Migraines

[Pete MB&D]

Two days with out a migraine bliss!!!!

I think I need to visit the doctors keep a eye out on what I eat and see how it goes.

Thanks for all the help, advise and your experiences of migraines, lets hope they find out what causes them and find a cure.

Pete

 

[Pete MB&D]

Well the migraines have stoped but the visual disturbances are back, they used to start in the middle and expand in an arc left an upwards until they vanished from sight but now go middle and right, I don’t know if that means anything I guess a visit to the docs is in order.

Pete

 

[Tantris]

Pete - I went through a few years of severe migraines, with the scintillating scotoma that you're describing, which seemed to be linked to weather and seasonal changes. What worked for me was (i) giving up alcohol, and (ii) taking a daily magnesium supplement, and I have been migraine-free for about three years. Migraines do seem to be very specific, and what works for one person may not work for another, but perhaps my experience may help you.

 

[MartinC]

My trigger is MSG, I can pretty much guarantee that when I had migraines and checked what I ate earlier MSG was there. Since watching for and avoiding MSG migraine occurrence is now very rare. According to my doctor some people's body's treat MSG as a toxin, hence the migraine and sweats. As you note you may want to look to see if you can find and relationship between what you may have eaten when occurences occur.

Certainly stress also can be a factor but most of us cannot control that.

Hope you can find some relief.

 

[Wolfmancatsup]

Actually, the thing that finally broke my migraine curse was when my G.P. put me on blood-pressure pills.

Yep. They helped me too. I recently bought a home blood pressure monitor as well and noticed the days when I had headaches were the days when the pressure was highest.

Mick

 

[Taff63]

Mine were caused by caffeine but the trigger was usually strip lights or stress.

Since packing up tea (I now drink red bush tea), I hardly ever get a headache, let alone a migraine.

Same here. Decaff tea and coffee and hardly ever get a headache these days after a friend suggested it.

 

[Pete MB&D]

No problems today but feel totally washed out, I have a nice glass of red but I am struggling to be bothered to drink it.

Pete

 

[martin clark]

Much sympathy here. I have suffered, on and off, since a vicious (and classic for a young man ) Cluster Headache attack period over c 9months in my mid-20s. Which was damn-nigh disabling for 3-4 days at a time on occasion.

Keeping a headache vs diet diary is a good idea to work out if there are any avoidable precursors - one of the triggers for me is actually soy derivatives- the MSG trigger post noted above is closely related - and so I manage my exposure ( I can eat & enjoy, just choose to tightly limit it). I get the visual aura early, and discombobulating brain 'fog' as much as outright pain these days. Onset usu early early a.m for me.

These days, I have 1-3 a year, and since I know pretty much what makes them worse and avoid it - Migraleve is all it takes to make it bearable. Still usually an entire wasted & unpleasant day though....

 

[poppop]

Actually, the thing that finally broke my migraine curse was when my G.P. put me on blood-pressure pills.

Pete as this. I'd been suffering since late teens with the usual migraine problems - visual, speech, occasional sickness, and headache. About 15 years ago I was prescribed BP tablets, and from suffering around twice a month Ive had perhaps 1 per year, and milder when they occur!

I kinda get why they work. The initial prescription was for Amlodopine, a vasodilator. Apparently a migraine can start with constriction of blood vessels in the brain, this medication helps prevent this. Although my "type" of BP medication has changed over the years, Ive always asked to remain on Amlodopine. I understand that these type of medicines are now prescribed as a migraine treatment.

With apologies to any Medics/Physiologists on the site, if this explanation is bollocks!

Would at least be worth a chat with your GP. Good luck.

Steve

 

[audiopile]

My GF suffered from migraines of the mewling and puking variety. For years she had a Doc that I could haul her to after she had been knocked silly by the migraine string and unable to keep food/liquids down for a couple of days -he'd make it abundantly clear that I should immediately get her home and in bed -and give her nice big injection of Demerol. I would take her -home -roll her into bed and most of the time -she'd sleep it off and only be a bit wobbly the next day - but it would break the migraine (usually). So her HMO ( acronym for Horrible Medicine Only) changed -her doc was out of system-so -I would haul her in to the ER over a three or four day run -tell them that the only thing that worked was to knock her out with Demorol (visualize large neon Sign over her bed at the ER -flashing "Drug seeking patient". Eventually around the third or fourth visit to the same ER -some doc would notice that she was really in bad shape - no food or drink for a few days will do bad things to your bloodpressure -amongst other indicators - hospitalize her /start IV's -finally listen to me that Demerol was the only thing that would work and after a couple of days sleeping -she'd come home and go back to work.
Response to this drug is a individual thing - but for her Sumatriptan has been life changing. Initially this was dispensed in a self injector (similar to what the military uses to administer the counter acting drug in case of exposure to the more common nerve gasses) -this was about $125 a dose. Within a few years a pill form was available - this is still expensive -but both were cheap compared to the combination of lost work days and hospitalization expenseses. The massive improvement in her life has been reasonable confidence that she wasn't going to suffer thru any more of the multi-day migraines that had been her lot since her teenage years. She is not a fan of Sumatriptan/Imatrex -describes it as making her feel "yucky" - but has allowed her to gain reasonable control of her life. Very likely menopause has helped too.
In my case blood pressure mediaction seems to have dealt with my silent migranes pretty efficiently -so I'll second or third the suggestion that a visit to the Doc is a dam good idea.

