I knew I shuldnt have started bragging. This time last week I found 3 Imitrex tabs from my last Episode. They were out of date in 2005 but i tried em anyhow. Also last sunday was when I found y'all again and read about the red bull. So Sunday night I took a pill before I went to sleep. Yipee slept all night !!!!!!! Monday morning stopped at 7-11 got a red bull. 7:30 beast wanted to go for a walk. Shot the red bull pretty soon the beast walked away YIPEE AGAIN !!!!!. Monday night took the pill before sleep Again slept all night Yahooo!!!. Tuesday morning red bull sent him packing again Thanks a million you guys.  Tuesday saw the doc said try the red bull with Excedrin migraine. Ok I Will. Tuesday night took the last pill PFN Great I'm on a roll. Wednesday morning did the red bull and the excedrin. Beast wasn't happy with that mixture decided to show his dipleasure + all that caffiene made me yucky till late afternoon. The beast didn't try to fry mr just toyed harder than the preceeding two days. So no pills left but still PFN Wednesday.Thursday and Friday same thing. So I'm on here bragging how they are receeding. Forgot the bastard is reading this as i type. Friday night shoot some triptan juice 2 hours after sleep. Sat morning RB works again Sat afternoon I get some Melatonin #3 at GNC 3mg per tab take 5 for 15mg before bed. Last night sucked. 11:00 Shot it, 4:00 and 8:00 rode em out didn't spike too high but I had the needle loaded. Just not crazy about using this stuff ya know. Well my question is, well are did I do the Melatonin wrong? Or Smoking more because I think i'm getting better have anything to do with this weekend. I know I have to quit smoking but wimp that i am its just really hard to do with this blasted crap going on too. Tried to clean up the yard this afternoon and wow am i bushed. Hate this giant pin oak tree in the back yard.
Jim
Sorry to ramble.
Thanks for being here and sharing so much of youselves.  

I was thinking of starting a thread asking how you Red Bull proponents handle all the caffeine but then I read your post 67Skylark.   [smiley=JAW_DROP.gif]

I could not do all that caffeine -- I have 2 giant 12 oz lattes every morning but then that's it -- in the middle of the night. How do you people manage?

Seriously.

Also, I think smoking makes CHs worse. I notice that, if I smoke at night, I get whacked real hard later.

You build up a tolerance to caffeine. And some people are more sensitive to it than others. With Red Bull, it's the combination of caffeine and taurine that does the trick.

It's probably the tolerance thing (I'm a seriously heavy coffee drinker) but caffeine doesn't really wind me up all that much.  Most energy drinks--the same.

However, the one exception I've run into of late is NOS energy drink in the 22 oz. blue bottle.  I suppose it has to do with the 350 or so mg. of caffeine and the 2400 or so mg. of taurine in it, but it seems to cause the afterburners to kick in.  Drink one in the late afternoon, and I'm up until 2:00 AM.  

Not all that tragic, since I'm usually up until 1:00 anyway--but although I don't sleep much, I need what little I get.   :P  

Bad habits.  I know...

I intend to try the stuff next time I go in cycle.  Energy drinks have never worked as much more than shadow-killers for me, but if any energy drinks are going to take down a bad boy, I think this one will.  

If not, I'm going to be one wide-awake floor-pacer.

Best,

George

Ahh, shit, Bro.

Wish we had told you sooner.  Pain meds, both script and NSAIDS, are are sure-fire bad days.  Maybe not everyone, but most people say steer clear of pain meds.  

I know personally, I cannot take pain pills, virtually at all.  I bet a redbull and a kick in the balls would be better than a pill.

Since I have quit smoking, the clusters are easier to handle, but no means a breeze.  My cycles have reduced in time, frequency and duration.  Even if cigs don't affect your clusters, quitting is a great thing to do, however it isn't easy.  Good luck!

