This seems like a small enough rant that it doesn’t deserve the Pit.
About every 4-8 weeks I’ll get an optical migraine. Not a whopper, but bad enough.
It starts the “pre drome”, which for me means getting a ‘blind spot’ in my vision where it’s hard to read text, and after of this a bit I’ll clue that the migraine is coming on.
Then we get 20-40 minutes of scintillating scotoma or “fortification spectra”. Very annoying. When it’s at full scale, I basically can’t see a thing and am essentially blind. (This happened once in a restaurant once when I was eating alone – all I could do was sit there for 30 minutes and wait for it to go away while pretending to read the paper. Driving or walking would have been impossible, eating was pretty damned hard.)
After that, the “post drome” begins – 4-12 hours of achiness, moderate nausua, extreme light and sound sensitivity (bright lights or loud sounds actually hurt) and especially "can’t think"ness – very slow thought processes and forgetfulness that makes it difficult to function.
On the bright side, I do thank God, Buddha and all other dieties that I don’t get the incredible splitting head pain that some get with a migraine. Or at least, not often – I have gotten such at least once. But at least it’s rare. I also thank the Gods that this only happens every month or two.
I’m in Post Drome right now. I’m indoors with the shades drawn and I’m wearing sunglasses. Extra Strength Excedrin, a glass of wine (and whine ). By morning I’ll be Me again, but I’ll be hiding in a quiet cave this evening.
I don’t get splitting headaches either, which is nice. But I also get the blind spot in my vision, the visual aura. I’ll get that and as soon as I know one is coming on I take my medication. My meds usually help keep the actual pain away, but the visual auras don’t leave. Luckily they only last about five to ten minutes. I can usual guess on how painful the migraine was based on how drowsy the medicine makes me. Sometimes I don’t get very drowsy, other times I can sleep the afternoon away.
I’ve had migraines for four years, and only began taking medication recently. What finally got me to the doctors is the one time when my visual aura lasted an hour and my left hand went numb.
Do you know what causes your migraines (the trigger)? I still don’t know what causes mine, but I’m guessing it might be radical weather change. I live in KC and one day it can be 80 and the next 40. My most recent migraine happened when it was 89 at around 11:00 AM and by 5 it was 58.
bean_shadow, glare seems to be a trigger, but not a reliable one. Sometimes it just happens for no reason.
I’ve never even seen a doctor about this, there didn’t seem to be much point. 2 close relations also get optical migraines, one uses meds, one doesn’t, and thier symptoms seem to be exactly the same as mine. If this happened more than every few weeks I’d try to get meds, but it’s seldom enough that it doesn’t seem worth the trouble. I just have a crappy day (or evening) every so often, but who doesn’t?
I must say, the first time it happened it scared the crap out of me. Then I told my father about it, and his response was, “oh, yeah, that. Yeah, I get those, too.” Once I knew it was an optical migraine and I wasn’t going to die or anything, it wasn’t so scary. Definitely annoying, though.
So, how was your first optical migraine? Did you have any idea what was happening to you? Was your aura strong enough that you couldn’t see anything else?
Orgasms help me. Take two and try to take a nap. Also caffeine and lots and lots of OTC medication. Usually I can at least tolerate them that way.
I don’t get the aura, I just get the searing pain in one side of the head and nausea. Sleep disturbances, weather changes, onions, and stress seem to bring them on. Sometimes I get them for no reason I can identify.
Oliver Sacks’ book ‘Migraine’ is sort of interesting, as it catalogues symptoms and case studies. There are other things I’ve dealt with that apparently are related to my migraines. (Severe abdominal cramps, excessive salivary gland output, etc.)
I’m glad I don’t get those optical migraines. Though I guess if you get used to it, it’s not so bad?
OK, now I’ve sprayed soda all over my keyboard. Taking two may be impractical for me, at least in a short period of time. Recovery period, you know. So hopefully one helps.
Pretty much. It’s darned inconvenient – I can see being on a long drive and I’d just need to pull over and sit there for 30 minutes, waiting for it to pass. Try explaining that to a cop. It’s also scary if you don’t know what’s happening.
But I’d guess severe pain, which I usually don’t get, is much more problematic. My sympathies to you – I hope you don’t get migraines often.
Oh my God, just reading this thread makes me nauseous.
I have been getting migraines since I was 16. My symptoms are exactly as Squeegee puts them, except with the added bonus of splitting head pain. Heat triggers mine, and I used to get them so bad that vomiting was inevitable. Upon the onset of a migraine, the day was shot, and I would have to drop whatever I was doing to lay down and hope that I didn’t get sick too much.
Caffeine definitely helps. It is with this in mind that I drink an exorbitant amount of caffeinated soda – up to 10 cans a day, sometimes less. It’s probably something I’ll have to quit in a few years since – well, it’s a lot of soda, so much, in fact, that I don’t recommend this practice. But, it seems to work for me. Dark glasses also help greatly.
