So I have already stated on my previous post that I started a prednisone taper on Tuesday. It is now Saturday and this morning I took 40 mg of the steroid. About an hour ago I was doing some chores with my husband and all of a sudden it happened: visual aura.
It was a bit gradual--at first I just said, "oh no, something is off. I can see but I can't." The squiggly lines or tunnel vision or one-sided blindness (those are my particular visual auras that occur--my brother describes his as a donut, so they vary) hadn't happened yet, it was just a vague partial blindness. I quickly finished what I needed to help him with and then moved into fixing the toilet, my next project. By then the squiggly lines happened. Zig zags of light streaking through my right-side's vision. I didn't finish fixing the toilet (at least it is the third bathroom and not the only-so it can wait!), though the zigzags of light only lasted fifteen or so minutes.
I am out of my abortive medicine and I always get uncomfortable taking prednisone with heavy duty drugs anyway, since prednisone is a heavy duty drug already. 40 mg is no small dosage for the day. My brother takes two tylonel and three advil when he gets his "donut" migraine and so I am trying that today.
My left side is starting to ache from the back of my skull to the eye, pouring down to the side of my head. The pounding is minimal so far. I hope it fades. One more week on prednisone.
I hate this. Mostly because we are celebrating Halloween tonight and I am hosting. I have an hour before I need to start cooking. My husband said right away, when I stated my vision was off, that we should cancel. I don't want to cancel! I know, I am whiny when I say this. It is just that, and you migraineurs understand I am sure, that I hate these headaches controling my life. I don't want them to win. Cancelling plans is bowing down. I don't want to bow. Not to pain.
So I am going to fake myself well today, the best I can. I will rest for a little while and then get up and go.
And I am desperately trying not to go to that place that questions why the hell I am getting these migraines again. One year. One year it has been since I have had to deal with these regularly. Why now? No--not going there.
I really do hate this.
Signed,
Control Freak.
Saturday, October 30, 2010
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
trying not to worry
I think we migraineurs may have something in common: worry.
Worry about Is this migraine going to last for the rest of my life? (okay, maybe not that bad, but still, sometimes the pain makes me go for the drama.)
Worry about I have an important day on Saturday (or fill in the blank for some major life event, holiday, vacation--heaven forbid you have migraines on vacation!). I hope I don't get a migraine. That would ruin the day.
Worry about treatment. If the next latest and greatest treatment is going to work or not. Or if it does, what are the side effects?
Worry about how your headaches get in the way of living your life. The demands of a breadwinner, missing work. The demands of a mother (or father), missing out on the joys that parenthood can and does bring; but if you are on your bed, or even just in a bad mood trying to cope with the pain, you miss out.
Worry even about how people perceive you. I hate this one. We should not worry about how people think of us. But there it is, I do. I don't even like people knowing I have a headache. I don't like their pity-I feel that it weakens me somehow. Don't tell me how bad my life is--I am trying to look at my life as a positive one. You are only reminding me that perhaps I should be in bed, when in all actuality, I have to make dinner, bathe the children, do laundry and help with homework. I can't stop!
So life with migraines can be full of worry. And worrying really doesn't do anybody any good. It isn't productive in any shape or form. And for me, it makes me wrinkle up my left eyebrow--and that, my fellow friends-in-pain, is starting to form a permanent line!
You'll have to forgive me: I'm in full swing of being in my thirties and becoming all too aware of my imminent aging process. The other night I asked my husband if he thought it would be crazy if, someday, I had botox injections on my face. He thought I was a bit ridiculous, I think, and suggested that I age gracefully, accepting the lines. Perhaps he doesn't know just how vain I am?
So to my worry, right now:
I haven't had a horrible time with migraines in over a year. (No--I'm not worried about that; trust me, I'm getting to it.) I had a big migraine one week after my miscarriage this spring. I treated it with prednisone on day three and over time, it went away. Since then I only had one migraine on the second day of my period. Easy, right? One migraine a month is cake with delicious frosting. It is so easy to deal with.
My period started last week on Sunday evening. On Tuesday, day two, like clockwork my period was heavier and I had a migraine. I expected that. I didn't expect to have a migraine every day after that. So on Friday I figured it would go away when my period went away; that used to be very normal for me, when my migraines slowed down to just half the month or less. It ended on Saturday. I had a headache that night, but only for a few hours, and it wasn't that bad. Then on Sunday I had head pain, but again, wasn't too bad. Monday: headache. This morning (Tuesday): headache. NOT GOOD! This head pain/migraine (I hate calling them that for some reason, like I am admitting to defeat...) isn't going away.
