Free My Brain From Migraine Pain

Posts Tagged ‘Migraine triggers’

Where did Megan go?

August 13th, 2008

A big gap in posts here, but not due to Migraines and illness, for once. I took my daughter on a trip to look at four colleges in the mid-West. Perfect weather almost all week, some very promising colleges, and we had a fun time – many hours of cracking each other up

in the car, and some lovely visits with old friends. We were in the Windy City,

and the Twin Cities, and many miles of America’s Dairyland in between!

I had only one Migraine on the trip – the day we flew in. The triggers were two nights of insufficient sleep, stacked with the change in altitude on the flight. I had two marathon days of driving, which certainly exhausted me, but didn’t trigger any Migraines, I’m happy to say. Clearly fatigue and stamina are issues for me, but I was glad not to be coping with frequent Migraines as well. Stress may not be a direct trigger (I have my doubts) but a trip away from the daily stresses of my life is always welcome!

– Megan

Walker Sculpture Garden image courtesy of Eli Duke; Wisconsin Farm image courtesy of Randen Pederson.

Tags: fatigue, migraine, Migraine triggers
Posted in Travel | Comments (3)

Managing my Migraines: Recent Success

June 25th, 2008

All my hidden superstition comes out and I hesitate to say this for fear of jinxing myself, but I have only had one very mild Migraine in the past 19 days. It is too soon to tell if this is a trend or a fluke. It’s quite a contrast to the last 6 months though, when I’ve had an average of 5 Migraines per month and my Migraines have generally lasted 36 hours. I promise not to be embarrassed if this trend doesn’t continue. I believe I am doing a lot of right stuff – just sometimes we need even more right stuff to add to our toolkits.

I have yet to try preventive medications; I missed my long-awaited headache specialist appointment when I was sick with bronchitis. But I will give you my current regimen, and list the things that I think are making a difference. Please note that this is my list; the same factors might not work for you.

400 mg of Magnesium (see studies done by USDA linking magnesium deficiency and migraine)
200 mg of B2 (riboflavin)
a high potency multi-vitamin
60 mg Armour Thyroid*
an iodine supplement*
3000 mg phosphorylated serine per day, 1000 mg each at lunch, dinner and bedtime*
10 mg DHEA*
the Wiley Protocol – bio-mimetic hormone replacement therapy
not drinking caffeinated beverages more than 2 -3 times per week – and the ones I drink are mild!
30 – 45 minutes aerobic exercise daily
sleeping 8 hours per night
daily meditation
basing my work schedule on the idea that I have about 30 productive hours in me per week, and not trying to do more than that!
taking frequent breaks throughout the day and gardening or doing housework
napping if I need to
switching overhead lights in the house back from CFLs to incandescents
banning my son’s stinky cologne from the house
Summer – long days, warmth

I have Migraine disease, early stage chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), low thyroid and, I believe, seasonal affective disorder. I also have allergies, and frequent, sometimes chronic, sinus infections, and am very prone to catching whatever illnesses are around to catch. The factors that I marked with an asterix (*) above are not there to prevent Migraine; they are there to balance my hormones, strengthen my adrenal glands, and manage my CFS. All the research shows that CFS and low thyroid are co-morbid conditions with Migraine – they occur at the same time, without a causal relationship. I can only speak to my own experience, but when I am fatigued, and I push myself beyond my limits, I often get a Migraine. Low thyroid also contributes to my fatigue, which contributes to my Migraine frequency. Unless someone can prove to me otherwise, I will maintain that taking care of my thyroid and CFS also takes care of my Migraines.

I began the Wiley Protocol about a year ago to address menopausal symptoms. The Wiley Protocol replaces a woman’s hormones with the identical hormones her body makes (rather than the synthetic hormones found in traditional HRT), and doses them in the way that mimics her natural cycle when she is young. It is not specifically designed to combat Migraine, but for those of us whose Migraines increased in peri-menopause, it makes sense that returning to a younger hormonal state would help! I found initially that while my Migraine frequency didn’t improve, the severity went way down. My doctor started me on an adjusted dose of the hormones about 3 weeks ago, with estrogen levels raised slightly in the beginning of my cycle and lowered slightly later on. Since that’s the same time period where I’ve been having so few Migraines, I can only guess it’s helping.

