Migraines & Headaches Community

{{{{{{{{{{{{{{ouch}}}}}}}}}}}}}} Wow you have been through the wringer.....

Have you seen an ENT? or an Opthalmologist? As you know MRI test are very specific...and depends on what the doctor ordered the MRI for they might have missed something. Drugs based on what you have been prescribed is not always the answer......it's worth seeing your GP again and asking him/her to send you to another specialist if you haven't already been....

all the best......Mary Anne

After living since childhood up till age 35 with daily, except for one day which I still remember very clearly, with daily intractable complicated migraines, and being a guinea pig for every drug on the market, my care team of doctors, nurses, phychlogists, chemical dependecy people, and in the end, even a lawyer, decided to try methadone. That was 11 years ago and I have had 11 years of a relativly pain free life without any of the grogginess the short term narcotics gave me. I'm not advocating this for everyone, just me. It just so happedened to work for me, and it worked like a miracle. I'm not the addictive type. I don't smoke or drink alcohol. But Methadone is a safe, cheap, alternative to all this crap doctors are putting in peoples systems because they are AFRAID (hence the lawyer on my care team?)! They would rather you suffer than have themselves have to make sure they are keeping accurate records - and that's all they have to do to stay out of trouble with the DEA. If they are truly prescribing to someone who truly needs it, the person isn't abusing it, sees them monthly, and all this is documented, there is no problem with the DEA. I think that perhaps migraine cases are just a bit more work that the typical rushed doc wants to bother with these days, so people (women)will continue with a quality of life of zilch at a time in their life when it's so important that it be a 10. I cry and pray for you all.

OMG, how can you put up with it. I feel for you. You have to keep pestering your docs. There must be something, they just haven't found it yet. I'm on gabapentin for prevention of migraines. Seems to help a bit. Not all the migraine drugs work for everybody. I don't see Zomig or Maxalt on your list. Have you tried them? Maxalt didn't work for me but Zomig does most of the time. You just have to keep trying. With your MRI, you say they didn't find anything? I have white spots, which are common in everybody, but more so if you have migraines. Ask your neuro. Good Luck Karen

I also have chronic daily migraines, but I have only had mine for 3 years. I am not sure if you have ever been in an inpatient clinic such as " Diamond Headache Clinic " ( in Chicago) Or.. " Michiana Head Pain and Neurological Institute" ( MHNI- in Ann Arbor, Michigan) I also tried an inrecible amount of medicine. Have tou ever tried acpuncture, or chiropractics? Have you ever tried injectable meds like imitrex, or high potency bendryl. One med that was actually kiinda good for me, was an MAOI ( I am not sure if you have tried that drug class. With that one, there are some limitations.. but it is kinda a last resort. I am not sure if any of this helps. But let me know if there is anything I can do.

Have you tried acupuncture. See if that helps. Change to another prescription. I have made my own mix which is xanax and butalbital -asa-caffeine caplnt. Good Luck

Have you ever asked your dr if it might be cluster headaches? More men get them than women. Do your eyes ever hurt too? And on just one eye and behind it maybe? Also it could be sinus . One thing you could try is oxygen. But it may only work if it's clusters.

What I would do right now if I were you, is get on a search engine and look up "headache implants" or "BION implant". They're implanted in your head just under the skin and are controlled with a hand held remote control that turns the pain on and off. I remember reading years ago about a woman who had really bad pain in her forehead, and she got one of the implants for a trial period. The response was good for her. I can't tell you if they have it out for regular patients yet, and I'm not sure if insurance will pay part of it. But it's something you should definitly look into. Let us know what you find out.

I know what you mean about the 24/7 headache and there is nothing that can help. I am only on my 9th year but I have tried every thing. They will wake me from a sound sleep. Nothing ever works and if it does they take you off because its a narcotic and they would hate for you to be hooked on drugs. I have tried diets I have did the allergy thing. Sleep test, oxygen test. Right now I am getting 7 shots in my head because the have figured out that part of my headaches is the nerves in my head. Not that the shots last 2 weeks but they say that they will keep combining the drugs tell it does. Weather is a another part so wen the barameter drops so does my head on the pillow. I dont know if you have looked to any of these things but they are some of the things I am finding out. I still have not found all my trigers probably never will.