So I saw a doctor today. Not a neurologist (I moved and haven't had bad enough migraines to necessitate a neurologist--if this persists, I will get back on the neurology wagon), but my OB/GYN. Great doctor. Smart. I trust him. He gave me my prednisone taper and I have started it.
I know that the taper will work. It has never failed me. I don't worry about this migraine.
But I do worry about the next. How close will it be? Am I going to start slowly getting worse, like I used to be? It brings me to horrible self-pitying tears to think that I have to go back there. To that life where everything is about my pain. My head. My nausea. My dizzy spells. My fatigue. My medication refills. My worry. And most horrible: my worrying and the depression it brings on.
I have started running. That helps with my normal worries and I hope it will help with my migraine-worries. I am hoping it helps with the irritability I feel when using prednisone. A good run always seems to clear my mind and relax me.
I just have to have faith in my abilities to be proactive about the pain, not letting it control me, but taking control of it and killing it when it lasts more than three days.
To the void out there, maybe reading this because you are searching desperately on the Internet for answers to your pain and your worries: I hope you find what you need to eliminate the pain, or at least cope well with it.
And...uh...try not to worry...
Worry about Is this migraine going to last for the rest of my life? (okay, maybe not that bad, but still, sometimes the pain makes me go for the drama.)
Worry about I have an important day on Saturday (or fill in the blank for some major life event, holiday, vacation--heaven forbid you have migraines on vacation!). I hope I don't get a migraine. That would ruin the day.
Worry about treatment. If the next latest and greatest treatment is going to work or not. Or if it does, what are the side effects?
Worry about how your headaches get in the way of living your life. The demands of a breadwinner, missing work. The demands of a mother (or father), missing out on the joys that parenthood can and does bring; but if you are on your bed, or even just in a bad mood trying to cope with the pain, you miss out.
Worry even about how people perceive you. I hate this one. We should not worry about how people think of us. But there it is, I do. I don't even like people knowing I have a headache. I don't like their pity-I feel that it weakens me somehow. Don't tell me how bad my life is--I am trying to look at my life as a positive one. You are only reminding me that perhaps I should be in bed, when in all actuality, I have to make dinner, bathe the children, do laundry and help with homework. I can't stop!
So life with migraines can be full of worry. And worrying really doesn't do anybody any good. It isn't productive in any shape or form. And for me, it makes me wrinkle up my left eyebrow--and that, my fellow friends-in-pain, is starting to form a permanent line!
You'll have to forgive me: I'm in full swing of being in my thirties and becoming all too aware of my imminent aging process. The other night I asked my husband if he thought it would be crazy if, someday, I had botox injections on my face. He thought I was a bit ridiculous, I think, and suggested that I age gracefully, accepting the lines. Perhaps he doesn't know just how vain I am?
So to my worry, right now:
I haven't had a horrible time with migraines in over a year. (No--I'm not worried about that; trust me, I'm getting to it.) I had a big migraine one week after my miscarriage this spring. I treated it with prednisone on day three and over time, it went away. Since then I only had one migraine on the second day of my period. Easy, right? One migraine a month is cake with delicious frosting. It is so easy to deal with.
My period started last week on Sunday evening. On Tuesday, day two, like clockwork my period was heavier and I had a migraine. I expected that. I didn't expect to have a migraine every day after that. So on Friday I figured it would go away when my period went away; that used to be very normal for me, when my migraines slowed down to just half the month or less. It ended on Saturday. I had a headache that night, but only for a few hours, and it wasn't that bad. Then on Sunday I had head pain, but again, wasn't too bad. Monday: headache. This morning (Tuesday): headache. NOT GOOD! This head pain/migraine (I hate calling them that for some reason, like I am admitting to defeat...) isn't going away.
So I saw a doctor today. Not a neurologist (I moved and haven't had bad enough migraines to necessitate a neurologist--if this persists, I will get back on the neurology wagon), but my OB/GYN. Great doctor. Smart. I trust him. He gave me my prednisone taper and I have started it.
I know that the taper will work. It has never failed me. I don't worry about this migraine.
But I do worry about the next. How close will it be? Am I going to start slowly getting worse, like I used to be? It brings me to horrible self-pitying tears to think that I have to go back there. To that life where everything is about my pain. My head. My nausea. My dizzy spells. My fatigue. My medication refills. My worry. And most horrible: my worrying and the depression it brings on.
