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Topic: 7 years CH free (Read 268 times) |
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Clusterama
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7 years CH free
« on: Aug 27th, 2006, 5:25am » |
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Hello all,
I used to be a “regular” a few years ago and now -- 7 years since my last attack -- I figured I’d come back and tell my story.
Mine’s the usual tale of woe: intense headaches since childhood, countless doctors, all available medications and finally the Cluster Headache diagnosis at age 25. My CHs were seasonal, usually about a month a year with daily series of 5-8 attacks during the day and one every 40 minutes at night. During the CH month my employers (God bless them!) were usually kind enough to set an office aside for me to “hide” in whenever the attacks would become unbearable.
Needless to say, by the end of the CH month I was usually a wreck (mind and body) and on the verge of suicide… fortunately the CHs always went away right before I completely lost my mind.
At age 35 I began taking an antidepressant called Wellbutrin to help me with a slight case of depression and ADD… as some of you may know the active ingredient in Wellbutrin is exactly the same found in a product called Zyban, a medication used to help smokers quit their habit. Anyway, being a one-pack-a-day smoker myself I figured I’d jump on the opportunity to kill the proverbial “two birds with one stone”… and so I quit… and never had a cluster headache again. I still take the medication (low dosage) and continue to be smoke-free to this day.
I can’t say whether it was the Wellbutrin or the (lack of) cigarettes, or maybe the combination, but that was the solution to a nightmare I had carried with me since age 7. Obviously I didn’t smoke back then, but my father did and I received a hefty dosage of second-hand smoke on a regular basis. Coincidentally my father also suffered from CHs and he also got rid of them when he quit smoking at age 55.
That’s it. Draw your own conclusions and take from this what you may.
Take care and God bless you.
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