Hey there!
So I’ve had a migraine that has been going for a couple days now. Nothing entirely new, but it’s frustrating. Dark room, low noise, tried sleeping it off, taken multiple medications for it including my Ubrelvy which normally knocks it. It took the edge off, but now I’m going on day 3 with the migraine with no perceivable end in sight.
Anyone got any tips that normally helps them to knock their migraine that’s worth considering? Normally I don’t care too much as I’ve put up with them for years, but this one has me all nauseous which makes it that much more miserable.
Thanks in advance!
Edit: Sorry for not seeing the responses on this sooner. I went back to bed afterward and mostly stayed in bed and holy crap the responses blew up. I also called my neurologist and told them about it much like some of the advise that others have mentioned, and they started me on a round of prednisone to help. Fingers crossed it gets rid of it. Seems to be helping, but only time will tell. If it doesn’t, I’ll see about giving some of these a try. Thank you so much!
Oh no!
If you are not puking:
Water with electrolytes, dried cherries, and also sex with orgasm (or close to it) can help. A hot bath with ice cold cloths for your head.
But “status migraine” like that, for me at least, always involved so much vomiting that it got dangerous, has only happened maybe 6 times in the 40 years I have gotten occasional migraine, and has never stopped without emergency treatment. Heavy doses of opioids and promethazine, by injection, then sleep, is the only thing that really worked (the drugs don’t really break it just put you far enough away that you can stop.) This treatment worked every time for me but is no longer available. Now the protocol is some cocktail of liquid, electrolytes, Reglan, ibuprofen, and Benadryl. Which is slow and doesn’t really work but can stop the vomiting and make it less intense at least, and prevent the serious consequences of dehydration.
Fortunately I haven’t been puking, but got pretty close. I’m mostly recovered now but I’ll have to keep that in mind. The doctor set me up on a round of prednisone and that seems to be knocking it.
I’ve only had these kinds of migraines a handful of times and fortunately they’ve gone away on their own, though I had one that was like 10 days (which I know because it made me break down and download a migraine tracker). That was brutal. Figured after that one, and seeing that this one was taking its time I decided to call the doc, though I might just try the ER next time to see if they can do something even quicker.
I’ve never had one last that long, so I second commenters saying to check in with a doctor. However, my go-tos are caffeine (usually chilled cola), paracetamol and ibuprofen, placing a cold wet cloth over my eyes and/or the back of my neck. In addition to darkness and quiet, of course. This regimen doesn’t make my migraines go away, but it takes the edge off and makes them more bearable. I hope any of this helps you out, good luck!
You’ll be happy to know I did check in with my neurologist, and she prescribed me a round of prednisone that seems to be helping. I did try most of those outside of the cold wet cloth. Others have mentioned ice packs, so between those, that all sounds like something that could be easily tried in the future. Thank you for that!
No problem, I’m glad you’ve found something that helps!
I’m struggling with headache for decades now. I was also obese for the most part of my life, and doctors always blamed it on obesity since MRI scans didn’t show anything (thankfully).
When I lost weight I went to a neurologist and he put me on migraine meds which didn’t help.
A few months after contracting covid in February 2023, my headaches got worse, so I went to a neurologist, doing an MRI again, which, as hoped and expected, showed nothing. So the doc put me on Amitriptyline, 5mg the first week, then 10mg.
The 5mg already showed successful results for 6 days… I was in a better mood, and I haden’t felt any headaches except for the last day. I’m now on 10mg and I hope to go through summer without any headaches.
In any case, go see a doctor.
Right there with you on putting up with them for decades. It is no fun. And I’m a little overweight too which probably doesn’t help.
I’ve been on amitriptyline for a couple years, now at 30mg. In the very beginning it was helpful, but then it stopped helping so they added Aimovig which has been a godsend. Went from having headaches and migraines almost daily to only a couple times a month. Every now and then I get a nasty one that comes through though.
Fortunately I called up my neurologist who put me on a round of prednisone and that seems to be helping a bit.