I am usually healthier in the warm weather months, and sluggish and illness-prone over the Winter. I feel like I come alive again in the Spring. Short of moving far south, I think I will have to get a light-box for next Winter to address this.

The CFLs are funny for me. They are on a list of things that I “just don’t like” – and haven’t liked most of my life (baking in the hot sun, strong men’s colognes, crowded rooms full of noisy people, fluorescent lights). Lo and behold, these things that I never liked are actually triggers for me. When I began blogging about CFLs a month or two ago it occurred to me to get them out of my own house and see what happened. My husband had started replacing incandescents with CFLs in our overhead lights about six months ago. My Migraine frequency went way up when? About six months ago! Coincidence? We’ve been taking them out again and… fewer Migraines?

A conclusion here? As you all know who deal with this disease, there are many factors involved. If you are one of those people who only has to avoid one trigger, or take one herb, or use one particular drug, to eliminate Migraines, then God bless you! You have my undying jealousy! If you are one of those complicated cases who have to manage multiple triggers and multiple treatments, I know how tired you are of managing it all. I just want to hold out some hope – that the detective work is worth doing, and can make a difference. Keep on trying!

– Megan Oltman
Managing Migraines one day at a time.

Crossed fingers image courtesy of Meisje van de Sliterij.

Tags: chronic fatigue syndrome, magnesium, Migraine treatment, Migraine triggers, the Wiley Protocol, vitamin B2
Posted in Managing, Medicine | Comments (8)

Coping, hoping, moping and other strategies

April 11th, 2008

I had a couple of posts on coping with migraine that I thought would work fine for this month’s blog carnival, but I couldn’t resist doing some on-the-job research. Yesterday I had a splendid set of opportunities to get a migraine, followed by an opportunity to cope.

It went like this: First, to create the desired research environment:

1. Sleep badly.
2. Rush through getting ready and go out in rush hour traffic to coffee with a business associate. Choose the hip, cool, NOISY coffee shop.
3. Stay in the coffee shop for 2 hours afterwards doing professional reading with the noise battering your ear drums.
4. Step out into the gorgeous Spring day with the Bradford pears in full bloom along the street (they are very pretty and I am allergic to them.) Sneeze a lot.
5. Lead a seminar over lunch. Have the attendees show up late so your lunch is late. Get ravenous before eating. Then have an intensive seminar on a challenging topic, that you have never led before.
6. Back at the office, discover a major error in your publication that will cost you money you can’t afford.
7. Receive worrisome news about someone.
8. Cry.

There. A near perfect research environment. The only surprise was that the migraine pain was mild, and didn’t begin until about 6 pm.

And on to the coping:

1. Unsure yet whether it’s a “real one” or just a tension headache, take the mild and mainly ineffective pain-dullers available to an allergic person like me. (Endorphigen D-Phenylalanine supplement and Magnesium Choline Trisalycylic acid). Drink a lot of water (16 oz or so).

2. Take a fifteen minute gentle walk. This will usually clear a tension headache for me.

3. When these don’t impact the head pain, eat a light dinner. I cannot take my triptans on an empty stomach, as the ache and pressure in my trunk from the triptan will make me nauseous on an empty stomach.

4. Take the blessed and cursed Imitrex. (Blessed for usually halting the migraine, cursed for making my head go all stupid, making my whole body ache, and intestinal ickiness.)

From here on in, it’s all about comfort.

5. Receive hugs from husband and any offspring so inclined as to offer them.

6. Hug kitty-cat who will probably not come snuggle on the bed. (He comes once in awhile. But generally considers our bed to be the territory of elder cat who died 7 years ago. Can’t convince him otherwise.)

7. Lie down on comfy bed. Lights low. Soothing adobe-orange walls. Many pillows. And my stuffed animals.

Wally is the perfect size to hug.

Pepito is very soft and exact holding-in-hand size.

Willy the Wooly Mammoth is really Danny’s, but I borrow him for my other hand (he’s my favorite but don’t tell).

7. Buckwheat filled eye-mask can be cooled in the freezer, blocks the light, and puts a soft comforting pressure on my eyes.

8. Husband or offspring checks on me after an hour or two, usually bringing cups of tea and medicinal dark chocolate.

9. Gentle comedy on the tv goes a long way.

10. Sleep.

– Megan
There’s got to be a morning after.

