Hiya,

I used to suffer very severely from cluster headaches. They would happen pretty much every day for an hour to 2 hours for about 5 years. Horrid stuff as I'm sure you all know or have seen.

I've been a bit of a guinea pig with the doctors - trying anything they gave me in the hope that it might work. So many over the years I can't remember which ones! (Although I could probably get the info from the docs if anyone wants).

I have prescribed oxygen cylinders which I have at home and these tend to relieve the pain within 5-15 minutes - life saving!

The main thing I was looking for was something to prevent them, but nothing had worked. Eventually a friend of mine suggested that low iron levels in the blood could cause headaches - every day since then (January 28th 2015) I've been taking a one-a-day multivitamin with iron and I haven't had an attack since!

Basically I just wanted to spread the word because I haven't seen this suggested before. I know it seems too simple and that it could be a placebo effect but even if it is then it seems to be working!

Just spreading the word in the hopes that I can help someone else.

Oh and another thing that's REALLY helpful is a technique my girlfriend developed! I get really agitated as most do when I have an attack and she thought that thrashing etc. probably wasn't helping. She told me to take really deep breaths and count them up to 60. Now normally due to the distracting pain I would lose count at about 3.. (So much for my A Level in Maths..) But with her reminders we would get there and it calmed me down a lot - the headache would tend to wear off soon after or even during the counting.

I really hope that this can help you if you're suffering. Hang in there, you're not alone.

Joe

Hi Joe and welcome,
It could be one of two things! Either your cycle just
ended, or the combination of the other vitamins in
the multi vitamin you are taking. I've never read
or heard of iron by itself acting as a preventative.
Maybe check out the vitamin D-3 remedy on here
that's keeping the beast at bay for lots of us.

Inhaling deeply through your nose is a known
technique to abort the beast should you ever
be caught without oxygen.



Cheers, Hoppy

Hi Joe and welcome

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That has got everything we know about how to use oxygen for killing off CHs. It might have some useful info for you.

Hyperventilating using just normal air can work for some people too, as you've found, which is useful for when you've nothing else around to kill off a CH.

The deep and rhythmic breathing has been so important to me from the get go. I don't know how it works, I don't know if it works or simply takes my mind off things, and neither do I care.

It bloody works!

Thanks for passing on your hints and tips, mate. You may well be helping someone else who must endure this madness.

I've an idea your cycle just ended, and I am glad it did. Please don't take this wrong. I don't think adding the vitamin did anything for you, whether low in iron or not. The reason I say so is I have taken multi-vitamins w/iron for years, no difference. However, the Vit D3 regimen mentioned before has been a tremendous help to this 40+year CH fighter (12+chronic).

I hope you stay PF, and keep hold of that girlfriend. Good ones like that are hard to find, especially for us clusterheads.

Jerry