I have started running. That helps with my normal worries and I hope it will help with my migraine-worries. I am hoping it helps with the irritability I feel when using prednisone. A good run always seems to clear my mind and relax me.
I just have to have faith in my abilities to be proactive about the pain, not letting it control me, but taking control of it and killing it when it lasts more than three days.
To the void out there, maybe reading this because you are searching desperately on the Internet for answers to your pain and your worries: I hope you find what you need to eliminate the pain, or at least cope well with it.
And...uh...try not to worry...
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
A Migraine
I suppose I should mention (since I never write on this blog anymore since my migraines haven't been much in my life --I don't mean to sound like I'm bragging, I promise!) that I had a migraine.
When I became pregnant early this spring I had a few migraines--though they were nothing, really; but they were more than usual. When I moved to a different state, quitting a job that was very stressful and going to no job, my headaches went away except for just a few a month. So for me, just a few a month is nothing. Even once a week is like nothing, really.
But anyway! Back to the pregnancy: just a few headaches.
Then I had a miscarriage. I was just short of eight weeks when I miscarried the baby. After delivering the baby and placenta on my own (no need for a D&C, I was so grateful!), I bled for just one week.
The day after I stopped the bleeding was a Sunday. It was also Day 1 of a serious migraine. It lasted and lasted and lasted until Wednesday morning I knew it was a beasty one. So I didn't fool around: I went to my midwife and asked her to prescribe me a 12-day tapering course of Prednisone, starting at 60mg the first day and decreasing 5mg a day until the last day of just one 5mg pill.
I started that morning (always good to start prednisone in the morning, especially if you're taking 60mg, so that there might be a chance to sleep that night!). After ten days, yes TEN days (!) of the taper, my headache finally went away.
I firmly believe, based on previous migraines, and in particular, previous unmedicated-with-prednisone migraines, that the beasty migraine I started after the miscarriage would have lasted months, bringing me into the cycle of migraines I started on that fateful day of July 21, 2007.
Instead, the migraine was controlled after ten days of the dose and I didn't have any further migraines.
Yes, I have had a few headaches this week, since my menstual cycle begins sometime soon. I usually get some shoulder/neck spasms around now, and headaches that go along with them; but nothing out of the ordinary.
I am grateful for Prednisone. Nothing else works for me. It is a beast to take (irritability, hunger, restless sleep at night) but it stops the cycle that my body gets into and gets me back to life quickly. May I not ever have to take Prednisone again; but if I have another Beasty (my nickname now for the long unrelenting days-and-days-on-end headpain, nausea, vertigo): give me Prednisone!
When I became pregnant early this spring I had a few migraines--though they were nothing, really; but they were more than usual. When I moved to a different state, quitting a job that was very stressful and going to no job, my headaches went away except for just a few a month. So for me, just a few a month is nothing. Even once a week is like nothing, really.
But anyway! Back to the pregnancy: just a few headaches.
Then I had a miscarriage. I was just short of eight weeks when I miscarried the baby. After delivering the baby and placenta on my own (no need for a D&C, I was so grateful!), I bled for just one week.
The day after I stopped the bleeding was a Sunday. It was also Day 1 of a serious migraine. It lasted and lasted and lasted until Wednesday morning I knew it was a beasty one. So I didn't fool around: I went to my midwife and asked her to prescribe me a 12-day tapering course of Prednisone, starting at 60mg the first day and decreasing 5mg a day until the last day of just one 5mg pill.
I started that morning (always good to start prednisone in the morning, especially if you're taking 60mg, so that there might be a chance to sleep that night!). After ten days, yes TEN days (!) of the taper, my headache finally went away.
I firmly believe, based on previous migraines, and in particular, previous unmedicated-with-prednisone migraines, that the beasty migraine I started after the miscarriage would have lasted months, bringing me into the cycle of migraines I started on that fateful day of July 21, 2007.
Instead, the migraine was controlled after ten days of the dose and I didn't have any further migraines.
Yes, I have had a few headaches this week, since my menstual cycle begins sometime soon. I usually get some shoulder/neck spasms around now, and headaches that go along with them; but nothing out of the ordinary.
I am grateful for Prednisone. Nothing else works for me. It is a beast to take (irritability, hunger, restless sleep at night) but it stops the cycle that my body gets into and gets me back to life quickly. May I not ever have to take Prednisone again; but if I have another Beasty (my nickname now for the long unrelenting days-and-days-on-end headpain, nausea, vertigo): give me Prednisone!
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