Migraine

 Kicking April off with a bang, today I left work at noon with a Migraine. Why, it would be too much to go for two months straight without a major headache – or two months without missing work. Can’t have that! We don’t want the boss to get too complacent!

The temperature plummeted 30 degrees in about 12 hours, so I probably shouldn’t be surprised. Sudden drops in temperature are one of my brain’s favorite things to bitch about. Day 4 of Microgestin for this month as well. Just noting for follow-up purposes. It wasn’t that bad – for a migraine – and seems to have passed already, at least for now. Who knows what tomorrow holds? My life is filled with excitement.

Aura

Originally posted 09/11/2005

So I’m at work minding my own business Wednesday around 11:20 a.m. I sit down at my computer after a routine trip to the bathroom. I look at the page I’m working on, then look at my screen. Weird…my vision seems blurry – there’s a light in my field of vision. Shoot, I must have looked directly at my lamp or something. I blink and look away a few times, figuring it will fade. I try to work again. Strange, it’s not fading. I can hardly see what I’m doing. The damn thing is getting bigger now. And wow, I’m starting to feel really freaking weird. Am I gonna faint? I think I might faint. I tell myself to stay calm, finish my page – which is time-sensitive. Somehow I manage to finish as my vision gets worse with this arc of blurry light growing ever larger in both eyes. I print the page and turn the whole thing in, trying not to fall down all the while. My head is swimming and I feel very light and slightly nauseated. I sit down again. What am I going to do? I can’t work like this, I don’t know what’s going on or what I should do to take care of myself. Should I tell someone? I feel stupid. Maybe I’m having a stroke. But I can move all my limbs and remember things and talk. I just can’t see right and I feel light-headed. Stay calm. But I want to go home and lay down! I’m afraid. What’s happening to me? If I don’t call Brian right now before he goes to work I may not be able to get a ride home from him and I’m too frightened to ride home with anyone else. I have to leave. It’s still getting worse instead of better.

I ask my boss if I can leave. I tell her I feel strange. I don’t tell her about my vision or the enlarging crescent of light that moves wherever I move my eyes. I can even see it with my eyes closed still. She tells me to call in the morning if I still don’t feel well and warns me against driving. “Blurry vision and light-headed aren’t good for driving” she says as if speaking to a kindergartner. I don’t care. At least she cares about me. She’s just trying to be nice. I have bigger problems. I call Brian now and he seems concerned. I try not to sound whiny and panicky as I quickly explain my problem. I don’t know what’s wrong with me! He asks if I want to go to the hospital. I’m so frightened I say no. I just want to go home and lay down. I secretly hope I’m not dying but don’t want to sound dramatic. Thank god – he will leave now to pick me up.

I go back to my desk to pack up my junk. hey, the problem with my vision is subsiding. Well, good, but WTF? Naturally, a sudden company meeting is called. I go and slump in a chair trying not to look conspicuous. After the briefing it is lunch time. I wait outside for Brian. As I sit on the iron staircase feeling woozy, it occurs to me that my head is now starting to hurt. Great. Maybe it was a stroke or an aneurism or something. More worry. I do have a feeling of what it might be – but never had it happen this way before. The research will have to wait.

When Brian picks me up my head is starting to throb on one side of my forehead. My right eye (not the side that throbs) feels really strange – like there’s a tugging sensation behind it. My vision is fine now. When we reach our apartment my headache is full-blown. I lay down a few minutes and feel well enough to eat lunch. I have a bowl of soup. Oddly, after the soup I feel a lot better. Now I am really confused. For the rest of the day I can feel the headache on the outskirts of my being. And I am not entirely “myself.” I feel a little detached and like I’m hovering in a hot-air ballon right next to myself, instead of being at one. Does that make any sense? My nerves are on edge and I am quick to change moods. I’m just “out of it.” 

By the end of the night the headache is back. It lasts another entire day. I didn’t go to work Thursday. Friday was better. Yesterday – not so great. I feel okay today.

F.cking migraines.

I think that’s what it was. I never ever had one start with an aura before. But Home Friend and I had discussed it on our trip to Albany a few months ago, as they happen to her husband. I think god was trying to tell me something. Warn me? I also know what’s behind it, I think. The new pills I am on to take care of my neverending gynecological nightmare. I’m so sick of feeling not right. It’s almost been a year now. Just a few more weeks and it will be my one year anniversary of feeling like cr.p. Should I bake a cake?