Aimovig was a godsend for me too, taking me from a couple of migraines a week down to once a month if I was unlucky. I’ve since swapped to emgality, due to insurance coverage, and now they’ve stopped pretty much entirely. I don’t know if it’s a difference between the medications, or a change in my migraine pattern. Have you tried any of the other injectable meds?
Nah, Aimovig is the first for me. I literally just requested to up the dose like an hour ago, so assuming that goes through hopefully that will completely knock it out from there. If not, I’ve heard good things about Emgality and another one I’m drawing a blank on the name for, so I can always see about revisiting those if needed.
Good deal that the Emgality is working for you!
Caffeine can help. What really helped me was I started using cannabis to treat anxiety years ago. It ended up curing my migraines at the same time, which was a pretty nice surprise. I went from having 2-3 a week to 1-2 a year (and with way lessened symptoms).
I tried cannabis several years ago (not for headaches, but recreationally with a friend) and unfortunately I didn’t have a good experience with it. Could have just been bad timing, but I ended up actually getting a nasty headache with it. Unfortunately it is also illegal here, but maybe if that changes I can give it another shot.
Maybe give some full spectrum CBD tincture a try first (legal almost everywhere, including all states). CBD can lower blood pressure by relaxing blood vessels. Which can prevent migraines somehow (maybe similar to getting more oxygen into your brain, some migraine medications work that way too).
Different strains can make a huge difference if you ever try it again. Most sativa’s give me a headache, even in edible form, so I avoid them. A few indica strains work really well for me and I microdose every day with those.
Hope you find something that works well for you. Migraines suck.
Tums. (If it is indigestion caused). Rose colored glasses
I didn’t take tums specifically for the nausea, but rather pepto bismol. Didn’t really help though…might have to try tums next time though.
As for rose colored glasses…do you mean positivity? Or do you mean literal rose colored glasses?
Acid migraines are the worst if your family has a history of ulcers or acid reflux. Tums is 10x better that Pepto if that is the cause.
Those are the rose colored glasses that my wife uses. They are a general light preventative. (She can “relax” in public). Also concert earplugs like “eargasm” are something that allow focusing through the pain.
Sometimes nerve pain in the legs like sciatic can contribute as well. If you have weird “someone hit my funnybone” pain in your legs then you could look into neural flossing. Sometimes the pain in the legs cause tension all over which makes a migraine until everything resets.
Good luck!
Oh dang, I remember reading about those glasses a while back. Appreciate the reminder. I’ll check them out. Technically my eyeglasses have blue light filtering, but given I work IT, improving the blue light limitation could prove beneficial so it’s at least worth a shot.
Taking a hot or cold shower, depending upon which temperature helps.
A little Lavender essential oil on the temples or back of the neck can help slightly.
I find magnesium glycinate to be helpful as well and may help yours if tension is a trigger for you.
The only medication that I’ve really found helpful is sumatriptan. It’s more helpful stopping a migraine just as symptoms start, but can still help once a migraine develops.
A massage gun can help knock out some tension around your shoulders, as well as breathing exercises. Here’s one that I find helpful. Sit up straight and tall (if you’re able) and take deep tummy breaths let your tummy relax and allow the breath to go down there instead of just to your chest. After a couple breaths, feel your diaphragm (located just below your rib cage) lower as your lungs expand and raise up as you exhale, then in the next few breaths notice your neck slowly expand and contract with each breath, then turn your attention to your sinuses slightly expand and contract, and finally for the last few breaths feel the top of your head raise slightly with each breath. This should help provide a sense of calm, I like to picture that calm as either a serene place in nature or you can think of it as light. Then notice a spot on your body holding tension and lightly press it with a finger. Then imagine that same serene natural location or light entering that tense spot and take a few deep breaths. With enough mental focus putting that peaceful place into the ball of tension, it will release.
That breathing exercise doesn’t immediately knock out a migraine always for me, but makes them a lot more bearable and can shorten the length of the migraine.
A roommate of mine suggested taking a prebiotic called acidophilus for nauseau and seemed to help with that symptom.
If light or screens are a trigger for you, I have found that glasses lenses with FL-41 tint to be helpful. You can find some at theraspecs and they offer both prescription and non-prescription glasses and sunglasses.