Tags: comfort measures, migraine treatments, Migraine triggers
Posted in Managing, Musings | Comments (8)

The Weirdest Migraine Trigger Ever

April 1st, 2008

It’s April Fool’s Day, but this is not a hoax. I do want to have a little fun though. I had a very weird event trigger a migraine the other day. I’m going to tell you about mine, but I’m also going to ask you to tell me about your weirdest migraine trigger ever. Then we’ll have a contest – I’m working on recruiting the judges right now. I will publish our judges’ picks for the 3 weirdest migraine triggers on Free my Brain. And there will be prizes! Maybe we can’t stop the pain, but at least we can have a little fun in the meantime.

Here’s my weird trigger:

What is that a picture of? Well, I had to drive my daughter to an appointment in the evening in the pouring rain. We’re talking buckets here! And suddenly as I drove along the passenger-side windshield wiper started flapping loose. It was flailing and rotating so wildly it looked like it would smack into and break the other wiper. The little bracket that holds the blade to the arm had broken, as I discovered when I stepped out in a huge puddle to try to fix the thing. I fiddled with it in the pouring rain and the already broken bracket snapped in two. So I took the blade off and got back in the car.

Now you may be wondering about the Triple A sticker on the windshield – why didn’t I just call them? We live in a somewhat rural area and it takes them a long time to get to us. We had this appointment to get to. So I started up the car and watched this little metal hook at the end of the wiper arm passing back and forth – it wasn’t contacting the windshield so I figured we were okay.

I took my daughter to her appointment and on the way back the metal hook started scratching the windshield. A faint squeak at first, getting louder and louder, until it became this loud squealing scratching noise. After about 5 minutes I could see a scratch in the windshield where the hook was rubbing against it. We’re driving along, it’s a few miles to the nearest gas station. I’m worrying about my windshield breaking. It’s dark and it’s pouring. And there’s this hideous loud noise. I can’t think and the headache is starting.

My brilliant daughter suggests I tie one of her socks around the hook. I stop and find an old ragged piece of towel in the back of the car. On the roof rack were some pieces of twine from when the Christmas tree was on top (let’s hear it for bad housekeeping – a tidy person would not have had these useful items!). I ripped a piece of towel, tied it on with twine and finished it up with the Scotch tape that was in my purse for some reason. That’s what you see in the picture, the brilliant solution that saved my windshield. And enabled me to get all the way home before the migraine hit!

Now we all know that migraine was probably triggered by loud noise and bad weather, with a hefty dose of stress pushing it over the edge. But when I ask you for your weirdest migraine trigger ever, I’m not
asking for the technical official triggers. I want your stories of a pile of weird circumstances or coincidences that came together to trigger a migraine. Want to play?

Just send me an email by April 30th with your weirdest migraine trigger story through Contact page. Winning entries will be posted in early May. Happy Spring!

– Megan Oltman
Hoping all your storms are on the outside of your head.

Tags: Migraine triggers
Posted in Silliness | Comments (6)

What can I do with my hair?

March 15th, 2008

A frivolous topic, I know. Can you tell I’m laying around in post-drome, not quite well enough to be up and doing but well enough to be bored? This is dangerously close to a self-indulgent pop culture style mag question, but please indulge me! When you’re a red head you spend your whole life with people commenting on your hair, so I guess it becomes an obsession. What is the right hair length for a migraineur? Is there such a thing?

The photo I most often use professionally and for an avatar online is about 4 years old. I’m going to have to change it soon for a more recent one. But lots of my online friends know me looking like this:

Now it’s not that I don’t look like this, but I grew my hair out over the past 3 years and now it’s quite long, almost as long as when I was a hippy-dippy teenager! I also stopped coloring my hair, at least for now, I’ve got white wings on the red at the sides. Hey if it’s good enough for Bonnie Raitt, it’s good enough for me! The problem is, my hair weighs a ton! And it’s hot on my neck. I like to wear it up, or braided, or back, in hot weather. But if I have a migraine, or I’m in post-drome, my scalp is tender and I can’t stand the pressure of putting it up. Even the weight of it pulling on my scalp when it’s down makes me nuts.

So now I look like this (a not very great picture of me last spring break) but my hair has gotten even longer. I hate to chop it all off again after spending 3 years growing it back. I’m also pushing 50 here and I’m not sure the face holds up to a short haircut any more!

