Oh! My Aching Head

I don’t have migraines often, but when I do...

Migraines are not like other headaches. According to the Migraine Research Center one out of ten people suffers from migraine. That’s a pretty big number, even if it doesn’t seem like it. That means that if Madison Square Garden were filled to capacity, out of those 18, 200 people, approximately 1,820 of them would suffer from migraines.

People who don’t suffer from migraines tend to feel that the disabling effects of migraine headaches are self-indulgence and laziness on the part of sufferers. It is easy to dismiss the problem as “an excuse to take a day off” but the truth is that in the throes of a migraine, it is sometimes impossible to do anything. Light and sound can raise the level of pain, making it unbearable to do anything beyond lay down in a darkened room.

From nausea to dizziness to blurry vision and flashing lights, migraines interrupt life. The interesting thing is that medicine has not figured out what causes migraines. I should know. I’ve had migraines in the past but the most recent bout was completely incapacitating. I just spent nearly a week under the pain and disorientation of a migraine headache that I thought would never go away.

The week began on Sunday when the headache first appeared with none of the normal indicators of an approaching migraine! There were no flashing lights, no blurring of vision and no nausea until the headache reared it ugly head. Once it started, there was no stopping it. I tried ibuprofin with only a slight reduction in pain.

When the headache was still in full force on Tuesday, I went to the doctor. Or should I say, the Nurse Practitioner. She gave me a shot and then prescribed Sumatriptan. The shot gave me some temporary relief. The Sumatriptan gave me unbelievable nausea. On Thursday, I took the day off from work. This is not something I do lightly, by the way, I’m a contractor and only get paid when I work. Friday I had to take another day off and I went back to the doctor.

She said, “I think you have meningitis.”

Then she told me that the only way to get tested quickly is to go to the emergency room. Great! I may sound cheap, but the whole reason I went to the doctor was to save the $85. The co-pay for the doctor is $15 but the ER has a $100 co-pay. They didn’t charge me the doctor’s co-pay when I was there, but I bet I get a bill from them. So now I’ve lost hundreds of dollars in pay plus another $115 for the co-pays.

We went to the emergency room. They determined that I don’t have meningitis, and then gave me a combination of Benedryl and Reglen in an IV that finally stopped the headache.

This experience leaves me wondering about several things:

• What caused the migraine in the first place? I haven’t had any for years. Why now?
• Would benedryl alone stop the headache? After all, you can buy it without prescription. If it will help, maybe I can stop the headache without having to go resort to the doctor or the emergency room.
• Isn’t it interesting that most of the results you get when you look up migraine relief revolve around collecting money for migraine research. Which leads me to the final question
• Are they actually doing any research or are they just collecting money?

I’d love to hear your opinion on this, of course. What have your experiences with migraine been?