Monday, June 22, 2009

Losing my cool

And this week -- not starting off great.
I thought maybe we (by which I mean I) could be done with the headaches for a while already.
But by about 4 p.m. or so, one was definitely setting in.
But I thought I could finish my work and get out before things got hairy -- maybe get on my bike and ride it off before it could really get out of control.
But I was working on two stories (fortunately one got held, or I'd have lost my mind completely) and one of them (the one that ran) was controversial, which always seems to take a bit more effort.
Anyway -- I finished my story and turned it in.
Then it turned out I hadn't saved the final changes and the stupid program let me close it without asking if I wanted to save, as it randomly does from time to time. So I had to go in and redo those parts.
Then my editor started reading it and although I had thought the story was reasonably clean and clear, he had a million questions and wanted to change a lot of things around.
So of course by now my head is pounding and it's getting to that point past which I cannot cope.
I'm afraid I was rather snippy.
I REALLY, REALLY didn't mean to be.
It's just that it started to seem like it would never stop -- his questions, the pain, the pain, the pain.
He was on the last paragraph and I guess I should have tried to pull myself together -- but I lost it and said, "I'm sorry, but I really have to leave."
And flounced out rather petulantly.
I don't understand why this is happening to me. Why it has to be this way. I try so hard to be And yes, I know I'm being a big whiny baby poor me wah.
As always, the fear of losing my job, not being able to do my job, because of the headaches.
Am I being melodramatic?
Possibly.
The pain is not the worst I've ever felt. Not even close. It just feels like a brush fire behind my eyes.
I'm sorry. This whole blog idea seems to be bogging down in self pity.
I didn't mean for it to be that way.
Maybe I should go back to the doctor and see what the pharmaceutical industry has to offer these days.
That back bedroom with the drawn shades and the laudanum is looking pretty sweet right about now.

Sunday, June 21, 2009

A possibly tedious recounting of my four-headache week...

Last week was not a great week in my head.
The headache I woke up with Monday faded away before noon, which was a great relief.
Tuesday was okay.
Wednesday started out fine, but by lunchtime the noise was starting up in my head and it became that question of whether to take Relpax or risk the consequences -- a question I had to answer before eating lunch.
If I time it just right, often I can take it just in time so that it's bad enough so I am certain it was necessary but not so far gone that it won't do any good. I've gotten pretty good at gauging that, generally. On Wednesday I decided to take it, and I think it was justified.
It made me feel really, really sleepy as it sometimes does, but I managed to get through the day.
Just as it was taking effect I was interviewing two geology professors at Lamar University. When it hits me hard like that I often wonder if other people notice something odd about me -- like maybe they wonder if I'm on drugs, which I am, but not maybe the way they think.
Anyway, I got through the day and did most of what I meant to do.
Thursday, by late afternoon, my head began to ache.
Generally, I try to avoid taking Relpax two days in a row, as I think that's too often. And so far, it hasn't often been necessary (that is, since I got off the cycle of rebound headaches, which is the reason I limit my use of Relpax in the first place).
Anyway, out of sheer desperation, I took a whooooole bunch of ibuprofen -- about six 200 milligram tablets. It made me feel a little weird, but miraculously, it seemed to do the trick.
Who knows -- maybe the headache would have faded away on its own.
Friday was okay.
But Saturday, I woke up with a headache -- and I had to work.
I thought about trying the ibuprofen again, but I didn't have any at home. My assignment was to cover a historic gun exhibition in Orange (about 20 miles from Beaumont, where I live) so I got ready for work and drove over there, stopping at a convenience store for ibuprofen. I took five, and I think it might have blunted the progress for a little while. Hard to say.
But two hours later, it seemed to be building again.
I left the museum where the exhibit was being held and went back out into the heat and got in my un-air conditioned car.
I felt afraid to take the drug (because of the side effects) and afraid not to (for obvious reasons).
I looked around me, trying to read the landscape -- maybe it seems stupid to believe in signs -- it's not exactly that I think mystical messages are planted for my edification, it's more that I think my subconscious will use the objects and activities going on around me to help me navigate. Either way, maybe it sounds goofy.
Anyway, I saw nothing much that stood out to me one way or the other and drove on apathetically.
It occurred to me that the consequences of doing nothing could be extremely painful and at the same time, I realized that I WANTED to take Relpax.
So I did.
And again, I think it was the choice that most helped me get through the day I had planned.
Part of my day Saturday was training a new reporter on the duties of the Saturday shift, and I'm pretty sure that would not have gone well with a raging headache -- much less a full-blown migraine.
And this very green rookie reporter would not have been able to cope on her own with the Saturday routine.
So, all well and good.
But I woke this morning with a faint pain in my head.
Nothing major, but waking with pain is usually a poor start to a day.
I have an obligation later today -- but I don't think it would be appropriate for me to take Relpax again.
I was doing so well there for a while.
Granted, this week my period started, which makes it more likely for me to have headaches, but I don't always have FOUR the week of my period.
It seems to go in cycles that way -- but when I get into a bad patch like this, I'm always afraid it's never going to end -- that this is just going to be my life from now on.
It's especially worrisome because, from what I've read, migraine is not considered a disability. Which seems odd to me.
True, for many people, they are not a daily or even weekly occurrence. But when they are, they make it very difficult to work and be productive.
I'm not really sure how this fits in with my ambitious mission statement of finding solutions and cures and all that.

