Posted by Tony Dwyer (202.139.59.131) on June 24, 2000 at 12:22:37:
My age is 65, I got my first CH at age 21. At first I wasn't too worried, I thought that I needed glasses because the CH only lasted a few hours and came on when I was at a movie. The next CH occured two years later when I was having a few drinks and lasted the whole day. From then on they became more frequent, about 12 mths. apart,but still only lasted one day.
As the years passed by, the remission period remained at one year, however the CH became daily and lasted about 3 months.
The situation now is: I go into remission for about 2 to 3 years, then the attacks are daily for up to eight weeks.
I do not refer to CH as a headache, for me it is more an excrutiating eye pain and always on the left side. When I am having a CH my eye will water,the eyelid droops and my nose gets stuffy. Yes, I have been known to cry, I do bang my head and there have been times when, if I owned a gun,I would willingly have blown my head off. Is there a pain worse than CH? I don't know and I certainly don't want to find out. Right now I am three weeks into an 'attack period'. I am writing this because I am afraid to go to bed because I know that in an hour, after doing so, I will be crying in agony.
To all of my fellow sufferers, God bless you ... you have my sympathy. Tony