Migraine

[BTM]

Yes, I've googled it before, and I did again. The definition seems to vary greatly, and a lot of different symptoms seem to fall under within the migraine category. I guess I'm just asking if anyone experiences or has experienced a migraine headache, and how they dealt with it, or deal with them. Does anything seem to "trigger" them for anyone? I thought I had experienced a few before, but after this morning, I am now confident I have only experienced one, and it was absolutely horrible. I wish to never have another.

Background info: I spent last week fighting a bug of some sort. I had slight headaches, no appetite, but no nausea, fever, or anything like that. The main thing was that I had absolutely no energy. I worked about a 3/4 week, and literally spent the rest of the time sleeping. Thursday and Friday I slept for 16-20hrs each day. I waited too long to see a dr, and he basically said whatever it was, it seems I have gotten over it for the most part, and he wrote me a script for some antibiotics in case it got worse over the weekend, and if it did to call him Monday. I didn't use the prescription, by Monday I felt my old self.

Last night, as a result of a late lunch, I didn't have much appetite for dinner, so I snacked on a few things, and had 3 glasses of wine (anyone who knows me on here can attest that's akin to 3 glasses of water for me...) I got into bed around 11, wasn't very tired, watched some TV, and an old friend called and I spent some time catching up. I finally went to sleep around 2 or 2:30, thinking it wasn't the smartest to stay up that late, but I hadn't drank much can still get a solid 5-6hrs in...

I woke up about 2 hours early, about 5am, with a slight headache. I got up, got some water, took a piss, and went back to sleep. 7am, my head is pounding like a seriously bad hangover. I snoozed for 15min, woke up again, to the absolutely worst pain, just behind my forehead I've ever head. I am thinking wtf...

I have a naturally high tolerance for substances/pain (there is a warning sticker or whatever you want to call it on my medical file noting a high probability the dr will have administer about a 50% higher dose of whatever than average, and double/triple if there's a chance of building up tolerance and I've been given it recently). I've had local foot surgery with what amounted to absolutely no effective antiseptic. I have had hangovers probably as bad as they can get, stemming from self destructive 3-4 day drink/drug binges. The most notable came after a 4 day party in which large amounts of alcohol, cocaine, good MDMA, bad MDMA that was really just heroin and meth, and whatever prescription pills people had...xanax, perc, etc... I'm not mentioning any of this to sound tough, or be cool, because it wasn't at all, I've done absolutely retarded and self-destructive things to myself, and maybe you can imagine how the come-down from something like that must have felt.

This morning, honest to god, felt worse than any of that. It was 7:30, and I felt my way to the bathroom because not only was it excruciating to open my eyes, my vision was like wearing someone else's very strong prescription. Whatever was in my stomach came up, followed by heaving and stomach acid. I found my way back to bed, crying the pain was so bad. I laid in misery for hours, and must've eventually dozed of, waking up around noon, with a slight headache. Took 2 advil, showered, dressed, and now I'm at work. It's almost 3 now, and it almost feels like nothing happened.

If that wasn't a migraine, I don't want to know what is. What's weird is, aside from being under the weather last week, I haven't made any significant changes, switched, stopped, or started any meds, am not under any more or less stress, and my allergies, which seem to be getting milder the older I get (I'm 24) haven't been bothering me. The only thing I changed, was I lifted weights Monday, for the first time since June. Just a freak, excruciating headache, out of no where it seems.

TLDR: fuck migraines, could something I did have triggered it?

[dziqsek]

I know that what im about to wrote right know seems funny but who cares :

My good girl friend sufferd from migraine for about two years, she get many medicines and they help her only for some short amount of time until her body have not accustomed to them. She quit medicines and started to practise some accupuncture but not good result until she decided to become honorable blood doner... after about 3 days after she give her blood migraine gone....

She and I didnt know if it was coincidence or whatever but she is blood doner for about year now and no migraine ....

Second you can try some poultice of castor oil I've heard many good thinks about it with migraine problem.

[BayMoWe335]

For me, they result from lack of sleeping 9 hrs/night (yes, per night) and not eating on time.

You did both, so I'm not surprised. My migraines include throwing up as well.

[Kgolf31]

I have chronic migraines.

My triggers are stress, high amounts of caffeine, and lack of eating. Those are the major triggers, sometimes I do wake up from 8 hour night sleeps with headaches.

When I get migraines, I'll get dizzy and have a light headed feeling. If I let it continue I'll go straight into tunnel vision. My symptoms get worse VERY quick. It may be completely different for others.

I'm prescribed on Maxalt now and I've been fine. It's nothing daily, just when I get a headache, I'll take one of these and in 10 minutes I'll be perfectly fine.

Please go and get it checked out. It got to the point of my migraines where I was immune to Excedrin extra strength. I still am to this day, it's like candy for me

[dr.mba]

BTM, you gave a lot of detail in your description and I am not going to ask you questions about what else you may have left out cause chamces are you did not. It sounds to me like this could have been a cluster type head ache. You might wanna go and read about it and see if it fits what you felt. The only thng thats against it is your age, usuakly starts in older men 30s to 40s but not unheard of in young people. Oxygen terminates these headaches and alot of the people with cluster headaches will have an oxygen tank at home in case they got an attack. As the name implies, these usually cluster in time in episodes. Enough said, let me know what you think when you have done some research.

