Hello,
This is my first post.  I've been suffereing from CH for about 20 years and am in my mid-40's now.  I've been fortunate that they have only come every 3 years since in the last 9 years (2009, 2012 and now). 

2009 was particularly bad.  I was on a variety of meds (verapmil, Topamax, prednisone cycles), but was using Imitrex for the pain.  I started to get terrible rebounds, so I tried O2.  It worked very well for about 2 weeks, then I got even worse rebound headaches.

In 2012 I finally found a nuero who was a headache specialist.  She put me on Methergine, and I did not have one severe CH.  It was a miracle.

In March a new cycle started.  I went on Methergine and had no problems until May 14th.  I had CH's on the 14th and 15th, so my dosage was increased.  It stopped them until the 21st, but now they are completely out of control.  I'm having at least 3 acute attacks a day, and have a headache pretty much all day. 

My nuero put me on Lyrica now.  Does anyone have any experience with using Lyrica successfully to treat CH's?

Thank you!

Hey Duke,

You're likely experiencing an allergic reaction to pollen...  When that happens, the allergic reaction kicks off a flood of histamine that will make just about every form of CH intervention less effective if it's effective at all.

A couple tablets a day of Benadryl (Diphenhydramine) should do the trick.  Benadryl is a first-generation antihistamine that passes through the blood brain barrier to block histamine receptors in brain cells...  Second- and third-generation antihistamines cannot do this so are generally ineffective for CH'ers suffering from an allergic reaction to pollen.

Be very careful if you need to drive as benadryl will make you very drowsy.  If that's the case, take one tablet at night when you're done driving...  The half-life for adults is 10 to 12 hours so you should be fine for the drive to work the next morning...

Check your PM inbox for more info...

Take care,

V/R, Batch