Monday, June 15, 2009

Getting old

That's a little play on words -- the title of this entry, I mean.
It's just my little way of being funny about having a headache that's creeping into its third day and how it's making me worry about aging.
Anyway, it started Saturday and it's now Monday morning.
At no point has it been totally debilitating -- it's just kept me from doing some things I wanted to do and made things I did do less enjoyable.
I guess I should be grateful it isn't any worse.
But wretch that I am, I'm not grateful. I just want it to stop already.
I've been assuming that this is a hormonal thing, that I'm sliding into menopause (kicking and screaming) and that there's no telling where it will end.
The fact that I woke up early this morning (4 a.m.-ish), too hot and had to turn the a/c temperature down a couple degrees does nothing to dispell this illusion.
But who knows? Maybe it's something else.
A sinus thing?
I should be getting ready for work now -- though going to work sounds about as thrilling as a root canal just about now.
I'm working Saturday and this should be my day off to compensate, but my editor asked me to wait and take off next Friday because a lot of people are on vacation
I guess if it starts getting bad I'll go home.
IMHO it should start going away soon. I was waiting for that to happen yesterday afternoon and evening, but...

Saturday, June 13, 2009

What to do...

Headache today.
Trying not to take Relpax and I might have waited too long for it to be any use anyway.
I had a big day of Getting Things Done planned.
I've been busy with one project and another on the weekends the past few months and my apartment shows it. It's been bugging me, so I made an ambitious to-do list this morning.
I got a few things checked off, and was on my way to drop off recycling and Goodwill donations and pick up cedar sachets so I could put away my winter clothes. But my head was starting to hurt.
As usual, deciding what to do was not easy.
My first impulse was to continue what I had planned, and take Relpax if it seemed like things were getting out of hand. After all, I had some good Getting Things Done momentum going on.
But then I thought maybe I should go pick up the cedar sachets on my bike. Exercise sometimes helps and even if it doesn't, it's always good to get in a work out... right?
So I went and it was good to be on my bike, even though the pain didn't abate much if at all.
On my way home, the dilemma intensified.
I knew if I was going to take it, I would have to take it soon.
But sometimes the exercise cure takes a little time to work.
So I got home and poured a glass of water and sat on the back steps pondering the question.
Maybe it doesn't seem like much of a dilemma to anyone else, but I really don't like taking Relpax, (except for the getting rid of the headache part) because of the side effects; I don't think I should take Relpax, because the side effects make me worry that it's doing something bad to me in the long term; and then of course there is the issue of rebound headaches, which makes me avoid taking it if I possibly can.
So here I am. My head hurts and I was planning to go to a party tonight.
Bummer.
On the bright side, there's a very pleasant breeze blowing in my window for mid-June in Southeast Texas...
If I thought anyone was reading this, I'd ask you to send me healing energy or pray for me or whatever sort of positive thinking you prefer.
I'll take whatever goodness the universe has to offer.

Wednesday, June 10, 2009

Potatoes, turnips

I have a very slight headache right now that wouldn't be worth mentioning, except that I've had it for about the past three days.
Not really sure what's up, but I also haven't slept very well all week. Sunday night I had very restless legs (but maybe that's a subject for another blog...)
I don't know if it's my hormones being all kooky and shit or what, but it's worrisome.
I'm glad it's (so far) stayed a mild pain, but -- I guess my fear is that the wild yam, which has been so very good, is losing its effectiveness, or maybe the hormones are dropping even more and the wild yam just can't fight it any more.
I'm trying not to indulge my fears.

A week ago on Monday I had a pretty bad migraine. I was at work and trying to finish up a story -- it wasn't a very difficult story, so I thought I could get it knocked out and get home and chill out and maybe everything would be fine. It's not like I can always tell how bad it's going to be, so I was being optimistic about it.
But I just started feeling worse and worse.
I finished the story and lurched to the ladies room and puked my guts out.
As I think I've said before, I really dislike throwing up, tho I did feel a tiny bit better afterward, but mainly it makes me feel oddly better psychologically.
It's that thing I think other migraine sufferers deal with -- people around us seem to think we're faking it or something, but projectile vomiting (which I'm fairly sure this was) is difficult to fake.

Anyway, it was all pretty miserable.

Just writing about it is making my head hurt.

There's another thing I haven't really addressed here -- superstition.

There was a time I used to call headaches "potatoes" -- or was it "turnips" -- because I was afraid just by saying the name I would somehow bring one on. Kind of a giving it the power of the word type of thing.