My husband has had, during the weekend, what we believe is an episode of migraines: started with blurry vision and sensitivity to light, and then his eyes were sore. It took us a while to figure out what was going on, because neither of us has ever had migraines. He has always been sensitive to artificial light (he literally can't go into Target and similar big-box retailers, for example. If he is forced to, he can be knock out for a few hours, but is back to normal after that), but it has never been so debilitating in our own home.
He's made an appointment with his GP to get himself checked-out, just to rule other things. However, as much as he trusts his GP, doctors can sometimes be in a hurry and be short in information. Therefore, if it ends up being migraines, I would like the input from readers. I've never had migraines, and he is 43 years old and never had them before so far (or we have never identified them before as such). As you can imagine, we are researching about the topic, but I would love any suggestions you can give me, based on your own personal experience: what triggers an episode for you, how do you deal with it best, advice of any kind, etc. Thanks very much for whatever you can tell me, it will help us both calm our anxiety.
Flashing lights triggers for me. Much happier camper once I figured that out.
ReplyDeleteI always drink some coffee (I avoid caffeine regularly just so it works when I get a migraine), take an aspirin, and sleep for a long time.
Thanks for the input... I'll pass it to him.
ReplyDeleteMine are purely hormonal (e.g. I get them a day or two before period/ovulation), so that's no use to your husband.
ReplyDeleteHowever, what helps is that at first sight of light sensitivity or aura, I take aspirin with Coke and go to sleep. So, similar as N&M, except coffee doesn't do it for me. Timing is very important: if I take the pill too late, then it doesn't work and I get a pounding headache and am very nauseuous, which can last for up to 2 days. At rare occasions it got so bad I had to go to a doctor because of the headache, he would then give me a painkiller injection and send me home to sleep. But this happened perhaps 5 times in my entire life, so really very rarely.
Funnily though, the aspirin+Coke combination proved to be better working for me than any prescription medicine that I was ever given.
Do you take sugar in your coffee? If not, that might be the reason Coke works but coffee doesn't. When I landed in the ER with an epidural headache, they gave me an IV of sugar + caffeine, along with a strong NSAID.
DeleteAnyway- I get migraines if I drink certain types of wine. I have a strong allergy to mold, and any oak that wine is aged in will contain mold from the region in which it was grown. So I need to avoid wines aged in oak barrels from my part of the world. That is too complicated for me, so I just drink wine from outside the US (I've never lived anywhere else for long enough to develop allergies). And frankly, this is one reason why I prefer beer. It never gives me migraines!
An allergist put the pieces together once, I'm not sure I ever would have. But every single migraine I've ever had was preceded by consumption of an American white wine. Migraines suck enough that I'll avoid all American wines on that correlation.
My mom gets them from red wine. She's got no problem with Napa whites!
DeleteI learned bio feedback to cope with them in college when I was plagued frequently. I have to be in a dark quiet room. Icepack compress on forehead/base of neck helps too. THEY SUCK big time. I'm fearful that between seasonal allergies and freaking perimenopause they may be returning.
ReplyDeleteThere has been a LOT of research lately linking migraines and PFO's-- a minor cardiac defect. It's basically a little hole in the heart and in recent research they found closing the hole stopped the migraines. Worth asking about.
ReplyDeleteBTW I have a question for you related to your field (I think). I'm taking a class this Summer called Representations and Fictions: Latin American Realities. The professor is Salvador Raggio and since I know this is a really tight niche of a field, I figured I'd ask if you know about him at all? A friend took the class and said he was awesome plus he has good ratings on RMP.
P.S. Thoughts on RateMyProfessor??
Thank you all so much for your suggestions. As we suspected, it will be a learning process for him, but your comments help a lot. Specially regarding mold, stress and seasonal allergies.
ReplyDelete@MutantSupermodel: I will tell him to mention PFO when he goes to his doctor's appointment. Regarding your other two questions:
a)No, I don't know Salvador Raggio. I checked him out, and he is still a grad student. That is probably why I haven't heard of him. BTW, that in no way affects his ability in front of a classroom (trust me, I've seen countless TA in my field that are better teachers than many tenured professors). And that institution in particular has an excellent Modern Language department, as far as the Spanish section goes. Personally, I only know one of them, but several are really well-known in the field.
b) Unlike many of my colleagues, I actually like RateMyProfessor. I believe that reading the comments actually gives you a pretty good idea of how a professor is. Of course, you always have to take into consideration that it is being written by a college undergraduate, so you'll have to interpret the comments. As an example, what I believe is one of the best professors at my institutions has a 3.3 rating, with 24 comments. He is an amazing professor, but even the superstars will consider him a challenge. He is demanding and challenging, but you will learn a lot. And in the process, probably only get a B+ when you are used to getting As everywhere. Regarding this professors, the comments are either he is the best professor ever, or avoid at all costs. But they all mention how challenging he is, and it is not hard to infer that the ones who say avoid at all cost are the ones who do not want to put the effort into the class.