anarchomoto
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Hi all, and thanks for this board.
I suppose I should describe my headaches as I have not "officially" been diagnosed. I have an appt at the Cleveland Clinic neurology dept on Tue Oct 2nd. Not nearly soon enough, but they are among the highest rated neurology depts in the world and I am lucky to live near them. I purchased expensive insurance solely to seek this help.
I am going on month #3 of daily headaches that occur 1-4 times per day. The attacks occur usually once per day, around 7-9 pm and typically last 45 mins to 2 hours however..about 2 nights ago I am forced awake 2 hours into sleep by one. The pain started out concentrated behind my left eye and left temple 3 months ago and has progressed from a golf ball size ball of fire to what would best be described as a rabid rat living in the left side of my brain, chewing, clawing, and scratching inside my head. I should tell you that I am an empathetic person that has watched several family members fall terminally ill, so I hate to use the word agony trivially...but it is agony. The worst pain I have ever felt in my life, and I have wrecked motorcycles, had my knee twisted in half, my hand set on fire, bones broken. Nothing compares to this. Some days I am 100% pain free until the attacks but on others I can "feel" the pain lurking in my head, waiting to wake up. It literally feels like something is living in there and the times I am not in pain are when it is sleeping. 2 nights ago was the worst. I laid down after a 2 hour long attack, exhausted. The feeling after the attack wears down is almost like being high..sweet blissful relief from the pain and exhaustion from dealing with it. I drift away to sleep like a baby then wake up with a ball of fire in my head. Turn on my cell phone to check the time, the light from the phone feels like a dagger in my eye. Stumble to the bathroom, get in a hot shower with the lights off. The showers are the only thing that give me any kind of relief. Sometimes I stand in there until all the hot water runs out. Most nights I can get back to sleep within an hour, but that night I sat on the edge of the bed rocking back and forth for 4 straight hours. Every time I put any pressure on the head by putting it on the pillow it send broken glass shards of pain throughout the whole left side radiating to the top of my skull down to my neck.
I am not proud of this, but have a small gun collection, and I had to have my father come over and take every single one out of the house and lock them up because I've considered putting one in my mouth during one of these headaches. Chewing up handfuls of ibuprofen literally does NOTHING for relief.
A friend of mine gave me several oxycontin (very powerful narcotic pain reliever) and get this; they only intensified the severity and longevity of the pain 10X!!! So I will never touch one of those again.
So yeah...going on month 3..the neurologist I'm seeing is supposedly one of the biggest hot shot headache specialists in the world, Dr Tepper. If he treats me like a junkie seeking dope or prescribes me another NSAID, I will prob fall completely into despair. Nothing, literally nothing, stops this pain, and the hot showers only barely make it manageable. Thanks for reading.
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