Month in Review - May 2013

Another month and another batch of migraines and a lot of headaches but things are starting to look up.

So this month might look bad, and I must admit it felt pretty bad too, but compared to April things are starting to look up.

The Neverending Headache continued as May started and sadly that'd a trend that carried on through the whole month.

I took things as easy as I could on the bank holiday weekend at the start of the month, though on the Saturday it was Free Comic Book Day so a trip to the local comic & games shop was in order and I managed to make it the short drive over to Leeds to see a friend for his birthday but I could feel the headache building though so we had to leave a bit earlier than I would have liked but I managed to keep it at bay at least.

I felt good the next day though I was sleep by 9pm so on the bank holiday Monday I tried to do a bit more and worked with Chris on clearing out the old boxes from the garage to make room for the things we stll have boxed up in the house.  I took loads of breaks, kept well hydrated and thought I was being sensible but it seemed not as I was punished with a migraine the next day, and another day of work missed.  This was was particularly frustrating as I could feel it was starting before I went to bed.  I woke up in the night between my deep sleep cycles and I knew then that it was a bit too early for the meds but I knew by the time I woke after my next deep sleep cycle that it would be too late for them so I took them then and so they didn't do their job fully and although I was mostly ok when I was perfectly still, looking at any light or moving my head at all was like a knife in my eye so work really was out of the question.

That then turned into a nightmare week all in all.  I was back at work the next day but I'd gone in while the migraine was still lurking and it turned into a new full migraine by 4pm.  I had to double dose that evening but it shifted by the time I managed to sleep.  I then forced myself to go to work again the next day and was really badly punished for it, ending up curled up in the corner of a dark office crying while waiting for a kind friend to pick me up and take me home.  This meant at least one of my colleagues saw me in full migraine and that wasn't something I wanted people at work to ever see, I felt embarrassed and naked in some respect and I hope I never repeat it!

I was understandably not at work the following day then (10th) but I also had an appointment at the hospital where I'd managed to bag a cancellation appointment with the neurologist to bring the appointment forward by over a month.  I made it there but left very dismayed as I got hardly any time with them as they were running so far behind schedule.  I left with the big result I wanted though, I was to start on a new preventative of Amitriplyline which I could use in combination with the beta blocker preventative I was already on.  I went straight to my GPs that afternoon to get the prescription as well so that I could start on it straight away.

This is where I see a massive difference in the chart above though it may not be obvious to others.  From the 10th May when I started taking the preventative, things have been slowly but surely improving.  Although a migraine started at the end of the working day on the 14th and I was forced to miss work on the 15th with it (I tried to go and had to turn around within 2 mins from my house it was so bad) things haven't been as bad since.

I had a low key Eurovision party (party of 4) round my house on Sat 18th but despite doing everything right, I was so excited about Eurovision that I suffered The Migraine Punishment for it anyway.  The meds worked though and I was back at work the next day also it re-triggered by the evening because I worked through it but I didn't miss any work and that was the major thing for me.

The next two days I then finally had a respite, two whole clear days of no pain, it was amazing.  It felt so incredible to have that time without pain but I had to be careful not to get too excited by it or I'd just give myself more pain!!

The big test for me then was UK Games Expo weekend.  A whole weekend of migraine triggering fun!  The drive down to Birmingham was the first threshold-lowerer and I escaped that unscathed (other than the constant low-level headache of course).  The next day was fun and frolics and two games of Dungeons & Dragons, one of which wasn't scheduled to finish until midnight - after my usual time to sleep and I had to time my amitriplyline for later (as it knocks me out) and I still survived it!  The Saturday (25th) was the most full-on day of the Expo and I was suffering by about 5pm so we headed off and with some meds and an early night I was still going next day, although the pain was such that I couldn't enjoy it quite as much.  I managed to play in the Dungeons and Dragons game I was most looking forward to, though not on full form, but I made it through, enjoyed it all, and the migraine hit in the car on the way back.  My meds did the job and I spent the next day resting (a day we had booked off work as we knew I'd need a recovery day!) and I was back in work as planned the next day, incredible!  I don't think I would have made it through this full-on weekend that well before I started on the amitriplyline.  Well, I'm hoping it was because of the amitrip as to why I survived it so well because that's a lot of hope for the future if it was.

Yesterday we did a big drive of there and back to Milton Keynes in one day to visit a friend in hospital (and yell SURPRISE! on the ward as she didn't know we were coming!) and I made it through with just a level 4 headache by the drive back!  I also upped my amitrip dose yesterday so hopefully I'll just see more and more improvement from here out!

It's my first anniversary weekend this weekend and we're off to Cumbria for lots of castles and a hotel by the sea.  Here's hoping my migraines give me the weekend off and let me celebrate without the pain :)