So I've had migraines for a while. They haven't been bothering me much since I got pregnant over two years ago. I think breastfeeding also helps keep them away.
I used to take Inderal to prevent them, but slowly tapered off of it before trying to conceive. For whatever reason I got headaches nearly every day of the fouth month of my pregnancy and then they went away. I got a few in the first 6 weeks of pregnancy and a few post partum. I also got auras for the first time after getting pregnant and during the post partum period. In fact that would be my first warning sign. I wouldn't be able to read, everything I look directly at was a flashing blurry, squiggly line.
When I was five weeks pregnant I called my doctor's office and spoke to a nurse about the aura and told her I was about 5 weeks pregnant and then proceeded to have one of the worst conversations I've ever hadwith a nurse and ended up crying a ton after it. Basically she said, "well I don't know what the heck is going on with your headache, but if you are already 5 weeks pregnant (3 weeks after conception) you are harming your unborn baby by not already being under the care of a good OB/GYN!" Which is bullshit by the way, unless I had like some serious medical condition on top of it. So yeah, great way to make me basically not call anymore to that clinic. I almost had a homebirth over that very conversation. Hell, I was ready to have an unassisted birth in my back yard.
Anyway. I've had a few migraines in the last year and they haven't been too bad, just bad enough to be very annoying. Bad enough to make me look and act sick, but not so bad that I can't get through the day. Today was one of those days. I stayed in my bath robe until well past noon, got to my ECFE class and just sat there rubbing my head while my kid played and the other parents mostly talked. I was not interested in interaction, I barely sang along to the songs. We picked up a Papa Murphy's pizza and DQ and I laid in bed and nursed while my husband cooked the pizza. Then I did some extended couch-sitting and TV watching after dinner and am now typing up this blog. It feels better now, but not gone, not to the point where I feel good.
I imagine this is how life is like with a chronic illness. Something that someone might not notice at first, someone might even think you were faking it. Actually I've heard a few stories of people not "believing" in migraines. I kind of want to hit them really hard on the head and give them food poisoning at the same time, then they would know what a really bad migraine feels like. They are real.
In college they were the worst, and I missed quite a few activities because of them. I also had doctors that probably didn't know enough about migraines, because no one said my combo birth control might be making them worse (a very common prescription that can cause migraines!) until I switched birth control methods and they got way better. Another fun fact: combo birth control pills can drastically increase your cholesterol levels (mine were 220 on and 156 off). Again doctors old me about my high cholesterol without even mentioning that it might be the birth control causing it.
Another funny fact is when I was talking about possible things to help with my bad PMS and suspected PMDD they said they treat it with... combo birth control pills. Gee... no thanks. I think we need to come up with some other options for those of us who really can't take these hormone pills. You'd think they could have some other kind of low dose hormone pill or something! It would probably give me migraines anyway.
So I probably need to make an appointment to get a few Immitrex for when I do get migraines, because even though I can get through my day while having one, I'm not really living.
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