Ok so my number of attacks per day seem to be increasing. I've been pretty reliably 2/day for about 3 years until this cycle. My previous neuro put me on Magnesium for the off month prior to this cycle due to the 1,2 punch of both CH and migraines. My cycle came back a little earlier than expected and now my attack frequency is increasing. Magnesium is really the only major thing that I changed.

Do you think that magnesium could be causing the increase in attacks and possibly the early onset of the cycle?

Or is it more likely to be just the crazy nature of CH changing once you figure it out?

hi Sean,
          sorry your still having a bad time with your ch
magnesium, I take 400 mg a day of magnesium with the vit d regime, it hasn't caused any reaction, apart from some fast visits to the back room for a couple of days at the beginning.
Batch would be able to tell you exactly what magnesium does in your body, but my belief is that it aids in the calcium, d3 absorption and is an anti inflammatory. but, we take that with the other co-factors to balance the regimes over all effect.   but I wouldn't have thought on its own, since it has anti inflammatory factors, that it could react in a negative way with your clusters......
.....hopefully

col

It is impossible to know if magnesium had any involvement with your cycle. CH does tend to change over time with things like when cycles start, stop, duration, etc. so the fact that it changed does not mean that it must have been caused by something.

There is published research linking magnesium and headaches, including cluster headaches - START PRINTPAGEMultimedia File Viewing and Clickable Links are available for Registered Members only!!  You need to or END PRINTPAGE". This will be why your neuro suggested taking magnesium.

Hey Sean,

You're right... CH does change over time...  and I've always wondered why...  My present theory on this addresses one of the possible causes...  Vitamin D3 status and competing consumers of vitamin D3 metabolites.

Over the last 3 years, we've collected a lot of empirical data that clearly suggests a direct relationship between CH activity and vitamin D3 status as measured with the 25(OH)D lab test. 

When the 25(OH)D serum concentration is low, CH activity it high...  and when the 25(OH)D serum concentration is high, CH activity is low or nonexistent.  These relationships apply to chronic CH'ers full time and episodic CH'ers when they're within their usual cycle period.

Causality and coincidence?

At first blush, and even with a very high correlation based on data from hundreds of CH'ers, it's difficult to prove a causal relationship...  that is until CH'ers who have gone pain free on this regimen stop taking it and their CH symptoms return.

This increases the probability that the correlation is actually a causal relationship and not just a coincidence.

We've also found that CH'ers suffering from other sources of inflammation, i.e., viral or bacterial infections, allergic reactions, or trauma/surgery, need additional vitamin D3 and a higher serum concentration of 25(OH)D to remain pain free.

If you consider the fact that magnesium plays an essential role in the enzymatic processes responsible for metabolizing vitamin D3 to 25(OH)D3 and on to 1,25(OH)2D3, it's easy to see why the vitamin D3 experts claim magnesium is the most important cofactor.

When you add it all up, the available studies and anecdotal information on benefits of taking magnesium to help prevent CH and migraines far outweigh any reason not to take it.

Better yet, there's compelling data coming in on a daily basis from CH'ers and migraineurs in favor of taking the anti-inflammatory regimen with at least 10,000 IU/day vitamin D3 and 400 mg/day magnesium along with the rest of the cofactors.

Hope this helps.

Take care,

V/R, Batch