I swear by Red Bull/Monster during the shadows, but the Excedrin isn't a good thing.  Give the Melatonin some time.  It doesn't work overnight and it may not at all.  Everybody is different.  Just read this site and you'll have an arsonel in your mind for the next cycle.  Also, I don't use O2, but a lot of folks here swear by it.  My insurance is problem there.  

Best of luck my Friend!

Chad

Thanks guys. Yeah the red bull in the morning has been working pretty good. Didn't have to take any today. But last night was tough. Freq is going down . K factor is all over. Nearing the end of month 3 for this cluster so mayybbee.
Jim

i noticed when i swiched from marlboro lights to ultra lights my headaches actually got better. Then the local store ran out of ultra lights so i went back to the regular marlboro lights and sure enough half way into the pack i started getting hit quite a bit again. Threw them into the trash and bought the ultra's again and sure enough the headaches got a lot better. Good luck, i know this sound weird but maybe it could help you too.

I quit smoking on January 15, only to begin another cycle mid-February.  My neuro told me that if I quit smoking I wouldn't have clusters anymore.  Right.  Between the clusters and the dopamax, it sure seems like a cigarette would make everything better about now! ;)

I've never smoked...still get CH! (There are a few of us non smokers who on occasion wonder if we really ARE CH'ers!)

On the other hand, there's certainly no shortage of good reasons to quit! ;)

dhames1428 wrote on Apr 9^th, 2009 at 2:49am:

I quit smoking on January 15, only to begin another cycle mid-February.  My neuro told me that if I quit smoking I wouldn't have clusters anymore.  Right.  Between the clusters and the dopamax, it sure seems like a cigarette would make everything better about now! ;)

For me:

CIGS/CIGARS/POT whatever... = Clusters that are far worse

I don't know how anybody could smoke during a hit.

Do yourself a favor and keep it up.  In addition, you'll benefit your body in the long run.
It's been 4 years in Feb. for me and my cluster cycles/duration/frequency/intensity has been significantly reduced.

i can't smoke during a hit but right afterward  man i gotta have one.

before i was hip to the plethora of info contained on this board i would drink coffee to  abort an attack. it worked pretty good for a while. after a while i would drink a pot or 2 before work. 3 or 4 pots during work. then 4 or 5 pots at home. at that point it wasn't doing anything. funny how desperate we get isn't it? my point is do just enough to keep the beast away. the red bull works good for me as an abortive but it tastes like stump water and it gives me heart burn. maybe its just one of those things i associate with being in cycle.  yuk!

edited to add: also keep this in mind. towards the end of a cycle(for me anyway) my trusty abortives don't work the way they once did. when you get to that point stop using it and see if you cycle will die. i've had cycles before where i have stopped using all over the counter pain pills like tylonol or ibuprofen and it had ended the cycle but i was taking wayyyyyyy more than the recommended dose.

the use of o2 is immune to this logic though. you can use it as much as you want.

I don't see a whole lot of talk about oxygen as an abortive.  There were a couple of mentions about it, and Johnny's plug for it, but not a lot more.

OXYGEN ROCKS!!!

Read the information behind the tab, on the left side of your screen oxygen info.  Even if you had tried it before, and it didn't work, read the information, and see all the improvements we have found.  Then try it again!

And, as Johnny said, you don't build up the tolerance to oxygen as you do to so many other treatments.

And even if you are having trouble getting your insurance to cover it, it is cheap enough, and effective enough, to pay for it yourself, while you fight with your insurance company to cover it.

Your friendly oxygen junkie
Chuck

I went to the Headache Center at UCSF where Dr. Peter Goadsby is the head guy.  They have the Melatonin protocol printed out as follows:
1 - 3mg cap for 5 days (before bed)
2 - 3mg caps for 5 more days
3 - 3mg caps for 5 more days
4 - 3 mg caps for yet another 5 days
you want to get to 6 caps or 18mg per day.
This has worked for some people - I got up to 3 caps and they told me to stop because it wasn't going to work for me.