# Psychodelic, maaaan.... **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [August 5, 2005, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/psychodelic-maaaan/315709 "2005-08-05T13:36:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 2\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![BiblioCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ed8c4c/32.png) [@BiblioCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BiblioCat)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2005, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/psychodelic-maaaan/315709/41 "2005-09-02T20:31:17Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Um, in fairness, how are non-migraine sufferers expected to have known this? To most folks, “migraine” means “really bad headache”. So now suppose that someone has the worst headache they’ve had in five years. Maybe that just means they need two aspirin instead of one, but for all they know about headaches, it’s a pretty bad one. Can you really blame such a person for calling it a migraine? I think this would fall under the heading (no pun intended) of “A little knowledge is a dangerous thing.” Yes, there are a lot of people who think a migraine is simply a bad headache, and sometimes I would swear I’ve met them all. I’ve spent _a lot_ of time explaining the difference between the two. I explain that I’m under the care of a neurologist and that I take a daily prescription medication to prevent them and that I have another prescription for when I do get a full-blown migraine. I have to explain that migraines don’t go away with an aspirin. Some people are receptive to learning what a migraine really is and others just seem to blow it off, like they know better than me. There’s a thread in here or in IMHO about what to do when someone tries to correct you, but they’re wrong and you’re actually right - I read it with a familiar feeling, since there have been times I’ve mentioned having a migraine and someone will say, “Why didn’t you just take a couple aspirin? I get migraines all the time and an aspirin always gets rid of it!” I try to be tactful and polite and explain that no, what you had was not a migraine. They’ll usually suggest a certain brand of aspirin or pain reliver - “Oh, you should try Tylenol, that gets rid of my migraines! Just one works!” Like I said, most people are receptive to learning about the difference, but there are still a lot of people who think the words ‘headache’ and ‘migraine’ are interchangeable. ---
**Author:** ![Kiminy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Kiminy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kiminy)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2005, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/psychodelic-maaaan/315709/42 "2005-09-04T13:22:42Z")
I have infrequent, head-splitting-nausea-accompanied-put-me-in-bed-with-NO-light-for-hours headaches that I have always called migraines, since that was my understanding of the symptoms of a migraine. However, my own personal treatment is a couple of Advil. It doesn’t _always_ work, but it does help more often than not, and since I only get these headaches at most a couple of times a year (and then only if I’m stupid enough not to avoid their triggers), I’ve never found the need to seek further medical attention. The first time I had an ocular migraine, though, I was home alone with my two young children. I had a serious eye injury many years ago as a child, and the affected eye has had a fragile retina since then. Since a fragile retina can remain attached for years and years and never cause any problems, the doctors just keep telling me not to worry about it unless I get a flood of floaters in the eye, at which point I should _immediately_ see attention so that the retina can be re-attached as soon as possible. When the ocular migraine hit, I was worried that it was my retina collapsing, even though I was seeing a “kaleidoscope” effect more than a flood of floaters zooming toward the top of my eye. The worst part, though, was the fact that I was home alone with our kids, and my husband was on his way home from work, so I couldn’t reach him by phone. I couldn’t see at all, so I couldn’t use the phonebook to find a doctor’s office to call, and neither of the kids was old enough to read well enough to find a phone number. By the time my husband came home, I was virtually blind. He placed the call to the doctor’s office, and a kind nurse there explained what was going on. She did advise me to take some ibuprofen just in case I was one of those people who gets a headache after the ocular migraine. It was over within about a half-hour, I guess. It’s only happened one other time since then–about a year later. I was home with the kids again, but when I recognized it, I just went back to the bedroom to lie down until it was over. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/psychodelic-maaaan/315709.md?page=2)