Migraine

hi t.a. ! i think i’m the migrane queen. i had one a day for the last three days. my doc. gave me a prescription called “zomig”. it’s a miracle drug. i know some things that trigger my migranes. i almost ALWAYS get one at christmas from eating too much chocolate. if i have too much caffeine and then suddenly stop, i’ll get one. the doc. also told me that dairy products and nuts can cause them in some people. i’ve also read from this site that some people get them as a gbs residual. i’m assuming that that’s what brings on some of mine. i too went to the optician and an opthalmologist. my left optic nerve was damaged during my onset of gbs, therefore i’m not a candidate for lasik vision surgery. i jokingly said that i wouldn’t risk getting that done anyway, becuse if i ever lost my eyesight, i’d never be able to read braille, (due to my hands being numb). i have a warped sense of humor, but that’s how i get through this mess.
well that’s the only input i can offer on migraines. i get them and the zomig stops them within half an hour. i hope you can get this under control. i know the pain of migraines and it’s not a pleasant thing to deal with while having to handle all the other day to day crap we deal with. well, gotta run for now. we’re going to lancaster, pennsylvania to see the amish country. hope we don’t get hit by a horse and buggy as we did once before. the horse was fine. no harm done. i’ll check in with you later. feel better sweet pea!!
love ya,
deb

Migraines are no fun. My whole family suffers from them….even my son who will be 13 soon. His first was about a year and a half ago and he has had several since. When mine start (they are more frequent since onset) I can feel it poking at me right before I get slammed. I was perscribed one of the migraine meds but havent taken one yet. One of the contraindications was smoking so I am iffy about how I will react or what it would do. My doc knows I smoke so I am not sure why he wouldnt take that into consideration when perscribing it. Am I being paranoid? Sometimes I end up doubling up on normal headache stuff knowing that isnt good for me, but that is the only way I get complete relief. A pillow over my head, an ice pack, and quiet…and sleep if I can.

When I was really young I was taking care of my mom who suffers from almost constant headaches. When a bad one hits she has to go in for a demerol shot. So I have had a busy life taking care of people. And then to have them myself *sigh*. I am thinking my son may have to go in for a bit more testing since he was complaining the other night when one hit him that he got dizzy and sick and couldnt walk straight. He slept it off and was fine but it freaked me out. Of course he told me this after the fact 0.o or we would have been at the ER. Anyone else have that happen? I usually just get nauseted and dont want any stimulation, sometimes I see little flashes of white light if I move my eyes. Thankfully my MRI’s and CT scans showed nothing at all (HAHAHAHAA!!) so I was able to rule out anything serious. I’ll be doing more research on childrens headaches and talk to my sons dr.

I have had migraines since I was about 20. My daughter and youngest son also have them and my mom did when I was a kid. I know my triggers but it isn’t easy to stay away from them, especially chocolate.
Nate never had bad headaches until he got GBS. Now he has horrible ones.
They start at the back of his head then move to the left side like mine.
We saw our doc friday and I told him that they seem to be getting worse.
I asked him if we can try Nate on Imitrex to see if they are really migraines.
He agreed that it would be a good idea so he gave us samples.
Next time Nate has a whopper, I will give him some. Hopefully it will work like it does with me.
Nate has not had a really bad one though since he got a chiropractic adjustment a week ago last friday. He got a small one last week before we saw our regular doc, which was easily controlled by Vicodin.
I wouldn’t wish a migraine on anyone but I hope if they are migraines that Imitrex will work on him.
Watching him in such intense pain is hard, knowing how much he has had to endure already.

hi ta, i will make my migraine story really short since i need to get some rest before daybreak!:D i went from severe migraines-the vomiting, nausea with aura type, everyday for over 15 years to almost none since my first bout with gbs in 8/05. i have tried everything from narcotics to the simple stuff, even as far as dying from an injection at my dr’s office, and i finally found a med that will help most times, its Relpax. since my gbs i have had really bad migraines with each paralysis event i have. they start in the occipitals and go on the leftside only up to the eyes. just alot of pain and neck pain now-no nausea or vomiting. i use the relpax and they are gone. i think i have had a total of 4 migraines other then the event ones since 05, which is a welcomed feeling. wow i didn’t think i could fit 15plus years of migraines into that small of a paragraph-i just wished it could have felt that short and sweet all those years.:rolleyes:

Its a relative of Imitrex. Its Supatriptan and Relpax is Eletriptan. [url]www.relpax.com/relpax/relpax.portal?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=sectionPage&section=About+RELPAX&menuid=Menu-AboutRelpax-info.xml[/url]
No wonder it works so well for you.
The first time I took Imitrex, my migraine left in about 20 minutes. It was weird.
I felt sorta funky the rest of the day but my head didn’t hurt. That was all I cared about anyway.