 

[General Factotum]

Total sympathy from me, for sure. After more than half a century of migraines I think all we can do is get ourselves well medicated and retire to a dark room. Mine seem to come in cycles eg. one or two a month for a while and then two a week for a spell. Other than visual squigglies and headaches I sometimes get tingly itchy teeth, numb hands and VERY rarely extreme vertigo. By that I mean having to hang on to the floor in case I fall off! Wierd. After an hour or so of that nonsense I get 2-3 days of being slow and dopey with occasional headaches (not that anyone notices). Flashing light, caffeine and disrupted sleep patterns set me off so coffee in particular is a big no no and I wear decent sunglasses outside virtually all the time. I guess we all have to find our own ways to mitigate them.

 

[Pete MB&D]

Thanks for the reply’s, it sounds like I am getting of lightly compared to some people who have my sympathy.
I can’t think of any triggers apart from tiredness and flashing/flickering lights.

I will go to the doctor, I just wish they could find the cause and hopefully a cure.

Pete

 

[Rockmeister]

Same here. Decaff tea and coffee and hardly ever get a headache these days after a friend suggested it.

Don't then. Until you know whats going on, red wine and chocolate are on the 'trigger' list. Avoid for now.

I repeat my story of 'doctors'. In your ten minute slot they may (if your lucky) ask you about your lifestyle and etc but unless you are really lucky, their search engine will just throw up a list of industrial strength pain killers to knock you out.

If you do get lucky they will know that Migrane is often triggered by some underlying psychological problem (in my case it was simply depression, tiredness and stress combined). Knowing the cause allows you to make the changes that remove the trigger. Of course it's likely that you will need to get medicinal aid of some kind, but maybe aid that relieves the root problem, not aid that bandages the result.

I went to a herbalist. I was, and am aware that opinions vary on the efficiacy of herbal remedies, BUT.
1. A Herbalist or Homeopath will give you TIME. I sat for an hour, whilst he listened, asked questions and prodded until we both understood WHY I was getting Migrane (or, at the least, understood why my life was shit and how that shit was having an effect). Vital. Linking the cause and effect had an immeadiate result. I knew what exactly needed resolving.
2. Treatment was discussed. Natural rememdies simply helped me to cope with what was going on. They worked. It may well be that this was partly psychosomatic, and that hour convinced me that this man knew what needed to be done. I was open minded about the herbal 'medicines' and there was no barrier therefore to their working.

Now we all know this stuff, the moral simply is that you need to talk to someone that you totally trust. Choose your expert, spend time until you are sure you both understand and walk away expecting that the problem will be solved. If you can do that, then my experience suggests that it will be.

Otherwise, go to the doc ofc, but make sure that he/she understands your need to discover and treat the cause. Good luck anyway.

 

[gintonic]

be persistent with medical professions. Many years ago, my wife had very bad migraine like symptoms (GP consistently diagnosed stress induced migraine) - which after a lot of persistence with GPs and Opticians (for what were originally thought to be visual disturbances and other vision problems), when another more curious and optician decided to do the puff of air test to measure intraocular pressure (despite her being at the time in her mid-30's so this test is not routinely done until 40) - and discovered she has a severe case of undiagnosed glaucoma. It has now been stabilised and has not done any more damage, but given it took 9 months to diagnose, she has lost about 80% of her peripheral vision in one eye.

 

[Rockmeister]

I lost my faith in GP's aged 19, when a busy family doctor prescribed aspirin and 'more sport' for what it transpired was a totally collapsed lung. Luckily there was one of those 'free X Ray' vans in the car park which dad wheeled me into. 3 hours later I was in hospital, where, they said, had that been a few days later, they have been wheeling me straight to the morgue.

 

[Pete MB&D]

Took a sumatriptan for a migraine today and lost the rest of the day, knocked me out totally.

I have not had a migraine for a couple of months now which is good the doctor just prescribed sumatriptan for the migraines and amytriptaline to prevent them which I am not taking at the moment.

Pete

 

[Mullardman]

I thought I was pretty tolerant of prescription drugs, but one 10mg dose of Amitryptaline, prescribed for 'nerve pain' flattened me for about 3 days. Never again.

 

[Pete MB&D]

I thought I was pretty tolerant of prescription drugs, but one 10mg dose of Amitryptaline, prescribed for 'nerve pain' flattened me for about 3 days. Never again.

Good to know Mull, I will keep them at arms length for now.

Still groggy this morning but at least my skin feels like mine again.

Pete

 

[Mullardman]

To be fair.. some people seem pretty impervious to Amitrypitwotsit (SP) but I'm not..
Glad you feel a bit better.

 

[Euan]

I used to suffer from these regularly. Strangely, they mostly hit me on the way home from work. My eyesight would go and shortly after I'd get a thundering headache and be floored for a day or two.

Since I retired five years ago, I have only had two of them.

Fortunately, if I get the pink Migraleve down my neck as soon as I notice my eyesight going they will knock it dead.