I am a 19 year old young women and I have chronic headaches and migraines. I have had headaches everyday for almost 2 years now, though some days are worse than others. My pain is in the front of my forehead, but when I get a migraine, my whole head just pounds and throbs. I have seen a Neurologist, and they have given me prescription medication, which does nothing. My MRI's have been negative. Naproxen, Amitriptyline... I'll even take Alive, Tylenol, Advil, Excedrin tension and migraine (not all at once!).

I get migraines about once or twice a week. These migraines get so bad I can't get out of bed to vomiting more than once. At one point in time I did have a migraine for a strait week in which I was taken to the ER for. The pain went down but the headache never went fully away. I am very light and noise sensitive. Sometimes I can tell when a migraine is about to hit because I will suddenly have horrible throbbing pain in the back of my head, around the base of my skull. My migraines never just come on slowly, they seem like I just suddenly hit a ton of bricks.

Nothing seems to make them go away. I can go to bed with a head ache and wake up with one. They never just come and go. I sometimes wake up in the middle of the night feeling the urge to get sick because I will get massive migraines in my sleep.

My headaches interfere with school and my ability to pay attention, I have an extremely hard time studying or concentrating on anything. I'm tired of living in constant pain and I don't know how sunk123 has dealt with it for 10 years.

I had one headache that lasted for 6 months, woke me up at night, never completely went away even though meds would help that pain to be bearable. I had a normal MRI, normal sinus MRI, and many other tests - all normal. Finally, after 3 tries, an ENT doctor found I had a bone spur in my nose that did show up on any of the tests. The spur was hitting my sinuses and causing profound pains in my head and face. He gave me a numbing agent in a spray bottle and the pain went away immediately (though came back when the numbing agent wore off). But this is what alerted them to the possibilitly of a bone spur. I'm not suggesting this is what you have but when a headache never goes away, it sounds more something pinching or poking that could be causing it. Please write to this forum if/when it goes away and let us know what worked for you.

hi again sunk( ) I reread your post and I also have concluded that you may not have tried everything. It sorta seems like the drs you saw were giving a lot of anxiety meds. Not saying this is bad, just that there are more preventative drugs out there. Not sure if they would help your type of headache tho.

The reason we get chronic headaches is because the first really bad one causes inflammation and nerve damage in the area. I do hope this and everyone else who posted helps you.

My sister in law had migranes for over 11 years. Every day, which the doctor's said couldn't be possible. She also had shoulder pain, an IBS. Finally, a tech that read her MRI saw something called "chiari syndrome". It is easily missed on mri's and the doctors usually just depend on the person reading the mri's report. Good luck, from megracie

this is a late reply..you may have already found a cure, but i still wanted to put this out there. i just recently got diagnosed with chronic daily migraines. my neurologist prescribed me 4 different kinds of meds (ultram, midrin, esgic plus, and axert) and two nasal sprays (zomig and migranal). his process of helping people like us with daily headaches is a rotation of these medications. i labeled each bottle 1, 2, 3, 4. i started on a monday, and i took my first medication i labeled 1. tuesday, i still had the headache, of course, so i took medication number 2. the next day, 3, the next day 4. then it starts over with medication 1. he says that by rotating them it tricks your brain. i was taking excedrin daily and sometimes hydrocodone if they got really bad. this has made them rebound. he just treated a man that had daily chronic migraines for 50 years by using this technique and he's down to 1 or 2 migraines a month. oh, the nasal sprays are only used as my 'rescue' meds as he calls it. if one of the pills don't help, i pick a spray, but i rotate them as well. can't use the same one in a row. i know all of this sounds confusing, but i didn't figure i had anything to lose with as much pain as i am in daily. it's actually very easy and all of them help my headaches. i just want to get to where i don't wake up with them everyday. i have missed 109 hours at work because of this. something has to be done. doctor said it takes about 6 months for it to start dramatically minimizing the headaches. good luck!