i tried imitrex and all those others before relpax. relpax took care of the pain and doesn’t mess with my bp like imitrex did. for a while there i was using toradol injections along with relpax-until the injections started making me ill-don’t need that ontop of a migraine.:eek: but now since gbs i only use relpax and usually its while in the hospital paralyzed. tooo bad the numb feeling doesn’t go up into the head! well i guess some people thinks it does anyway!:D

Have you had any problems with understanding things or comprehending things since you got sick? I don’t know if its the meds or the illness doing that.
It can be a touchy subject with some but I really would like to know.
I thought about making a post but I don’t want to offend anyone.
Trudy, natesmom

Hello Fellow Migraine Sufferers,

I have apparently had them off and on for many years. I did not know what was wrong until I had one when I went for a visit to my neuro. and he got a good look into my eyes. I get the auras first then the pain/pressure on my whole head. Imitrex has worked – I guess it is the blood pressure part I would feel a few minutes after taking the meds as I got real light headed and barely made it home from work. I think mine are hormone related.

The auras are the strangest thing… and I remember having them for many years. The doc. said these were called silent migraines.

Thankfully, I haven’t had one in a while. Good luck to everyone!

My whollistic doctor told me that most headaches come from your stomach and I find that to be true in my case. He said to eat a peppermint candy to stop one. He thought it came from a stomach that was too acidic. I found that if I did not eat for awhile or if I ate the wrong foods that made my stomach too acidic, I got a migraine. I would stop it by eating a slice of pizza and a Pepsi. Usually junk food stopped it! It sweetened my stomach. It works every time but you have to take it before you get to the throwing up part.

I had a migaine equivalent where it did not hit the pain center of my brain but hit the vision center. As I sat in my classroom, I saw a hot dog suspended at the ceiling for a second. My doctor explained what happened. He also said that sometimes it hits other centers. You could get paralysis on one side of your body. I asked him how one would know if it were a stroke or a migraine equialent. He said that if the paralysis leaves, it wasn’t a stroke!

AS for losing vision, I lost most of my vision in my left eye and it was from eating soy. When I stopped, my vision returned. Luckily I figured it out before I got on medication. Doctors don’t have enough time to figure out what we are eating. I have blood type O. Soy is not good for us. I wonder how many of us that get migraines are blood type O. I’ll bet that a lot more O’s get migraines than blood type A’s.

Trudy, huh?:D
actually i now have the confusion more since gbs. before gbs it was on occassion, i think the worst was when i was in the hospital for migraine iv treatment and my labs and potassium levels were really bad. since gbs i have the brain fog-worse on days that i have over done it, or during a relapse. it slowly goes back to my new norm after each relapse-well so far anyways.:rolleyes: you don’t need to worry about offending anyone when all you want to do is get answers to your questions. ask away!:) give nate a BIG HUG for me. take care

Carolyn, I’m A+, and my migraines don’t have a food trigger, most times its from a fibromyalgia flareup. my stomach problems were a sign of other problems though-immature cancer cells in my r ovary and the cyst/tumor, and stage 4 endometriosis. the stomach is the control center of the body, if its not happy, you’re not happy.

i agree with ta, i use sudoku and it seems to help me recover easier in between events. my mom started me on it after my intitial event, with the book, she has since given me an electronic style that keeps your scores-just 2 nights ago i broke my record, solved a level 2 puzzle in 5 mins 37 secs with 35 moves.:) that is a great ego boost!:D

when I was at my worst, I felt very empty headed and “slow”. I would forget what I was talking about usually mid sentence or what I was just doing. Once I was comfortable driving I would forget where I was going, my son was most helpful and understanding. Even now i have my moments, but everyone here chalks it up to me being wierd. I have noticed an improvement and I can remember [B]a lot [/B]more than I did 3 months ago…funny you should mention doing puzzles to knock the rust off. I really enjoy puzzles and they do help ignite something. Even online puzzle games that include finding patterns. But, now things are better and I am not as absentminded…well, not as bad as it was anyhow:o

I believe GBS affects more than anyone realizes. My neuro still says headaches are NOT at all associated with GBS. HA!

Its funny that one Neuro says headaches don’t have anything to do with GBS and others say it does.
Even Nates PT says they do, his primary care doc says they do, his hospital nurses says they do, his old Neuro too.
How they can be so divided is puzzling.
If you don’t have them before you got sick, then suddenly you do should tell them to wake up and smell the coffee. LOL
Nate only had one migraine that I knew of about 3 yrs ago. Now he has them 2 or 3 times a week.
He has been doing better though since we took him to the chiropractor.
Its such a relief for him too.