So, what’s a migraineur to do? I don’t want this disease to dictate anything else in my life! But days Iike today I sure want to chop it all off. It hurts to even think about washing it.

Please leave a comment and let me know how you deal with your hair!

Megan Oltman

Migraineur Fashion Central?

By the way, Mom says I should cut it!

Tags: hairstyle, Migraine triggers, scalp sensitivity
Posted in Managing, Silliness | Comments (5)

Migraine Early Warning System

January 31st, 2008

One of the first things you learn when you started dealing with your migraines is to identify and avoid triggers. I learned this shortly after a murderous 5 day migraine I had in Arizona – I was at higher altitudes than I was used to, and there were forest fires all week, exposing me to lots of smoke. I was drinking way more coffee than usual to keep up with a busy vacation schedule with lots of driving. Voila – smoke + altitude + excess caffeine = nasty head-banging five day migraine. For those of you living in Arizona – I don’t hold it against you or your state! It’s a beautiful corner of the world and I wish I had been able to visit with less pain. I saw Sedona in a migraine-fog – I understand it actually looks something like this:

Anyway this experience started me on an important inquiry – what are my triggers, and how can I avoid them?

There are common migraine triggers and then the ones that seem relatively unique to each of us. For one it’s eating dairy, drinking wine, for another flashing lights, particular smells, loud music, smoke, being startled, being in a crowd of loudly talking people, the bright packaging at the supermarket, the tv. It’s important to know what your migraine triggers are. If your brain is a loaded gun, ready to fire off with a migraine, and you know what pulls the trigger, that helps, right? You can avoid the triggering event or substance and reduce the likelihood that you’ll get a migraine.

Some lifestyle changes may be necessary to avoid triggers. Get into a regular sleep routine. Stop eating dairy. Stay away from places with flashing lights. Avoid smokers. (Just for instance. For a complete list of common triggers, visit mymigraineconnection here.) If you live with a smoker, you may need to an agreement that he or she won’t smoke in the house. If you smoke yourself, you may need to make a major change! If your kid’s hard rock music does it, you may need to have some rules around when and how loud it can be on. But some triggers are unavoidable, and we can’t avoid all of them all the time.

So I started asking myself – those may be the triggers, but what loaded the gun in the first place? By the way, it’s most unfair of me to be comparing our unique, sensitive and brilliant brains to guns. I hate guns. But we can’t deny the violence of the migraine. And even if you are a gun owner, I think we’d all agree that you’ve got to keep the thing unloaded around the house to avoid tragic accidents. So what loaded my migraine gun, and how can I keep it unloaded?

Migraine is a response to triggering stimuli. Current thinking is that stress itself is not a trigger but may predispose us to be more vulnerable to our triggers. You can read more about that here. For me, over-stimulation itself is enough of a stress to tip me over into migraine, even if I’m not aware of any other triggers. On some stereo speakers you can turn the volume way up, others you will blow out by turning them up high. Our brains have the blow-out factor set way lower than the other 88 – 90% of the population. So, I say when we are stressed for a long period of time without relief, when we are highly stimulated without relief or let-down, we are loaded for migraine. We may have an ability to go into hyper-drive, to perform effectively, rapidly and intensely. But the more we do that, the more often and the longer duration, the more likely we are to load ourselves for a migraine explosion.

It takes more attention, more thought, more observation and introspection to determine your early warning signs than to determine your triggers. The good news is that if you do get attuned to them, you have a much higher likelihood of avoiding the migraine altogether. When I took on a daily relaxation practice, doing deep breathing and meditation to calm my system down every day, I reduced my migraines. When I got out of practice, the migraines started increasing again.

So what’s your early warning system? For me it’s a tightness in the shoulders and neck that moves up into my head. Also a sense of agitation – moving and thinking really fast. What are the signs for you that come before the triggers, the ones you have the best chance of diffusing? Please leave me a comment to let me know what you think.

(This is supposed to be a picture of your nervous system when it’s all calm and serene, but Thor looks like he’s ready to play. Imagine him curled in a furry purring ball.)

– Megan

Hoping you catch your signals before the guns go off

stereo speakers courtesy of Valerie Everett

Tags: altitude, caffeine, migraine prevention, Migraine triggers, relaxation, smoke
Posted in Managing, Tips & Techniques | Comments (3)

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