Migraines?

Lounge
21

I also get migraines. I’ve had them for weeks straight in the past. My previous Dr. diagnosed them as migraines but they started out as sinus headaches when I was in High School and gradually changed. Currently I have a cocktail of 3 meds that I take in different combinations depending on what time of day I get a migraine.

The first step to trying to get rid of them is figuring out what causes them. Here is a link to the headache diary that I keep every day. Whenever I get one I document it…http://www.montefiore.org/services/headache_center/new_patients/.

Also, I agree with OffJumpsJack that you need to see a specialist. I have no idea where you live but if you’re in the greater NYC area I can’t say enough good things about the Montefiore Headache Clinic. It’s one of the best in country and the Dr’s are awesome. (Not to mention my particular neurologist has a striking resemblance to Dr. McDreamy from Gray’s Anatomy). The other great thing is they have tons of studies they need patients for which means you can go to the Dr for free! I’m taking part in a study right now where I take a 5 minute survey twice a day for three months. In addition to the free appt’s I get paid $60/month and $100 per dr’s visit.

The other thing is, there’s no way you can take every migraine trigger out of your life. You have to target your approach and eliminate the offenders. For example, I know the only food that triggers my migraines is MSG so I eliminate that. But chocolate, cheese, etc. doesn’t bother me at all. Also, if you drink wine at all, you should try to make sure it’s a quality wine. I don’t mean expensive just not “cheap.” A friend of mine is a wine broker and she explained to me that the tannins in cheap read wine are generally the cause. In higher quality wines they decant the liquid more thoroughly before bottling.

One last thing, once you figure what causes your migraines there are a number of natural remedies you can try. For example, I get migraines around my period so I take 500mg of Magnesium everyday and up the dose to 750mg the week before my period. It takes a while for these types of things to work but it’s finally started being effective.

You should also try yoga and other relaxation techniques if you can. The one thing that I found [B]always[/B] helps for me is running. If I have a migraine and it’s not debilitating I take my meds and head for the gym. It seriously always works and my dr’s can’t even explain why!

22

Wow, a lot of us get migraines! I’ve been trying to get rid of one for the past 2 days so this is a good thread for me. :slight_smile:

I’ve had migraines since I was 15 (I’m 31). The thing I found that worked the best was Imitrex injectable. It had the most side effects (felt like an elephant was standing on your chest for the first few minutes) but it nearly always kicked migraine butt! Unfortunately I developed an allergy to the medication over time and can’t use it. The nose spray and pill forms never really worked for me. Now I take Maxalt, which is a similar drug. It comes in pills and disintegrating tablets, but my insurance only covers the pills. It doesn’t work as well as the Imitrex did, and I’m starting to get an allergy to it also (it gives me mild hives every time I take it now). The weird thing is that these drugs have been around for over 7 years but are still not available in generic. No one has been able to explain that to me! They are very expensive, even after my Rx plan pays for part of them. I pay about $8 per pill for the Maxalt, and I usually need at least 2 per migraine. I also take Excedrin at the same time, but it doesn’t work on its own. For really bad migraines, I also have sleeping pills (temazepam), Darvocet, and Benadryl.

I’ve never had an aura. In fact I have trouble telling I’m getting a migraine until it’s full blown, probably because I get them so frequently it just feels “normal.” I never get nauseated, but I get very sensitive to light and sounds. I used to always get them on the left side of my head. Now they are more often on the right side, but they are definitely always on one side only. Ugh, I hate that throbbing, pounding pain that gets worse with any movement. :frowning:

I have found that my triggers are wine (used to be just red but now it’s white too), chocolate, certain cheeses, changes in my sleep schedule, stress, spending too much time on the computer, and air travel! I also get a lot more migraines when I have my period. Oh, and going to the movies. I can’t go to a movie in the theater without getting a migraine. When I get stressed, the muscles in my shoulders and back tense up, and that usually will give me a migraine. The sleep schedule thing is hard since I work nights. When I get a few days off, I just want to sleep and sleep.

There are a lot of meds you can take daily to decrease the frequency of migraines. I tried propranolol (a blood pressure medicine), neurontin (anti seizure medicine), and Topamax. The first 2 didn’t work and I’m very allergic to Topamax. I heard it works wonders for those who can tolerate it, though. In vet school I was getting a migraine a DAY, or maybe just a lingering one that wasn’t going away. Now I get one every 1-2 weeks, but it usually lasts a couple of days.

Another thing that helps is regular exercise. Bikram (hot) yoga was the best. When I had the time to go a couple of times a week, my back/ shoulder pain was gone and I was hardly ever getting migraines. Getting a massage also helps, but I can’t afford to do it nearly as often as I’d like.

Migraines tend to run in families. My grandma used to have them really bad, but they stopped once she went through menopause (guess that’s something to look forward to). My aunt (on the other side of the family) also gets them pretty bad.

Well, I’m off to the gym to try and get rid of the little bit of this migraine that’s lingering on!