MBA

[MZHammer]

I feel your pain dude. I was about your age when I first started getting migraines. The first one I had started without pain, but with a total loss of peripheral vision. I thought I was having a stroke. Within an hour I was experiencing crushing pain in my head. From then on, I would get one migraine in the spring and one in the fall, which I attributed to season/pressure change. On a couple of occasions, I have had one in the summer or winter, but these are very rare for me.
Almost all of the time for me, I get a vision issue which serves as a warning that the headache is coming. These cues are either a small temporary blind spot or sometimes a spot in my field of view that appears like a sparkling watermark (like a patch of water on a glass lens, that covers maybe 10-20% of the lens). By the time the pain sets in, I start experiencing nausea, and I start getting hot, then cold in short cycles, so I am in total physical discomfort. At this point, I am completely incapacitated, unable to do anything but lay down in a dark room, with the pain being almost unbearable. After a while, I will usually vomit, at which point the pain does not subside, but I can usually fall asleep. Most times when I wake up after at least a few hours sleep, the pain is almost gone, but I am left with a 24-hour period where it feels like my brain is fried (guessing by your original post, that you know full well what that feels like ).
The triggers for me, have been hard to pinpoint and/or verify, since once I have a suspicion that it was something I ate or drank, I totally avoid whatever it was moving forward. A couple of things I avoid are White Wine and Orange Gatorade. Sounds goofy, I know, but I will avoid just about anything if I believe it’s a trigger. I still drink tons of red wine, beer and other booze, so the trigger is not simply alcohol. Other flavours of Gatorade are fine for me too (actually it was only one time that I had a migraine after an orange one, but that was the last orange one I have ever had).

[Loogey Clapp]

I used to take Imitrex for my migraines. Now, they have a generic version named Sumitriptan. I know that when I get a migraine, they really help. As far as triggers, I am not sure what hits me but when they do, bright lights (daylight?) is dam annoying!

[infinitekidM2C]

I'm no doc, but what you described to me BTM sounds like a migraine. I've had a few and yeah sensitivity to light and throwing up are par for the course. Mine get triggered by caffeine deprivation so now i only have my morning coffee--and ALWAYS HAVE MY MORNING COFFEE!

In your case maybe it was the empty stomach + red wine..red wine constricts blood vessels and can cause headaches...and since u hadnt eaten in a while, must have really kicked in.

Tyramine
Wine-and-cheese parties give you a migraine? It might not be the pretentious banter. You could be overdosing on this amino acid, which is found in both foods. It constricts cerebral blood vessels, and when they reopen, you get a throbbing headache. So skip the cheese, but be sure to nosh on something; you’ll absorb less tyramine if you have food in your stomach.

[onebadmofo]

http://www.reddit.com/r/self/comment...my_life_1000x/

[tomob63]

dark room, ice bag on head and a norco. works for me

[jragan]

A buddy of mine gets cluster migraines so bad that he has to carry around some special shot as a rescue if they come on while he's out. Even with the shots he can be bed-ridden for multiple days.

I, myself, had juvenile migraines that I mostly grew out of and now only have one every couple years. Tunnel Vision, vomiting, diarrhea, and an axe through my head were the traditional symptoms that, for me, anyway could only be cured via similiar means as to what tomob63 said. These days I suffer from sinus headaches which are usually just annoying but sometimes rival a minor migraine and can only be aided by use of Alleve Sinus & Headache (or sometimes labeled as Sinus & Cold but it's the same product and is always behind the counter). I've tried other sinus headache remedies and none of them help, only the Alleve products works for me and it makes a night-and-day difference.

[Duhst]

I also have chronic migraines after many many tries dr. finally came up with 800mg Motrin and a nice cool dark room..

[BTM]

Interesting stuff everyone thanks for the responses. I'll have to look at cluster headaches but this was really what I consider to be the first one I've had - I'm not scheduling appts over it or sounding alarm bells unless I am doing what I can to mitigate it and it returns. It kicked in before I normally have my morning coffee, so not sure if caffeine was a factor or not. Seems like the lack of food and sleep were really the main things. I really almost never skip dinner, so that combined with wine that didn't have much substance to "soak" it up I guess is really the only thing I did differently.

Interestingly, I have spent my entire life completely unable to fall asleep on my back. For whatever reason, a few months ago, I started to fall asleep on my back, but wake up on my side, which is how I always used to fall asleep. Something clicked to where sleeping on my back become more comfortable all the sudden, but like I said that was a few months back.

[tomob63]

Brian? I think I met you at WSTO a few weeks back. Hang in there man.

[BTM]

Originally Posted by tomob63

Brian? I think I met you at WSTO a few weeks back. Hang in there man.

Yea that was me. Thanks - like I said just one, but bad enough to make me never want another.

How do you like the cobb tune?

[prichards516]

Caffeine is indicated to treat migraines.

[CoconutPete]

I get migraines - they SUCK! I don't know what my triggers are, my migraines seem random. Sometimes I get 2 in one week, sometimes I get one every 2 months.

Mine are somewhat but not completely debilitating. I get sensitive to light, my eyes won't open more than halfway and every noise seems SUPER loud.

My doc said he could give me medication to try to prevent them or give me medication to take when I get one. I chose the second option and he prescribed Treximet. It works 95% of the time. If I'm home I take one and lay down for an hour, if I'm at work I take one and go downstairs and get a large coffee.