I’m sitting here plagued by a migraine I wouldn’t wish on a soul, except maybe Hitler, and he was probably soulless, so that puts that concept to rest. Please don’t tell me he was “good to his dogs”. I’ve known some horrible people who were good to a cat or good to their dogs; do NOT use that as a measuring stick by which to judge people as “good” or “bad: It’s inaccurate.

This migraine has been going on for nearly 24 hours and two rounds of medication. Every time I thought it would get better, it managed to get worse. The problem with this type of migraine is that it’s difficult to keep it hydrated, because you know you won’t be able to keep fluids down for long. The pain isn’t just in your head any more either, you can feel it in your entire body. Not because it’s a different type of migraine, but because you’ve been afraid to move around too much since it started. The pain is so sickening, you’d rip your head off your own shoulders to make it stop. You learn from experience that as you go through the process of a lengthy migraine, the less you do, the better off you will be. The fact that it has eaten up nearly a day and a half of my life is not making me happy though. 😦 It plagued me before it even began.

Someone asked me yesterday if I’d go to the emergency room with a headache like this. I’d love to say “I’m going to take a quick shower and go now.”, because it’s THAT bad and I know I need an abortive, but I also know I will sit in a brightly lit ER for 3-6 hours, if not longer, in sunglasses, and that it’s far from quiet there. From the time I go into triage until they discharge me, my blood pressure will go from normal to “If you don’t medicate me right this minute, I will strange you to death with a cord.” That seems dramatic, but if you multiply the worst pain you’ve ever been in times 1000, you’ll be experiencing this particular migraine.

It is hospital policy to check your BP every hour, and when I’m in pain, like many of us, mine shoots up because being around low IQ’s and stupid questions pisses me off. The last two times I had to go to the ER for non-migraine related issues, I was given blood pressure medication and made to sit there until my blood pressure normalized. If the doctor hadn’t agitated me with a false diagnosis before she ran a single test, blood pressure meds wouldn’t have been necessary. I don’t have high blood pressure, thank God, but I do have incredibly low tolerance for bullshit.

The first time I went in this “doctor” ran up a nearly $6800 bill, most of which was for lab work that I’m not even 100% certain I had. The only major thing she did was a chest x-ray. And despite the fact that I could not stop coughing my brains out, she actually hesitated when I asked her to give me something for that cough, as if she wanted to suggest Robitussin. I know people who walk in with coughs far less severe than mine and they’re given cough syrup that helps them fall asleep and suppresses the cough, etc. I was given a prescription for cough perles which I suspect are the equivalent of something slightly stronger than a Ricola. She acted like she was doing me an immense favor. That attitude, when I have a migraine, is not conducive to my getting proper treatment. I do have the choice to go to a different hospital, but it’s five times larger and I shudder to think what that experience may or may not be like. I’m too sick to put myself through it.

Unless an emergency room is trained to handle migraines, you’re not going to be taken seriously. An ER that is prepared has a dark, quiet room that is secluded and they will make sure to follow your doctor’s instructions to the letter. I went in with one years ago. My neurologist specifically stated that he wanted them to give me a shot of Demerol and send me home to rest, that I’d already had a migraine for three days. He’s an on-staff physician there and he spoke with them himself, he verified my treatment plan, one I’d never had to use. Three nurses and a “doctor” were whispering off in a corner that they wouldn’t do it because I was “probably just a junkie looking for a fix”. I was there for genuine medical care and to be treated like that outraged me, thus making the migraine worse. I left without any treatment at all, and I never went back because I felt that what they did was irresponsible.

But back to this migraine: I hope that at some point in my lifetime, I live to see a cure. People love to talk about what works for them, but we’re all individuals and what works for you may not work for me, and vice versa. I’d never denounce a migraine because I know what it’s like to live with them.

Last week someone mentioned Pink Himalayan Salt as a treatment method. They said they put 2-3 granules under their tongue three times a day and have been migraine free because of that. They said that if they felt a migraine coming on, they used a little more salt and drank a full glass of water, but that it “cured” them of the need for preventive medicine and abortive medicine. I found this an extremely odd “treatment method”, but apparently it is a complete salt, full of minerals, elements, and electrolytes. Using it for migraine treatment requires two teaspoons in a glass of water along with half a cup of freshly squeezed lemon juice. This is supposed to stop the migraine in its tracks within ten minutes. I completely forgot to grab this particular item when I shopped last week, but apparently the higher quality the salt, the better the results.

I am going to try it and see if it holds dishwater. In the meantime, I am taking my third round of medication and praying that tomorrow is a healthy, pain-free, productive day. Not just for myself, but for anyone that suffers from an invisible illness and has been mistreated because of it.

P.S. How do I type through a migraine this bad? Slowly. In the dark. In complete silence. The fact that it has rained and will continue to rain helps. There’s a method to my madness.

copyright © 2015 by Lisa Marino & Blackbird Serenity LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.