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        New Message Board Archives >> 2005 Cluster Headache Specific Posts >> How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
        
(Message started by: mynm156 on Apr 11^th, 2005, 7:34pm)

Title: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by mynm156 on Apr 11^th, 2005, 7:34pm

My son was at a birthday party on Saturday. (He gets Clusters too 17yrs old) He was making Snow Cones for the little kids and descided to have one. Then Bam! He calls me and say Dad I was eating a Snow Cone and got a Brain Freeze it is just like a Cluster! I have always felt that way and have tried to describe it to people that way. Just take that REALLY bad BF and make it last 20mins to a couple hours!

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by TonyG1 on Apr 11^th, 2005, 7:58pm

For me it isn't so much a brain freeze but more like the fires of hell [smiley=sgrin.gif] at the base of my skull and on my cluster side ...

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by chicagoseal on Apr 11^th, 2005, 7:59pm

It kinda feels like that only imagine the pain being a good 10x stronger and centered on one side of your head and no matter what you do it doesnt go away... it's the WORST feeling in the world. To me, it feels like if someone stabbed a knife in your eye and left it there.

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by judkins on Apr 12^th, 2005, 1:58am

The only way I can describe it is "indescribable head pain". Then people don't know what you mean...not sure I do either.

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by Chillrmn1 on Apr 12^th, 2005, 5:32am

Yeah, I use "brain freeze" as a way to describe to my non-ch buddies what the pain is kind of like. I tell them it's in the same pain spectrum but worse, with stabbing pains and last an hour instead of a couple minutes along with the blocked sinus and eye boring pain.

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by vig on Apr 12^th, 2005, 5:05pm

like getting 'tasered' in the eye....

every 5 seconds....

for an hour....

repeat...

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by PerryGR on Apr 12^th, 2005, 8:14pm

Like having a spear running my head through and through. Entry wound at the base of the scull, multiple exit wounds: temple, eye, eyebrow, cheekbone. I'm not sure that makes any sense though, sorry.

PFDAN to all,
Perry

mynm156: I'm very sorry your son has to go through this at that age, it's really a shame.

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by Kris_in_SJ on Apr 12^th, 2005, 8:34pm

Menopausal women might relate to this.

In a way, a cluster is like a hot flash, because it feels like a runaway train coming your way. With the cluster, it's a burning in the left sinus that ramps into a knife piercing your eye, temple and surrounding area.

With a hot flash, it's a burning in the tips of the ears that ramps up to massive sweating and a feeling your skin is on fire.

Now, guys ... imagine both happening at the same time!

Hugs,

Kris

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by taraann on Apr 12^th, 2005, 8:37pm

I always describe it as, Take a knife, stick it in my temple angled towards my eye, now twist it very slowly, now stop, pull it out, then rinse and repeat

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by TonyG1 on Apr 12^th, 2005, 9:16pm

on 04/11/05 at 19:58:03, TonyG1 wrote:

For me it isn't so much a brain freeze but more like the fires of hell [smiley=sgrin.gif] at the base of my skull and on my cluster side ...

Quoting myself --- :) Another description I often use is it feels like someone / something is injecting molten metal at the skull base and it follows a trail behind my left ear / eye :'(

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by pete_k on Apr 13^th, 2005, 12:26am

sometimes i think it feels like something gnawing away at my frontal cortex, just muching chunks out of it. or a vein that's clogged and swelling swelling until it burts, then somehow magically repairs and does it again.

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by bellarains on Apr 13^th, 2005, 1:27pm

I think they are very hard to explain when you don't actually have one, and when you do have one, you can hardly speak to explain the pain you are feeling. Mine usually wake me from a dead sleep, I have on occassion gotten one during the day, but very rarely, and never the intensity of the night time demons.

Explain my pain? It creeps in, but at a very high speed, I think I feel it and then, WHAM, yep, it's there. It is like a hole that burns through my right eye socket into my right temple, straight back to the right side of my head/ear, accompanied by a little demon stabbing me with a knife as if the fire were not enough :o.

Wow, I'm going to have to remember that explanation for my Nerologist visit ;)

Lori

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by TonyG1 on Apr 13^th, 2005, 5:23pm

on 04/13/05 at 13:27:42, bellarains wrote:

Mine usually wake me from a dead sleep, I have on occassion gotten one during the day, but very rarely, and never the intensity of the night time demons.

Lori

Lori - Mine too are ALWAYS at night waking me from a dead sleep ... I'm always dreaming when they occur. I seem to have trained my sleeping self to be attuned to when one is coming because in my dreams, I realize I'm dreaming and make myself wake up... << does that make sense ? :P

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by EvertBoer on Apr 13^th, 2005, 6:06pm

I know what you mean about dreaming. A couple of times I dreamt I had a cluster headache, but instead of waking up, I gave myself an Imitrex shot in my dream. Then ended up waking up a few minutes later when the shot didn't do me any good in my dream and the pain finally really woke me up.

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by bellarains on Apr 13^th, 2005, 6:56pm

Tony,

Makes perfect sense. I think we probably fear the unavoidable so much that we most likely do dream of it, and since they do seem to come like clockwork at times, it makes even more sense. I've never really thought of it that way, but now that you mention it......

Too bad the shot doesn't work in the dream. The pain is one thing, the endless nights of no sleep, or broken sleep at best is another burden to bear. I tried keeping it by the bed, but I always wake up my husband with the rolling around and praying, so up I go to my favorite corner of the couch to impale my temple there. Do the rest of you have a place like that??

Lori

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by TonyG1 on Apr 13^th, 2005, 8:25pm

Ahhh.. my place is the sacred recliner in which I have to practically strap myself down to stay still ... ;;D

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by Candycane on Apr 13^th, 2005, 10:09pm

I think its a pain that can make you feel as weak and helpless as an infant

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by De_Minimis on Apr 13^th, 2005, 10:17pm

Its like someone with MSDO (The Ben Gay for horses, if I'm correct) has a hand convered in the stuff, reaches into your ocular cavity and twists your eyeball at least 180 degrees. Then, with his/her free hand, pours battery acid on the effected hemisphere (assuming he/she has already drilled a hole through your skull and as inserted a funel for the battery acid). Yea, that might just about cover it.

Title: Re: How Do you REALLY describe a Cluster?
Post by kimmeesue on Apr 14^th, 2005, 9:44am

starts out like a bear trap wrapped in cotton has ahold of my right eye. Terrible pressure . As the pressure builds it works it's way through the cotton til the trap itself imbeds in my eye.
Before melatonin I used to wake my husband up with my moaning. Now I rarely have a nocturnal hit but wake to about a level 5 kip every day.