So Happy I Could Hop!

Wow, what a great day!

I felt perfect until about 1 pm today, after I ate lunch (cottage cheese & peaches w/ baked apple).

Just some pressure in my right temple so I iced it for twenty min. then went for a walk. By the time I was done walking I was back to a 100%. The cold, crisp air felt so good. I've been using ice lately and it really seems to help. Headaches can go away in an hour or so and w/out medicine. This is such a welcome change from Hell Week (last week of October).

I needed the break and the encouragement.

Only 2 more day until Botox....

I'm so happy I could do the bunny HOP!

You Wanna Piece of Me???

Wow, what a great couple of days. On my Wednesday appointment my doctor and I decided to decrease the lamictal to half of the dose I was taking and see if the headache frequency would stabilize to it's old pattern in order that I could possibly stay on it. It really has been the best medicine I've ever taken to help with my moods. Changing medicines is always hard because you never know what kind of side effects you are going to experience. I may have to drop it all together, and even if I don't, I may still have to add something else. But for now, we have a plan.

Also, now that my menstrual cycles are going back to their old pattern I have to deal with the extreme mood changes I experience during that time. In the past, I had taken an extremely low dose of Prozac and that helped immensely. So, we are going to try that again. You take it the ten days leading up to your cycle.

Wednesday I had no headache at all and was even able to go out to dinner in Portland w/ the hubs and to a "Five for Fighting" concert @ the Aladdin Theatre. The whole thing was so awesome. We ate dinner @ Montego Bay which serves Jamaican food. Never had that before, so that was pretty exotic. I had lamb and the hubs had jerk chicken. (fortunately it didn't turn him into a jerk!)

The Aladdin Theatre is fabulous. I'm guessing it was built in the 1920's and is in the art deco style. We have a theatre like that in the town where I live that's a little bigger than the Aladdin. I loved the small cozy feel that this one had though. We got there a little after the warm up band had started. If we had went any later we wouldn't have been able to find a seat. As it was, we sat in the very back of the balcony, but still could still see just fine. I took my earplugs but didn't need to wear them.

It was so great to get out for a "date" and be able to fully enjoy myself. I actually felt like a real human!

This morning I woke up with a slight headache, but put an ice pack on my head and tried to go back to sleep for an hour. It helped a little bit. When I got up I could still feel the pressure so I put peppermint oil on my right temple where I could feel it. Within about two hours, and a little bit into my morning walk in the crisp Fall air, I went back to feeling 100%. Hallelujah!

I was very tired this afternoon. Either from going to bed @ midnight or from decreasing the Lamictal. I am wondering if I feel tired from the Propanolol (beta blocker) as it lowers blood pressure. But I would much rather deal with this side effect than be in pain. Also, that's another one of the many reasons that it's important for me to stay on Lamictal or something like it because it will help balance out even the slightest of depressive symptoms.

It may seem crazy that I would write about all this. But my philosophy is that sometimes life sucks. And that is putting it mildly. It doesn't always make since why some people would go through such difficult and challenging struggles. All I know is that I have been schooled in a class I would never register for, but here I am. It makes sense, therefore, that I make it worthwhile. To try to make something good out of something bad. It's my hope that somebody whose struggling with migraines, headaches, chronic pain, mental health issues or just life in general, will read this and know that they are not alone. And perhaps, maybe something that they read (could it be you?) could be helpful to them on this crazy path called life.

can i have a little help please?

Right now as I sit here eating my scrambled egg dinner (I couldn't bring myself to eat Chinese Food @ our Thailand meeting for fear of pain) I think I may have had my question answered that I threw across the sky this morning. Perhaps it didn't fall on deaf ears.... "can I have a little help please?" *I was actually hopeful when I said that.

It was a beautiful morning for walking. It had just gotten light out and the fog was just hanging low across the fields near where I walk and onto the tops of the trees. lovely! Even the ducks greeted me this morning and walked along with me for a while. They were my buddies!

And as I walked I was thinking about my worsening headaches of course, because it seems that lately it's about all I think about. It occured to me that my Lamictal was increased from 100mg. to 15omg. in early October (turns out Oct. 4th actually). That's about the time my "month from hell" started.

Then, I realized that the next dosage increase came Sept. 25th, and immediately, the next day in fact, I ended up getting IV medications and the next night landed in the E.R. The rest you are familiary with from the previous posts in the last week. This dosage increase was from 150mg. to 200mg.

Could there be a link between my worsening headaches and the Lamictal? It would be terrible if there was. It has helped me such a great deal with my moods (not counting the anxiety during menstruation and high pain levels). But overall, my husband admits I seem more loving, as in caring and nicer to be around.

But HARK! The headaches most definitely have gotten worse after each increase....

I braved church today. I took earplugs and did alright because I was feeling great before I left. We sold a few calendars this morning, about 5, and that is better than nothing.

After church my friend came and talked to me. She recently went on Lamictal and said her dose was 200mg. The interesting thing though, is she's had daily headaches since starting the medication. The other day she even had a migraine and she says she's never had one before.

I FREAKED! I had just made this correlation a few hours ago, and here she was confirming it w/out me even bringing it up!

When I got home I called the pharmacy and asked them about side effects. He said that yes, headache could be a side effect. So, although I don't know for sure, I e-mailed my PA and told him about my concern and what I've been noticing. Fortunately, all my trips to the doctor for IV meds are in my chart so it will be easy for him to substantiate that. Also, if he has more questions or needs more information, I can direct him to this blog.

It sounds crazy, but I'm so excited even though I was quite fearful at first. There are other mood stabilizer/migraine meds I can go on and this means that the increased frequency isn't a permanent thing, just due to a reaction with the medication.

The other day I asked myself the question: What kind of twisted life lesson am I supposed to learn from all this?

I think I've learned a few things in the last month.

1) that I am capable of going to the doctor or hospital when miserable, asking for help, and getting it

2) that I can e-mail my doctor and he will e-mail back and even order pain control for me

3) that I have lots of friends who love me and care about me and want to help me, especially with the children

4) that my husband wants to help me, hurts when I hurt and would do anything to help me get better

5) that IV magnesium DOES NOT work for me and even makes me feel worse

6) that sometimes I need extra aleve with DHE injections of IV's, and that if you inject yourself too close to a nerve your muscles will spaz out

7) that the throbbing pain pulsing through my neck was from borderline high blood pressure

8) that when I'm menstruating, along with super high pain, I tend to get very anxious and agitated. by asking for help, I can get medication that will keep me safe during this time

9) that there usually is a cause, explanation or a reason for what's happening to me, even if the answers are a long time in coming

10) that once pushed to the limit, I will do anything and give up anything (in this case a variety of foods) in order to be proactive in feeling better.

So, all in all, the help hasn't come yet. I'm hoping to hear a response back tomorrow, and if I haven't by late afternoon I will call my PA's advice line or leave a message for him on his voicemail. However, he seems to be exceptionally speedy and helpful with his responses, he may just have a backlog of messages from being out of the office for a week.

Tomorrow is a new day, and I will take it as it comes and deal with it the best I can.