Just another Oct. 31

I skipped Halloween tonight. This seems pretty sad at first: I mean, I have always loved Halloween and tend to dress up each year--if you exclude a handful of early high school Halloweens when I was too cool (and too old, according to my parents) to dress up and go trick-or-treating.

I've told you a little bit about my dear friend HT before. She and I are very similar in a variety of ways--it's not just our height and Germanic looks. (What an odd non-Janet-sounding sentence. I'll keep it.) We get along well for many reasons; it helps that she is perhaps the only real-life person I know who genuinely understands what it's like to live with a chronic illness. Because our personalities and senses of humor are so similar, our perspectives are that much more in sync.

Earlier this week, I called her to see if she'd be interesting in spending the night IN on Halloween. As the night is her favorite holiday, I knew she might be reluctant to commit. As she'd been pretty sick off and on for the weeks prior, I knew she'd probably end up being able to hang out with little old me. As it turns out, we did get to spend time together. We had dinner, chit-chatted, and watched The Shining for the first time in over a decade (for each of us). Let me just tell you: this movie is AWESOME. I somehow remembered it as being sort of slow and boring until the final scenes--but my 28-year-old self now scolds my high school self for not having realized how wonderfully suspenseful the film is. The experience I had watching it was lessened by the pain and discomfort I felt during the loud scenes or very bright shots. I thought to myself a few times, "Wow--this would REALLY be painful in a movie theatre!" I asked HT to turn the volume down once or twice, but the high-pitched, sitting-on-the-edge-of-your-seat squeaky strings still got to me. When I watch TV with my boyfriend, I almost always have to ask him to turn it down for me. (He's a musician who must already have irreversible hearing damage; I'm an ultra-sensitive girlfriend who is getting paid back by karma for all the times her older sister used to tell her to turn down the volume.) I can relax pretty well on my own, but now even laid-back activities are threats of pain and discomfort. I don't like that, even when I'm in a friend's quiet, smoke-free house--a place that should be lovely for a migraineur--I have to ask her to make many adjustments to accommodate me.

I suppose I feel as if I'm always on guard; that a trigger could be waiting around the corner. IS waiting around the corner, and I've got to be quick enough to catch it.

Even now I'm affected by the unintentional elements of my visit. When HT gave me a long hug goodnight, I could smell hand sanitizer on her, hand sanitizer with a strong scent (strong for me, at least). Even the hug couldn't be an enjoyable goodbye--instead I was thinking, "Oh, I hope she doesn't hold on too long, because that smell is going to wear off onto my clothes and it'll bug me!" Now I'm sitting at this computer, 30 minutes after saying goodnight, and the hand sanitizer smell is wafting through the air and sending daggers through my nose into my brain. Sorry.

So yeah. Back to Halloween. We drove downtown once to deliver HT's husband's i.d. to him--he'd forgotten to carry it along with him in his costume. We got to see a few costumes and were creepily incognito: we wore bags on our heads as we parked outside my favorite bar and waited for HT's husband to come out. Only he and two other friends knew who we were; they snapped a few photos of us. I looked beyond them and saw many of my friends outside the bar, no one knowing I was near. And then we pulled off.

And you know what? I'm not sorry I didn't got out. At this pinot, the night is over for most folks in town and I'm sure they had a great time. So did I. I continue to get used to this lower-key Janet who chooses to stay in when she used to be social, social, social. I hope I stop questioning her choices so much and trust her to do the right thing.

mine nose is mine enemy!

In the last several months, my sensitivity to light, smell, and sound has skyrocketed. I don't know what the deal is, but times are tough. I won't even go into the fact that going to rock shows (which is one of my favorite things to do in this entire world) has become painful to me even when I wear my omnipresent earplugs. Let's save that tragedy for another post.

Let us focus on my borderline live-in boyfriend for a second. J. is thoughtful, lovely, kind, smart, and extremely goofy. Wonderful traits. J. wears a combination cologne-deodorant that my 19-year-old self would have swooned over. (Swooned!). He smells so wonderful when he sprays the mist into his pits. Unfortunately, the smell has gotten worse. A couple of years ago, I asked him if he would wear the blue-bottle scent instead of the green-bottle scent because greenie and I didn't get along. Then came a lovely period when he used normal stick deodorant like most of us. A month or so ago, he bought his old brand again...and this time I CANNOT TAKE IT.

Despite my feeling like a crotchety old lady, I asked him that if he was going to get ready for the day at my house could he please spray the deodorant outside on the porch? Affirmative. Except for the times when he forgot and I had to turn on fans and lie down. (One time in particular I got a migraine attack within thirty minutes despite my going as far away from the Spray Site as possible!)

It's been awhile since I trained him to spray outdoors (ew--I sound like I'm talking about a feral cat). Tonight he sprayed his deodorant on the deck and reentered the house. Kind soul.

Too bad the smell is shooting straight up my nostrils into my brain! So gross! I am in my office, door closed and window open. I still cannot shake the smell that he sprayed nearly two hours ago OUTSIDE.