Oh, I forgot! One doctor also gave me a script to have IV magnesium and IV medication to help with migraines. It was very helpful if you can get a script and have somewhere nearby that you can go.
Wow, a lot of things I can try here, I appreciate it! Normally I take hot showers, but trying a cold shower sounds easy enough.
The lavender sounds lovely since I like the smell anyway, so I’d be happy to give it a try! Do you have any that you would recommend?
Unfortunately sumatriptan is a no-go for me…I previously took that before I took the Ubrelvy, but it was mostly ineffective for me. The Ubrelvy typically helps, but in the most severe cases like this one it doesn’t seem to. Fortunately the prednisone the doc prescribed seems to be helping, though that seems like a last resort type of thing from what I can tell due to the potential for some nasty problems.
I’ll have to save this tough…there’s a ton here for me to try. Thank you very much!
I like the Lavender essential oil that I bought from Whole Foods the most, as far as smell. It’s not going to knock out the migraine but it does help take the edge off.
I’ve also used peppermint before and although it didn’t help me quite as much, it has helped other people I know. The peppermint is much stronger than Lavender, so I only rub a drop of peppermint oil on the back of my neck. One time, I put peppermint on my temples and it was so overwhelming that it made my eyes water.
I hope that some of my suggestions help! Hang in there!
I second all of this, also recommend talking to your neurologist about Aimovig or other CGRP inhibitors, literally life-changing for me. 62% reduction in frequency and close to 80% reduction in severity of my migraines.
Before Aimovig, I ended up in the hospital with the worst migraine of my life. They gave me a cocktail of drugs that did absolutely fuckall for the pain and released me, just made it feel like every muscle in my body tightened up, which made the migraine pain even worse. The next day, I took sumatriptan and max dose of Tylenol, waited about 6 hours and did it again. Repeat a few more times and it got down to a manageable level, but I was out of commission for a week and a half before I felt anywhere close to normal.
I tried ubrelvy too, but it wasn’t particularly effective for me
Funnily enough, I’m actually on Aimovig now. 70mg, likely looking at upping the dose. For the most part, it has been a game changer. I used to get migraines and headaches nearly daily. Now it’s down to a couple times a month, typically pretty minor compared to how it’s been. It’s just that every now and then a particularly bad one comes in.
This may be surprising, but this isn’t even the worst one I’ve had on Aimovig. That would have been end of February into early March, when I ended up with a migraine that lasted almost 10 days. That was brutal! They told me then that they could have given me prednisone to help break it if I had mentioned it sooner. So this time I did, and it seems to be helping. Hopefully once we up the dose of the Aimovig, these particularly nasty migraines fall off.
As for the sumatriptan…unfortunately that doesn’t seem to work for me, hence the Ubrelvy which is what made us look into Aimovig as it’s also a CGRP inhibitor. Typically the Ubrelvy works if I take it like you mentioned with the sumatriptan, but during these particularly nasty ones it only seems to take the edge off.
That sucks man. I started at the 70mg/ml dose and upped to 140mg/ml after about 2 months and it has been much more effective. I started in January 2022, upped the dose in March or April, then missed a dose by two weeks due to the VA’s incompetence in October that knocked me out for over a week. Otherwise, been very stable. A few mild migraines in that time, but nothing nearly as bad as they used to be for a decade before I tried Aimovig.
There are tons of different triptans that can help relieve pain, hopefully you can find something that works. Hope the higher Aimovig dose works for you!
I started my Aimovig back in February I think, and we started at the lower dose to appease insurance. That has been pretty good but hopefully the 140mg dose goes well, and that insurance doesn’t fight us on this. Given these few hiccups but otherwise overall dramatic improvement, I think they’ll be onboard with it.
I hope so man. I went through the VA to get mine, which was its own nightmare (took 6 months to get them to approve a medication that I was already taking from my neurologist that I was seeing on private insurance (that I made sure was in the VA’s network), even with an approved claim for service connected migraines and meeting their use criteria), but having dealt with my wife’s insurance claims, that’s a removed of a process.
