One Utah

Wednesday afternoon, I felt a familiar, deep, disconcerting pain behind my eyes. Acting quickly, I took a dose of Imitrex. Within a short time, the pain had lost its edge and become a dull, pressure-pain. After exercise and a hot shower, I went to bed - still with that pressure-pain but hopeful it would be gone after a good night’s rest.

Thursday, I awoke with a sharp, disorienting full blown migraine. For those who don’t suffer them, let me explain. A migraine is not a headache like any you’ve ever had. For me, they start behind my eyes and rapidly wax to an intensity that makes walking difficult; I experience sensory alteration - depending on the severity, it can be simply sensitivity to light and sound or visual impairment including difficulty focusing my vision and having “fractured” vision (classically called auras) and ringing in my ears. During a migraine, I feel physically disjointed and experience decrease in my coordination and balance. I feels as if my entire body is dangling from the crown of my head, my eyes water, my skin is hypersensitive to variations in temperature and touch; I’ve been in so much pain I have a hard time forming coherent sentences. Noise and light are all but impossible to bear. I remember floating through days at school in a haze of pain. I have suffered headaches and migraines my entire life (I was six the first time I had a full blown migraine). As an adult I have two separate prescriptions for migraine medication which allow me to function as necessary. (Several years ago, after 48 hours of pain, I went to the clinic where I received an injection; 45 minutes later, the pain went away and I felt as if I was wrapped in cotton for the next twelve hours.)

The experience of a migraine is an odd one - during migraines I experience broken thinking and heightened awareness. At times, I’ll stay at work during a migraine because driving home is a worse idea. Sometimes, the solutions I create while working with a migraine demonstrate exceptional creativity - if that’s the right word. When thinking with a migraine, I make weird connections, odd logical leaps, strange slips in thinking that somehow work out. I have sizable financial models with weird formulas that somehow produce reliable results.

I cannot imagine taking drugs to achieve an altered state of consciousness. The alteration of awareness during a migraine can be rewarding but is, more often, agonizing and unsupportable when normal thinking returns. A migraine is a sharp, bright edged cleavage in my life that isn’t worth it. At times, the rebound headache is worse than the orginal migraine. While suffering migraines I’ve made decisions I wouldn’t have made otherwise - for instance I once stopped dating someone; it was the right decision and it was the physical pain I was suffering that pushed me to the point that I was no longer will to put up with his shit. Alternatively, while suffering with a migraine, I’ve missed things I would have preferred to have attended. The price is too high.

I often say I don’t hangovers - quite frankly compared to a migraine, a hangover is minor and easily treated with accupressure and water so I’ve probably had them and not thought much about it. In the last year, I’ve made substantial changes in my life resulting in significant weight loss and greatly improved my diet, I have also experienced fewer migraines (there is a theory that migraines are related to alterations in serotonin levels and healthy diet and regular exericise can regulate brain chemistry so there may be a connection).

I often see the world differently afterwards - at least for a day or two. Things are more appealing, food tastes better, I feel more physically and emotionally powerful. The world feels fresher and a better place to be. I’ve come to think of migraines as a temporary mental illness - something that alters my perceptions and comprehension for a short time, something that affects my mind’s ability to function and my ability to live in the world and relate to others which, then, mercifully, clears up.

Because of that experience, I think I am more empathetic and sympathetic with persons who suffer from serious mental illness - depression, schizophrenia, bipolar, senile dementia and Alzheimer’s. I cannot imagine what it must be life to live with broken thinking, a broken mind, all the time and I am incredibly thankful I don’t have to.

This entry was posted Friday, December 15th, 2006 at 10:01 am and is filed under Disaster, Mental Illness, This Blog, Uncategorized. Both comments and pings are currently closed.