Out of My Head

Bad Monday

wow- a long time since I've written anything.

I just found out that Dr Harrison who I've been seeing is no longer at the clinic. I am truly devastated as we had a very good doctor/patient relationship and he really listened to me. So tomorrow I will see the other doctor...only because hubby is making me go. I wish the clinic would have put out a letter or something saying he was leaving (or gone) I only found out when called to change my appointment and kinda freaked when the receptionist told me.

Oh well, I will be fine...it's all good

this is one of those times...

that it is really hard to NOT have a pity-party for myself. After having a stretch with several migraine free days I am once again back in the daily headache mode.  I even had to make two trips to the ER on the same night for what was one of the worst migraines that I had in a long time. And this is AFTER raising my Lyrica!?!? So I don't know what's going on. I got a cortisone shot and a dose pak 2 weeks ago. I suppose it has helped; at least I haven't had to return to the ER. But it is there, a constantly pulsating, hideous beast of a thing that muffled by pain meds and triptans but never goes away completely. And then some bored idiots with nothing better to do vandalized a bunch of cars here in town. Ours too, of course, so I had to use the money that I had put back for a rabbit show to get the window fixed. Couldn't go to the show, so I had to cancel the sale of a rabbit that I was supposed to bring along. There was money lost. And all we had to eat for our Thanksgiving dinner was pancakes. Not that I'm not grateful for pancakes, but it just wasn't "right". The kids both worked that day too.

on a brighter note (although it may not seem like it) the president of the National Lionhead Club (and one of the developers of the breed) came to one of our Nebraska shows so I was able to spend some time learning from the "master"! I asked her to go thru my herd and she spent almost 4 hours going over my rabbits. I had a few gems in the bunch, but there were quite a few she suggested I not use. Really hard to hear what your faults are from another person, even though you agree with them completely. The rabbits were kind of getting out of control for me what with the increase in migs. I can't lose them though...The dogs are a little much for me when it comes right down to it...we only got the two because I was feeling better and wanted to start training again. Needless to say I don't think Bosco even knows his name...

OK, I had better get outside and get the chores finished, I don't think my pain level is going to get any lower than this. I have avoided taking any Zomig so I can use some migranal tonight. Hopefully that will at least calm it down. I am SO tired of this...I wish that I never had any good days-it makes the bad ones so much worse when you can remember NOT feeling in pain (and that was such an odd feeling for me anyway) Now I am just hoping to get thru each day again

Waiting

here I am, waiting to see if another pain killer will bring my head pain down a couple notches so I can go take care of my critters. When I was at the clinic yesterday I got a couple samples of Migranal (nasal DHE) to try. I wasn't feeling too bad when I first got up, although it was really hard to roll out of the nest I'd made...I tend to want to snuggle when I'm migraining. But I had a dog to groom this morning-Kipper the poodle. By the time he went home I had a pretty solid mig going so I tried the Migranal. I can't say it did much. I took some vicoprofen and vistiril and sat on the couch watching a program on the National Geographic Channel about killer alligators and crocodiles. An hour later I am still in pain and wondering where I could go to find a croc to bite my head off for me. Since Eastern Nebraska isn't exactly in the crocodilian home range I decided to take a second vicoprofen. I'm feeling a little better, enough to bend down to tie my shoes anyway, but not quite enough to do chores. To think I used to live out on an acreage and mow, garden and tend all sorts of critters-now taking care of the bunnies wears me out. Just walking the dog around the block has me puffing and wheezing now when I used to get up, go to work, come home and break a horse to drive, milk goats or clean the chicken house-working well past dark only to get up and start all over again. I hate these migs, or at least what they have done to me. I tell myself (and anyone else who listens) that having this problem has taught me a lot-patience, resilience, appreciation for the small things, etc. I can't help but wonder though where I would be without them.

The first actual migraine that I remember having was when I was probably 7 years old. I had this awful pain in my head, and the light hurt my eyes so much I remember going into my parent's room where it was dark. When I was in my early adolescence they came back on a regular basis, and the medical "experts" at the time told my parents that I maybe had cluster headaches (assuming of course I wasn't just faking for attention) fortunately they calmed down and I had them only occaisionally (and not at all while I was pregnant) Then about 30 they came more and more frequently until I was having constant headaches, many of them migraines. It took awhile to find the right Dr. to work with, and even though I have the right Dr. helping me it still takes time to find out what works. We finally found that Lyrica lessens the severity of most my migs, so that is a big step.

I stopped working back in 98 I think it was...I had cut back my hours but was still calling in sick a lot(or worse yet driving  50 miles after swallowing a couple of vicodin and hoping the day wasn't going to be too hard) Having a business out of my home didn't quite work out either...that was a very frustrating time for me. I had a strict father who drilled work ethic in to me, so I took it as a moral failing on my part that I wasn't out working. I was also having a problem with depression that had been going on for several years without me realizing what it was...thank God that he got me thru all of it with our marriage intact and our kids growing up ok.