I’ve had good results from taking baths. My migraines are a bit weird but a bath often helps me quickly.
My chemistry teacher taught me a trick that knocks the pain back for a little bit - cold head and hot hands. Basically, cool my head down with ice wrapped in a small wet towel, while heating my hands up somehow. It’s supposed to pull the blood away from your head which lessens the pain.
I could at the very least see it being relaxing, which would help reduce stress which in theory could help. Do you just run a bath and get in, or do you put any special bath stuff in it? I’m more of a shower person, myself, so as silly as this sounds I don’t know how to prepare the “optimal” bath lol.
Sounds simple but yeah same here
Cold damp towel on my face gives instant relief. Best if you have someone who can rinse it for you every 10 minutes to keep it cold
Yeah, I’ve seen this mentioned in a couple other comments, as well as ice packs. Seems simple enough that I’ll have to give it a try. Thank you!
My mum found an ice pack shaped like a ski mask that covers my eyes, it’s magic for this. It’s black so it blocks out the light and has that ice pack gel in it so if you get it cold it stays cold for quite a while.
That sounds amazing!
Microwaved damp towel. Hot as I can take it. Meds don’t do jack all once it’s started. (Edit: cluster headache.)
Ouch. I’ve never had cluster headaches (that I’m aware of) but I know a guy that gets them. Sounds absolutely awful. You have my sympathies.
Appreciate it;)
I don’t get migraines but just pretty bad headaches and what helps me is staying in a dark room, putting an ice pack on my forehead and using a peppermint essential oil roller on my forehead and temples and then a muscle balm on my neck because often my neck muscles stiffen and that tends to make the headaches worse.
I hope your migraine lessens soon!
That sounds like migraines to me, based on what my doctor said. She said that headaches don’t really react to light changes, don’t normally react to ice packs, and don’t usually come with neck or back pains. Migraines, on the other hand, almost always do.
Did you know that some migraines are painless? I had no idea!
Wow, I had no idea! I was diagnosed with headaches due to wrong posture and wrong lens prescription as a child and I never had it checked afterwards, even though the headaches remained. I just did the exercises my physical therapist prescribed and had my lenses checked every year.
I just accepted the headaches as something I sometimes get and didn’t think it was anything worse, also because my younger brother has migraines and he has vision-like symptoms, I don’t. Figured that meant I didn’t have migraines.
I have all those things you mention. And no, had no ideas they can be painless! How weird is that! I see a lot of reading in my future and a talk with my doctor.
Thank you so much for your comment, it might help me get the right diagnosis for my life long headaches.
One thing I’ve learned with medical things: never accept a diagnosis years later. Things change in the medical field. Doctors learn new things. What was once diagnosed as forever headaches, can now be diagnosed as treatable or curable (depending on the root cause) migraines. I’m no doctor, but I always recommend to get reevaluated every few years. For me, regularly taking high quality vitamin D (5000 IU) cured my migraines.
Yeah, I hear you. Typically for me my migraines manifest as just really bad headaches and a complete inability to focus, and last for a few hours. Like what the other person said, if it is reacting to light, it’s probably a migraine.
I’ve heard of those peppermint rollers being useful before. Do you happen to have any you recommend? I can see about looking into getting one.
I make them myself! I buy the best peppermint essential oil I can find and I have some aromatherapy rollers on Amazon.
Then I add 5 to 10 drops of the oil to the bottle, top it off with almond oil or something like that and then put on the roller top. Put on the lid, and shake it and then remove the top. Roll it on your hand and check the scent, opening it up if the roller needs more and then I roll it on my forehead and temples when needed.
And I might have migraines then because I can’t stand light when the headaches strike.
Huh, interesting. Not sure why I never thought to try making my own. I might look into that. Appreciate it!
Most welcome! If you need any help, just ask. I make my own rollers a lot so I can help with any question.
I get migraines triggered from sinus pressure. Do you know what triggers yours?
Because mine are often from sinus issues, treating that will often help relieve or prevent the migraines. Tylenol Sinus and Allegra D have been the two things that really work for me, depending on the situation.