23

You saying that just reminded me of something that happened to me the night before last, and, once before a couple months ago. I awoke in the middle of the night, from a sound sleep, because I thought I smelled a pizza cooking in the oven. It was that type of smell when the pizza has over cooked just a bit and there’s that kind of burnt crust smell…I quickly sat straight up and started to get out of bed to rush to the kitchen and just like that, the smell was gone.

Thank you all again, so much. After everything I’ve read, I really think this is what my problem is.

I’m definitely going to start keeping a “migraine journal”. Though, a lot of triggers mentioned aren’t a part of my diet as is…I do drink a lot of coffee, but, I’m not a wine drinker, I rarely eat chocolate (or any sweets for that matter…lol), I don’t eat meat (though I do eat a lot of meat substitutes like Boca Burgers and such for the vitamins they contain, and well, they’re really good…lol), I’ve pretty much completely cut soda from my diet (I’ll have one every once in a while), and upped my water intake.

It could be that I’m just not eating properly? Since hubby’s pay cut a little while ago and the economy, we’ve had to scale back on everything including groceries. We basically have enough food for the kids to have breakfast, lunch, and a few snacks, and dinner for all of us. I’ve been getting by for the past year on coffee, cigarettes, and dinner…lol. And ya know, these pains in my head I know have started within the past year. Or at least the frequency has, I don’t remember having pains this often at any point before the past year.

I’m going to track my activity too to try to see if there’s anything in particular I do that “triggers” the throbbing pain on the right side of my head and in my right ear.

I know I get the sensitivity to noise though! Ugh, there are some days where it feels like if I hear another voice or the tv isn’t shut off immediately I’m going to explode! I haven’t noticed any light sensitivity, however, I’ve never liked a lot of light and during the day, no lights are on at all and at night, we use a small lamp when we’re upstairs, and downstairs another lamp with a 40 watt equivalent CFL bulb.

Today the head pain hasn’t been bad, a couple aspirin were able to knock that out but right now, the neck pain is what’s bothering me the most.

I’m also going to pay attention to see how close to my period I get these pains. My “period headaches” have become more and more frequent and I know, during that 5 days, I’m popping pain killers like crazy. Maybe a mix of too much caffeine, not eating enough, and, the hormones going crazy?? Hmm, this may not be a bad thing after all; I might finally have an excuse to lie around on the couch for 5 days and let hubby take care of the kids! :teehee:

24

eta: Your migraines might be caused by stress and your body is begging for food. When we don’t get good nutrition, our bodies let us know in unusual ways that we need to start paying attention.

I get migraines from allergic reactions (sulfites, corn derivatives, & soy are the biggest triggers) and stress. Mine usually start out as headaches, but then esculates to nausea, vomiting, and not being able to be in bright light. When that happens, I need to take my compounded tylenol & benedryl and lie down asap. My worse reaction was to medication they gave me in the ER after I had a reaction to my inhaler (all had corn derivatives in them).

I’m very careful about doing what I can to prevent reactions – using Nasalcrom when I know I will be exposed to a trigger and avoiding the foods that cause reactions, but every once and a while I am exposed to something in the environment (paint, perfume/cologne, fabric softener, etc) that even with the Nasalcrom won’t prevent and I will start getting a headache in the sinus area, which moves to the top of my head and into the neck area. I also get swollen glands in my neck.

I hope you feel better soon!

25

Don’t forget Stress…it does factor in…

26

Oh, indeed! Maybe I can boil it down to the kids being the trigger! :teehee:

27

[COLOR=“DarkOrchid”]In my early teenage years I started experiencing migrains. I don’t get them at all now and haven’t for a long time.
Medicine never worked on the pain for me. The only thing I could do was try, try, try to go to sleep so that the pain would end and be all gone when I woke up.
I couldn’t see out of my eyes when the migraine was full on… only little bits here and there and so many lightning streaks… Ugh!
The memory of them brings me shadow pain. I often felt really cold on the side of my head as well.
It could be allergies but for me it was probably anxiety.
As everyone has advised, so do I. See your dr a.s.a.p.
TEMA[/COLOR]

28

Stress and your diet is definitely a factor. Poor dear. I am worried about that diet of yours. It is not sustainable. Believe me, I’ve been there. I was doing the same thing when my kids were little and their jerk of a father wouldn’t work. I would eat a few snacks during the day, stave off hunger with coffee and eat dinner with the kids so that my kids could have 3 square meals and snacks. I had headaches constantly. I was 115 pounds which is underweight for my height (5’9"). I was doing it for my kids, but I wasn’t healthy - and the kids ultimately need a healthy mommy. Please take care of yourself :hug: :hug: :hug:

29

Oh - and BTW - Allergies can cause migraines, so your doctor may be right that you have allergies and you may be right that you have migraines. Interestingly, some decongestants, like Sudafed, sometimes help with Migraines as well. Sudafed has pseudoephedrin though so I would really be careful taking it when you are also taking in so much caffeine. I am very sensitive to such drugs and have not taken any medicines with pseudoephedrin in it since I experienced racing heart, racing thoughts and tense muscles for a full 24 hours after taking the recommended dose of an OTC allergy medicine with it