My neurologist put me on Topamax and the migranes slowly decreased. Six months later, I am migrane free. Sadly, I haven’t had the weight loss effect, but I can’t complain too much.
You know what sometimes cheeses me? Folks that casually claim they have migraines when they probably “just” get headaches. I’m sure it’s not very fun for them to get a nasty headache, but a migraine is on such a different scale altogether. Maybe I’m just being exclusionist, being a junior ‘optical’ member of the club.
I have to agree ** squeegee ** , a headache is a headache. But calling a headache a migrane is like calling a stomache ache akin to childbirth. It is not just the associated pain, it is the related odd effects like vision imparment and the godawful nausea.
My migranes made my hypersensitive to sound, so any noise at all was like shoving daggers into my ears. Light didn’t bother me as much as the noise and the nausea.
I also have a 'scrip for DHE so I can give myself a shot if needed, and that is nice-it really cuts down on the ER trips.
Looks pretty cool – “some migraine patients may get long-term relief from short-term use of Topamax. Research shows the drug can effectively turn off the migraine process in some patients after about 3-6 months of use.” Wow, possible permanent relief ?!?
OK, no more rum and coke posting :wally Please forgive the typos. I had no idea that short term use of Topamax could work long term. Damn, that just kicks ass!! I (obviously) have had some issues with the memory/word side effects, but compared to a two week long migrane…I can deal.
I have read some interesting articles at the neurologist’s office regarding the brain chemistry of people who suffer from migranes. Some doctors theorize the same parts of the brain that have seizures are the areas that spasm/freak out/whatever and cause a migrane. Hence, the effectiveness of Topamax, a seizure drug.
Enough for the night, perhaps I will be more with it tomorrow. :dubious:
Rhelle, if you don’t mind my being nosy – how bad does it get when you need to go to the ER? What are you experiencing? (I ask with some dread, anticipating I may have a migraine this bad one day.)
I’ve relied on Imitrex for the past eight years, but the biggest problem with Imitrex is the fact that if I have to break down and use it, it will cause a rebound headache, which means what might have just been a 1 day migraine is stretched into a 3-4 day migraine. I try to suck it up and lay in a dark room when I feel one coming on, but when you’re throwing up and can’t see, sometimes it’s just easier to accept the fact that you have to take this medicine and set yourself up for three days of it.
I’ve also tried to determine my triggers. PMS is of course, a bad one. There are certain nuts that will cause them, red wine, etc. Now that I’ve identified a few of them, the severity of my migraines have decreased. I still get them every couple of months, but I’ve eliminated a few of them since figuring out the triggers.
Squeegee, I’m not Rhelle, but I have made a couple of ER trips with migraines. For me, I couldn’t sit up, my entire head felt like it was in a vice, everything was cloudy, I was throwing up, and I had such pain that I literally thought I was going to die. I went to the ER to get IV drugs because my usual scripts weren’t doing the trick. And to be honest, I think there have been a few times that I should have gone to the ER and didn’t.
squeegee… Glare seems to be my trigger too. Driving in traffic looking at the sun shining off the car in front of me can do it. I also seem to be affected my strong black/white patterns. I can almost feel my vision starting to go haywire. I try to look away and divert my attention. That usually works. I have noticed that if I get an aura, I usually get repeating auras for 3 days or so and then it disappears for months. I have no pain, but it is very disconcerting. On two occasions, it affected my speech and memory. I know that it will pass but it is very frustrating and scary. Adding to my stress is that for reasons I don’t want to explain here, I must keep it secret. If I feel symptoms coming on, I have to get away and hide them. It is very stressfull to always be looking at a little floater or something, wondering is this it? How much time do I have? peace out and good luck.
Don’t know if it will help you at all, if you don’t have any pain. The serotonin (or whatever) rush seems to help me deal with the pain more than anything. Although sometimes it has no effect.
I don’t mess around anymore when it comes to going to the ER. I have found that if I can knock out the pain early enough, the duration of the migrane is much shorter. So I go to the ER as soon as the pain is enough to make me throw up.
My main complaint, other than pain, with migraines is dizziness and nausea. Actually, the dizziness probably causes the nausea. I have decided that it really doesn’t help the pain to throw up convulsively. :eek:
Damn, permanent relief? I hope so, since I’m about to hit 3 months on Topamax myself, while decreasing my Elavil dosage. Thank God my weight seems to be dropping a bit as well. I gained about 35lbs after trying Zoloft, Depakote and Trazadone over the past 4 years. Ugh.
It’s about time. I’ve had these stupid things since I was 6yrs old. Nothing like throwing up on your fellow students, who don’t understand how that could happen from having “just a headache”.
). By morning I’ll be Me again, but I’ll be hiding in a quiet cave this evening.
Taking two may be impractical for me, at least in a short period of time. Recovery period, you know. So hopefully one helps.