Post Covid had me congested for several months, accompanied by a constant baseline headache and migraines every other day. Allegra D was really a godsend that got me through that time.
In any case, best of luck, I hope you find some relief!
I know of a couple triggers for mine, but there are definitely others out there. I’ve been using the N-1 Headache app to track them to try to find a more comprehensive list of triggers though.
Fortunately my neurologist hooked me up with a round of prednisone and that is helping a bit, thank you!
If you have access to LSD you can try a microdose of it. Just put one or 2 hits in a pint jar of water, shake it up really good, and take a sip to a shot. Don’t overdo it, if it doesn’t work you don’t want to be tripping with a migraine. It’s never failed me though.
I’ve seen this mentioned in other places too. Unfortunately like with weed, there is the legal issue of that where I live, but beyond that honestly I am a little reluctant to try it as I’m a bit of a control freak lol. I think that is something I would prefer to try in a very controlled environment first before jumping into it with a migraine. Appreciate the recommendation though!
Well I was talking more about a microdose. Taking a tiny fraction of the amount required to actually trip. You don’t get high at all from it.
Either way, I hope you’ve recovered from your migraine!
Ha, and that tells you just how much I know about any of that. I’m of the way better now, thank you. For some reason I started smelling brown sugar, which is interesting.
Might sound kinda dumb, but try dumping a bucket of (ice) cold water on your head.
The trick is to dump all the water at once and not gradually to get your body into a “I’m being attacked by lions!” state.
This is for instant relief. For gradual improvement try increasing your daily water intake - set reminders to drink a glass or two during the day and drink right before going to sleep and right after waking up.
Source: inherited migraines from my grandma and started getting them regularly around my teens.
Doing the above has made me nearly migraine-free except for when there’s drastic weather changes (when I get them with auras and everything 😵💫).
Good luck!I put my head under the tap with the coldest water. Inlet it run over my the base of my skull for minutes at a time. Within an hour, it was gone. I was shivering, but didn’t give s shit.
It was a shit-kicker of a migraine too. Day and a half before I tried the cold water thing. Puking. Sight-loss. Bad!
I’ll have to give that a try. Seems like something that could be easily done. I’m currently on a round of prednisone per my doctor and it seems to be helping, but given it sometimes takes a bit for her to get back to me, this seems like something that can be done a bit faster. Appreciate it!
Everything everyone else said, but to really point out, if this headache is out of the norm for you GO TO A DOCTOR. I don’t mean to freak you out but my mom instilled that in me from early on. Headaches and migraines happen, but it you get a new type, a weird spot, or they last longer, or anything weird or different get it checked out asap.
I’ve known 2 people personally who have had aneurysms, 1 was lucky, the other not. Get it checked out to be safe.
Fortunately I have been going to a neurologist for a while for these migraines and headaches. I’m on a couple different medications to help keep them in check, and fortunately I’ve had MRIs, EEGs and other tests to rule out potential major problems. I called her up this morning to check with her about it, and she set me up with prednisone which seems to be helping to knock it.
Unfortunately this isn’t even the longest lasting one I’ve had. That would be about 10 days, and that was miserable, so there is more work to be done to get it better under control.
Good, I’m sorry for the migraines, I know how bad they can be, but good on you for getting it checked out. First friend was in high school, got a sudden headache and just took a lot of aspirin, he didn’t make it through the night. Second collapsed in the shower and his dog ran to get his wife as she was stepping out the door, made it to surgery within minutes of it being fatal. I always encourage people to get new and weird headaches checked out.
Hormones sometimes trigger migraines. I don’t know your sex and age, but you happen to be going through menopause this could be related.
I know this isn’t helpful but if ot keeps happening it’s something I would ask my doctor- to check my hormones are okay. And yes you can have hormones out of whack if you are male too.
Fortunately/unfortunately I can confirm that it would be bizarre if I had menopause as I am both too male and a tad too young for that. 😆 Probably wouldn’t be a bad idea to get hormone levels checked though, if for no other reason than to help identify a potential root cause.
