg can sound a bit more emphatic or old-fashioned depending on dialect and style.

In your sentence, both are possible:

… legger jeg en kald klut på pannen og hviler. ✅
… legger jeg en kald klut på pannen og hviler meg. ✅

The version without meg is slightly simpler and very common.