And in case you are wondering, yes, I do go back and fix my spelling mistakes, even though the migraines mess up my cognitive functions I am just compulsive enough to go back over everything to make sure it's right...must be that "migraine personality" at work ;)

Saturday

Well, wouldn't you know it...I complain about weekend migraines and they aren't bothering me as much this time. Of course there is the very real chance that I will get thru the weekend-all the visiting and traveling, etc and then totally crash on Monday. I'm sure most of you understand what I'm talking about. I'm not going to worry about it anyway, I'm just going to take a little something to try & head off the one I feel coming on and get thru the day. My parents won't be here until this evening, so I can probably take a little nap. I groomed a big dog this AM, just an all over kennel clip, for a special client...the guy who suggested I stop working for someone else & open my own shop several years ago. This was at 6 AM or so at a convenience store where I had stopped for something to drink on my commute to Lincoln. Bear in mind I was waking up with migraines, injecting imitrex and popping a Vicodin and then driving an hour to work, hoping that it would all kick in by the time I got there. No wonder his idea sounded so good! Anyway, the shop didn't last long cuz the migs never went away and just got worse, but I still had clients that I groomed for and they refer new ones to me now & then. Anyway, I woke up without a migraine this morning, "Anna" got her haircut, and I got a $14 tip so all is pretty good in my little world right now. I went and bought some fat pants...I'm not going to lose all this weight overnight, and I figured that I probably shouldn't go to Amanda's concert or Dan's graduation in sweatpants. So, I feel pretty good about having something to wear now. It's pretty sad that buying fat pants can make me feel good, but I'm pretty easy to please. Hubby brought home flowers for me last night, too..no special occasion, just because. So that may have something to do with my good mood too ;)

Anyhow, it's a beautiful sunny day, not hot or humid enough to trigger my migraines, so I will be out with the bunnies. There will be more on that too-we have had quite a few various critters over the years. Now we are concentrating on showing rabbits. We got some many, MANY years ago for the kids to show, then discovered that we enjoyed it more than they did. Now we are working on 3 breeds- Polish, Silver and Lionheads. You can see some of them here:

www.webspawner.com/users/glcritters

well, I have dog hair to clean up and rabbit pans to clean, so I guess I'd better close this for now.

~hugs~

Well,

I didn't make it to the clinic. I took a couple of naproxin and slept for a couple of hours and felt a little better. I'll probably hit the sheets early too. If worse comes to worse I can get to the clinic tomorrow...they are open until noon. Why don't I go to the ER when I get bad? Well, even though they usually treat me pretty good there, they don't give me the stuff I NEED (the DHE) because that isn't their way of doing things. Argh! I've had these darn things since I was a kid-believe me, I KNOW what works and what doesn't. Pain killers have a very limited effect for me, so going to the ER for a shot of Nubain & Vistiril gives me 2-3 hours of pain free sleep TOPS. DHE, Nubain & Vistiril will let me sleep pain free AND break the mig most of the time, even if I do have to make a 2-hour round trip in the car.

well, wish me luck for the upcoming weekend :)

My Weekend Migraines

OK, somebody answer this for me...
WHY does someone who hasn't worked a regular job for years almost ALWAYS get migraines on the weekend? If I worked a Mon thru Fri job I'd say it was letdown, but the last job I had I worked weekends (and yes, usually had a migraine).

I don't know why it is, but I STILL usually start in on Friday, and then I am miserable Saturday thru Sunday afternoon, when it tapers off. Then Monday of course I am too wiped out to do much. Very rarely do I NOT have a migraine on the weekends. Now this really sucks cuz that's the only time when we DO anything. There is church, and rabbit shows, and company tends to come on weekends. So I end up using most of my allotted Zomig and Vicoprofen just to get thru those few days.

For example, last weekend hubby & I were supposed to go to a church retreat. I was kind of worried about him because he had been fighting a real bad sinus infection and we didn't know if HE would be up to going. WHAM I get hit with a mig Thursday (OK, so it was a little early, but the weather had been up & down) Friday hubby worked so he couldn't take me to the headche clinic in Omaha (an hour drive) The doc called in an Rx of DHE injectable for me because that will usually break the cycle. Turns out my Rx plan, which is usually excellent, doesn't cover DHE. Funny thing, we didn't have an extra $300 lying around to pay for it so Saturday morning we were finally able to go up to Omaha so I could get my shots. So, we didn't make it to the retreat, cuz I went home and slept for 12 hours straight. And we missed a great weekend with our church family. AND I hate it that it's always my head that messes up everything.

This weekend my parents are coming up from St Joseph, MO and we are all going to Amanda's choir concert at her college (about a 2-hour drive) after church. Yep, I woke up this AM with the beginnings of a mig. I had a dog to groom at 9 so I needed to use my Zomig spray (it works faster, so I use it when I don't have time to lay around and wait for the tablet to work) I may see if I can get in this afternoon for shots and maybe I can make it thru the weekend. If I can I can probably snag some Zomig samples too so that might be the thing to do...launch a little "pre-emptive strike" against my dreaded weekend migs ;)