For some odd reason I woke up thinking about the bit of migraine conversation I overhead last night. As far as I know there is no "migraine specific" prophylactic. All the ones generally prescribed are meds that were developed for other problems and it's been discovered that they reduce the frequency of migraines for some. Beta blockers are the meds that have been used for this the longest. One of the big problems with you and beta blockers is the depression side effect, so it would be nice if they found something else that didn't have that side effect that worked for you. You might find some of this snippet from my lj interesting: (from April 28th)
After seen an NPR story about migraines (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5364970) I decided I really need to get all my information in one place so I started re-doing my health web page (http://www.britecloth.com/maria/MyHealth.html). The article gave me some things to think about. Yeast? It is one of the things that turned up in my food allergy blood test. OJ? Soy? Hmmmm.
Then a post from May 15th (http://flyingwolf.livejournal.com/530033.html) and since then I went a full 6 days without any kind of headache at all (something that hasn't happened in WAY too long). Headache-free days ended this past Thursday, but I have food suspicions as to why.
Not sure if you can find any useful information in any of this. I'm crediting my recent reduction on the B2 and Magnesium, but I'm sure the Neuro would say it's the Keppra. There's also the diet stuff - mostly a yeast reduction and no OJ. (I really hope the OJ thing is just a coincidence. I like OJ and miss it. But if it's been causing some headaches I'll cut it for good. Maybe soon - when I don't have so many deadlines - I'll add it back to my diet and see what happens.
I think the expensive drugs they're talking about switching me to are things like Imitrex, which I was under the (apparently mistaken) impression were developed as anti-migraine drugs. The beta blocker I'm taking does have a long history as a migraine preventative; they want to switch me to something else not because it's not good for migraines, but because they don't like the idea of keeping me on a blood pressure drug when I don't already have high blood pressure. (I'm not seeing a problem in practice, at least so far -- my blood pressure isn't crashing.) I didn't know about the depression side effect (and given my history with central nervous system drugs, yeah, that's one for me to worry about). So far so good: my delight at feeling like I'm getting "myself" back has improved my mood. But I hope that side effect doesn't bite me in the ass later, so yeah, switching to a drug that doesn't have that risk would be a good thing.
I don't think food triggers are a big issue for me -- I didn't have a significant diet change that would account for the months of problems since August (though of course it's possible that I developed some new sensitivity I hadn't had before), and I haven't identified any "I ate this and ouch" issues ... but I noticed in that NPR page you linked to that the lag can be up to 72 hours, which would certainly throw off my casual observations (especially not having known that before). I really need to start keeping a food diary for this and other reasons.
I've noticed that I start feeling generally crappy if I go a few days without OJ ... which doesn't rule it out as a migraine trigger, but does mean that I'd better find something else that fixes whatever problem OJ does for me if I'm going to cut it out. I also have problems if I go too long without chocolate, which is probably a simple addiction. I've used large doses of theobromine (100 cc of cocoa powder dissolved in water and chugged to minimize exposure to the bitterness -- to get the theobromine without getting a sugar spike-and-crash) along with the lavender/basil tea to knock the migraine-aura symptoms down. At that point the migraines were so frequent that I wouldn't have been able to tell whether there was a rebound headache later or not, because the next one would have been coming along anyhow. I haven't needed to do that since starting the beta blocker (though I have used lavender and basil a few times).
Right now the biggest factor seems to be lack of sleep. (But as noted above, in light of the new info I may be overlooking some food trigger.)
Thank you for the info. I'll be looking at it in more detail after Balticon, and I'll try to form a habit of logging what I eat in a food diary.
(no subject)
After seen an NPR story about migraines (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5364970) I decided I really need to get all my information in one place so I started re-doing my health web page (http://www.britecloth.com/maria/MyHealth.html). The article gave me some things to think about. Yeast? It is one of the things that turned up in my food allergy blood test. OJ? Soy? Hmmmm.
Then a post from May 15th (http://flyingwolf.livejournal.com/530033.html) and since then I went a full 6 days without any kind of headache at all (something that hasn't happened in WAY too long). Headache-free days ended this past Thursday, but I have food suspicions as to why.
Not sure if you can find any useful information in any of this. I'm crediting my recent reduction on the B2 and Magnesium, but I'm sure the Neuro would say it's the Keppra. There's also the diet stuff - mostly a yeast reduction and no OJ. (I really hope the OJ thing is just a coincidence. I like OJ and miss it. But if it's been causing some headaches I'll cut it for good. Maybe soon - when I don't have so many deadlines - I'll add it back to my diet and see what happens.
(no subject)
I don't think food triggers are a big issue for me -- I didn't have a significant diet change that would account for the months of problems since August (though of course it's possible that I developed some new sensitivity I hadn't had before), and I haven't identified any "I ate this and ouch" issues ... but I noticed in that NPR page you linked to that the lag can be up to 72 hours, which would certainly throw off my casual observations (especially not having known that before). I really need to start keeping a food diary for this and other reasons.
I've noticed that I start feeling generally crappy if I go a few days without OJ ... which doesn't rule it out as a migraine trigger, but does mean that I'd better find something else that fixes whatever problem OJ does for me if I'm going to cut it out. I also have problems if I go too long without chocolate, which is probably a simple addiction. I've used large doses of theobromine (100 cc of cocoa powder dissolved in water and chugged to minimize exposure to the bitterness -- to get the theobromine without getting a sugar spike-and-crash) along with the lavender/basil tea to knock the migraine-aura symptoms down. At that point the migraines were so frequent that I wouldn't have been able to tell whether there was a rebound headache later or not, because the next one would have been coming along anyhow. I haven't needed to do that since starting the beta blocker (though I have used lavender and basil a few times).
Right now the biggest factor seems to be lack of sleep. (But as noted above, in light of the new info I may be overlooking some food trigger.)
Thank you for the info. I'll be looking at it in more detail after Balticon, and I'll try to form a habit of logging what I eat in a food diary.