30

Processed meats (luncheon meats in particular,) and MSG - TOTALLY avoid!!! those are some obvious ones! :duh:

Bananas are related to latex, for those of you with latex allergies, contemplate what that would be like internally! (aloe vera is also related to latex.)

garlic is sulphurous, as are many cabbage family plants. if you have sulfur issues, probably best to avoid those and dried fruit that has sulfur added.

anyone withdrawing from caffeine is gonna have a migraine! caffeine is a drug! once it’s out of your system tho’, you’ll be fine - just don’t do what I do and start drinking it again and have to go through the withdrawls again! LOL (tea vender, here - like, yeah, that’s gonna happen!)

Sorry for overlooking the obvious. I should’a slowed down a little and thought that post through before posting, huh?

31

Caffeine withdrawal has given me headaches but not migraines.

When I was trying to figure out foods I did think salted popcorn was one but it was hit and miss. I could believe MSG because of that, except jerky doesn’t do it for me.

I even thought chocolate once because I started getting them after making chocolate chip cookies. But no joy there either. Worked for my grandmother.

I’m up right now because I got one as I was getting ready for bed around 4am (working late). Then I had to wait 30 minutes to take the Advil. Then it was questionable whether sleeping would make it worse, and I know getting back up at 8am would make it worse. So I decided to stay up until I could really sleep.

32

[COLOR=“#300090”]
No, no. You are thinking of INSANITY. That is hereditary, you know, because …

[SIZE=“5”]We get it from our children![/SIZE] :roflhard:

–Jack.[/COLOR]

33

I have one thing to add to the terrific suggestions already posted.

My migraines can also be triggered by neck strain. Working in front of a computer for too long, monitor position too high, too much weight or pulling on my neck or shoulders (like from a heavy necklace or too small blouse). I have to be really careful about my posture and take breaks from the computer, even from knitting!

Before I was trying to get pregnant, I would take the prescription drug Zomig. It worked really well for me and is a tablet that dissolves right in your mouth. No need for water and it is absorbed and starts working [U]much[/U] more quickly than pills that need to dissolve in your system.

Now all I can take is Tylenol, which is surprisingly effective, when taken early enough. I get tiny little “shooting stars” on the edges of my vision about a day before the migraine starts, so I start trying to ward it off then.

34

No way, I’m not insane! :eyes: :zombie: :wall: :hair: :waah: :drool: :teehee:

1 Like
35

Ya know, that could very well be my problem. I notice, when I’m knitting, I usually hold the yarn relatively close to my face and have to stop myself from tensing up. I’ll be knitting away and all of a sudden realize my arms and shoulders are as tense as can be so I have to stop for a bit and relax my arms before I start up again. And, I’ve been knitting like mad lately with all the Christmas presents I had to knit and finishing hubby’s sweater.

I told myself I was going to take a little break from knitting after going just about every day for 2 months straight, but well, as with any addiction, I was suffering from withdrawal :teehee: I have slowed a bit though, really taking my time with my current project: a pair of socks for myself.

Today I’m doing considerably better; a small amount of soreness in my neck and grogginess from the hydrocodone I took last night for the neck pain, but other than that, much improved.

Thank you guys so much, you’ve really helped me out with this! :hug:

36

My migraines can be just a bad pain over one eyebrow to full blown, can’t stand daylight, a leaf falling sounds like a canonball type! It seems to be getting worse the older I get. HOWEVER, I now take prescription call Fioricet (it has Codeine in it, so make sure you’re not allergic if you ask the doctor for it). I tried Immitrex for a while but it made my head foggy. I think Codeine tends to do that as well, but for me it doesn’t happen that way, I actually feel energetic and talkative. :teehee: (Possibly due to side effect from another medication I take).

Sometimes my migraines affect my stomach. They can make your stomach just shut down and not digest, so a pill is not digested nor effect. For that, there’s an Immitrex nasal spray which is great!

37

Ick, I remember that nasal spray. It’s just about the worst taste in the whole world (very bitter) and it will drip down the back of your throat after you use the spray. It never really worked as well as the injections did for me anyway, so I only used it a few times. That was years ago but I can still remember it!!

:ick: :ick: :ick:

38

With me it’s definitely hormonal, mostly my migraines come the week of and into the start of my period. Have you kept track of yours to see if it has that type of pattern? That would almost be a definite hormonal issue.

39

I never had the shots, I’d rather something that DIDN’T taste bad, but when I’m desperate I go for it.

40

No, I haven’t in the past but I will start. I do know that my “period headaches” have become more frequent, however. I never before even thought of migraines until I was researching sinus pain…I assumed I was just having sinus infections that cleared up before I saw the Dr. I found out that a lot of times migraines can be mistaken for sinus headaches and that’s when I decided to do more research on migraines. Will definitely start tracking now to see if I can find some connections.