One of my favourite posts from this blog was about Buddhism, but started with a migraine.
Of course, I wrote it the next day, when I was more sensible.
Now, I’m attempting to write one mid-migraine.
If you’ve never had one, you might think it’s a headache. But a blinding headache is only one symptom, and I’ve had migraines where there is no headache at all – though not often. I’ve got one now, about a 4 out of 10.
Here’s some symptoms I get most times:
Photosensitivity – I can’t bear light. The sun. Room lighting. A computer screen. The light coming under the door in a pitch-black room. It can be horrendous. It’s mild this time around.
Aphasia – I say the wrong word in a sentence. Or stutter and stammer and can’t get a word out. Or just go blank. And it’s not words like “refulgent” or “tatterdemalion” that go missing. It’s words like “shop” or “car “. This symptom really upsets me. (NOTE: I have left out a common word in this article because I can’t remember how to spell it. So it applies via my fingers too. I never actually knew that!)
Stupidity: I feel crushingly stupid. Can’t explain it any other way.
Refusal to talk: I just don’t want to say anything. I rehearse saying stuff in my head but just can’t do it. I get truculent and I just sit and sulk. Sometimes I think I’ve said stuff I haven’t.
Memory: I forget stuff I know, and also, I can have no memory of what occurs during a migraine.
Can you imagine how these symptoms play out if I’m working? I work as a consultant. Once I attended a meeting with a client whilst suffering a migraine. Next day I had not a trace of memory of it and my notes said “Potato, Potato”.
Over the years I’ve learnt to push through my symptoms.
Or here’s a weird one – I often do not want to take my medication. I become irrationally frightened that if I have it and don’t take it, I still have the means to get better in my hand, but if I do take it and it fails to work – it doesn’t always – then I have run out of options for relief. It makes no sense to me either.
But always, I reach for the teapot. And one of two options.
A doctor once told me that the only real cure for migraine was hydration. And so I came up with my own cure.
- About 600ml of tea
- The same amount of water
- Some salted food (unflavoured corn chips are ideal. I keep popping corn on hand as an alternative)
About that tea – what tea?
Over the years I’ve used them all, and they make little difference. But two types appeal.
One is a Moroccan mint style – green tea and peppermint or spearmint. Peppermint is a headache folk remedy anyway.
The other is Pai Mu Tan.
This is a tea I love anyway, but there’s something about its brackish sweetness that goes so well with water and corn chips.
So, I’ll just sip for now. The screen is starting to get on my nerves.
And there’s a possibility I’ll look at this tomorrow and wonder who wrote it.
Am glad you’ve figured out some remedies.
How many ‘social’ problems are somehow related to people not acting the way they’re expected to under normal/typical conditions? We all have moments where it should simply be tolerated that we slip off to our ‘cave’.
There. I’ve said it.
I’m sorry to read you suffer from migraines as I do. I’ve had all of your above symptoms but until now never knew what to call aphasia until now – thank you sir.
I’ve only recently heard that peppermint or spearmint can help with migraines so I always carry a homemade tsac of one or the other with me when I leave the house. (To this day I am unable to predict when they are coming)
Feel better soon.
I understand a bit better now what you have spoken of before. Amazing journey you travel, living life with Migraine. Tea on, my friend. I heart you.
Devotea, I am so sorry you are dealing with this. I had migraines for 25 years and you described quite well what it is like to get through a work day when you have all the issues that go along with the brain changes. I also had this conflict of take the meds right away, like it says on the box, vs waiting. Looking back I think I really didn’t want to admit I was having another one. I’m glad you are finding ways to help yourself and thanks for enlightening people who don’t have migraines about what the total experience is like, not just the pain.
I’ve never met anyone else who had the Med thing happening. It only makes sense during the migraine, doesn’t it?
When you say that you had them for 25 years, do you mean that you don’t have them anymore? Because then I”d be curious how you got over them? Or do you mean you still have them?
From wwhat I heard, migraines are really bad.
But knowing that you managed to find your own tea cure/help is a good thing.
Since I really don’t know much about migraines, reading your post was a bit of a shock. We usually see you sunny side up, or even if ranting; humorous and great with words. Hard to imagine you going through this.
Do you know any more about what triggers it? A friend of mine couldn’t eat chocolate because she believed it set them off. Any ideas? Have you always had them?
Anyway, I”m glad you’ve found a couple of things that help, but I wish there was a sure way of preventing or treating it. Funnily enough I do see your own logic in the medicine dilemma.
Here’s to you, I’m raising my tea cup!
J.
My allergies to citrus fruits is a common trigger, as is chilli. I must also be cautious with coffee and chocolate.
I’d like to think my 12-15 cups of tea on days when I don’t have a migraine is some sort of prevention.
I am sorry that you suffer through migraines. I don’t have them as often as I used to, but I would occasionally be hospitalized for them because they got so bad. And even though I was never actually told about the hydration thing, it makes perfect sense, because one of the first things they would do is hook me up to an IV and tell me I’m dehydrated. I never really put them together before reading your article though. Maybe they had told me but, because of the incoherent-ness symptom of migraines (where I just can’t understand things), I didn’t really understand what was said to me. When people would speak to me it sounded like gibberish or some weird language that I couldn’t decipher.
They are not fun. Not at all. I am glad to have read your article… because now I understand them just a little bit better.
6 yrs of migraines. Not only was hydration in general important, but I found that I needed to keep my caffeine intake *level* to avoid headache – same tea drinking habits daily.