When I was a younger lass, my mom's inability to be around strong sensory stimuli drove me crazy now and then. I'd come in the room after a shower and try to sit with her on the couch, but my shampoo smell was too potent for her and she'd ask me to get up (or even leave the room). When Bath & Body Works lotions were all the rage in eighth grade, I became a fan of the ever-popular "sun-ripened raspberry" line. My mother couldn't stand to be in the same room as I after I slathered myself in the overpriced body lotion. (Again, I will not discuss her other types of overexcitabilities here, but suffice it to say she is very sensitive to her environment.)

It made me sad and hurt my feelings when my mom wouldn't be able to hug me because I smelled. To be honest with you, my friends, I thought she was being overdramatic. (Sorry, ma--I was a 'tudey teenager anyway, eh?) Surely no one could have physical reactions to smells that were so mundane yet lovely! Right?

Wrong.

I am turning into my mother. Yeah, yeah, most adult women come to that realization some time or another. Truth be told, I am proud to be very much like her. Too bad part of that similarity is extended to my nostrils' oversensitive nature. I can't be around strong smells. My boyfriend is going to change deodorants. I hold a shirt over my face if I'm around cigarettes, thereby marking myself as one who is trying her best to passive-aggressively judge the smokers around her. (While I detest cigarette smoking, I am only covering my nose to help stave off the migraine attack, not to pass judgment with a gesture.)

So Ma, I'm sorry. Sorry I doubted the power of your nostrils all those years. Sorry, sorry. For now I am you! Aaaahhh!

The end.

Migraine & travel

Tomorrow morning--ahem, THIS morning--I'll leave my house early to drive to the airport in rush hour traffic. My mom and I are flying to Virginia together to spend some time with my aunt and my cousins; it should be nice.

Despite my intense, feverish addiction to travel, I often dread the first day of it. Getting up on time, worrying that I have neglected to pack something, not sure if I'll make it to the airport in time, sitting under fluorescent lights in the gate area, the air pressure shifts in the plane, etc., etc.--all of these factors combine and, more often than not, result in a Migraine attack.

For this trip, I didn't follow step one of my own advice, but I think I'm doing well with the rest of it.

Tips for traveling migraineurs:

1. Get organized a couple of days before you go. This way, you'll feel less stressed regarding the packing process and will remember to add forgotten items, as you'll have more time to realize you've not packed them. For me, counting out all the pills and vitamins I'll need during the trip (adding on an extra day's worth for good measure!) is the first step I take. Too often I've been on vacation and reached for the medicine bottle only to remember it's still in my cabinet hundreds of miles away!

2. For people like me who know fluorescent lighting is a trigger: If you're staying in a hotel or with friends/family, ask your host about the lighting situation. Will there be fluorescent lights at the hotel? Request incandescent bulbs IN ADVANCE or else your home away from home won't be as comforting and healthy as you'd like. Will there be fluorescents at your friend's or family's house? Ask them if they could pick up a few incandescents on their next shopping trip--you'll pick up the tab. And remember: always have your eyewear to protect yourself from unavoidable lighting!

For those of you with phonophobia and/or trouble sleeping: bring earplugs! You never know what will be happening around you, and missing out on good sleep will drive any person crazy--and it will make it more likely you have a migraine episode.

3. Have all your medication packed in your CARRY-ON bag. In the rare chance your luggage is lost or delayed, you can't afford to screw up your schedule, especially since your normal life routine has been shifted around for the day.

4. Have abortive meds nearby--in your pocket or in an easily accessible part of your carry-on bag. No worrying that you have to wake up the snoring man next to you in order to get your meds from the overhead bin--just keep them very close! Even if you don't have an episode, you'll be comforted by the proximity of your salvation.

5. Tell yourself (and your traveling companions, if applicable) you have Migraine disease, and tell them when you're nearing your limit or when you won't be able to participate. Don't eat foods that are on your list of triggers just because a very charming hostess has offered them up to you. Don't go to the amusement park if a long, hot day in the sun will make you sick. Be honest with yourself so you can best enjoy your free time, and don't try to pack in too many things without scheduling in some down time.

6. Carry some granola bars or other healthy snack with you to combat low blood sugar. Most of us know by now that skipping meals is a sure-fire migraine trigger for most. Keeping a snack or three in your purse or carry-on bag could very well save you from having a Migraine attack when you're rushing to and fro and have no time to get a meal.

I'm sure I could ramble on, but I'll leave it at that. I was going to write another post for this here Migraine Blog Carnival, but since I'm leaving in a few hours' time, I have travel on my mind.

Speaking of that, I need to take my own advice and remind myself that it's time for bed. ;)

The King of Migraines

I've read about Elvis having had severe Migraine problems before; I've read on reputable health websites that many of the drugs found in his system during the autopsy were treatments (both OTC and not) for his Migraine disease.

This article, though nearly a decade old, tells how the medical community and reporters found out about Elvis's health information.

http://www.migraines.org/new/news9904.htm

Interesting. Sad.

(photo courtesy of www.elvispresleynews.com/ElvisMedicalReport.html)

Migraine without headache

It's rare, but it happens. I think that I suffered from it during the nighttime and early morning hours as I tried to sleep. Imagine all the side effects of a migraine (nausea, vomiting, upset stomach, aura, discomfort, sensitivity to light & sound) without the headache. Better than the usual thing, but, at least for me, scarier to treat with expensive drugs since I'm usually not positive that what I'm experiencing is a Migraine.

In any case, I'm not feeling so hot, but I definitely feel better compared to where I was this morning. Ugh.