Since about a little more than 3 weeks ago I had my last real hit. Presumably due to the Verap. Else I´d be still in cycle, although at the end of it if I were to compare it to my normal cycles of 7 weeks rollercoaster and 9 weeks if you take in the pre shadows and post ones.

I do however still have the shadows all day long, not too painfull but very annoying as I am constantly aware of their presence.
Could this be that the Verapamil numbs my hits but that they are still present, I´d love to know. My neurologist said to just wait till they leave too.

The coffee I drink in the morning hours quiets them, but the rest of the day they bug me.

Could I take the oxygen to numb them, or should I save that for when another episode starts, which is hopefully not in another two years.
And to my understanding it is unwise to take Imitrex for just shadows, so I haven´t done that.

Any advice on how to get rid of ´em, other than coffee or energy drinks would be greatly appreciated.

Thanx.

I've mentioned the use of the over-the-counter antihistamine, chlorpheneramine maleate along with a couple of aspirin to alleviate shadows.  Don't know if anyone's ever taken me up on it, but it's worked for me.  You might give it a try to see if it helps.  Benedryl might work as well.

Best,

George

Sorry the shadow-man is still chasing you.  

I drink two cups of coffee every day.  That helps to keep the caffiene level more consistent and chase the afternoon shadows off.  That's usually when they tend to intensify.  

If the shadows stay real persistent I chase them off with O2.  Don't be afraid to use it.  Just make sure you don't run out.

George that's an interesting combination.  I'll have to give it a go.

-Dennis-

I am out of cycle right now but still am getting shadows, some of which become more than annoying so I get on the o2 and that takes care of them quickly.

Often times, 400mg of ibuprofen will help me keep the shadows at bay. What we call "shadows" are probably the layman's equivalent to a real tension headache (in terms of pain level).

maalstroom wrote on Jul 22^nd, 2008 at 12:52am:

Since about a little more than 3 weeks ago I had my last real hit. Presumably due to the Verap. Else I´d be still in cycle, although at the end of it if I were to compare it to my normal cycles of 7 weeks rollercoaster and 9 weeks if you take in the pre shadows and post ones. I do however still have the shadows all day long, not too painfull but very annoying as I am constantly aware of their presence. Could this be that the Verapamil numbs my hits but that they are still present, I´d love to know. My neurologist said to just wait till they leave too. The coffee I drink in the morning hours quiets them, but the rest of the day they bug me. Could I take the oxygen to numb them, or should I save that for when another episode starts, which is hopefully not in another two years. And to my understanding it is unwise to take Imitrex for just shadows, so I haven´t done that. Any advice on how to get rid of ´em, other than coffee or energy drinks would be greatly appreciated. Thanx.

Arme Maalstroom!  Ich bin glucklich, ich habe nie Schatten gehapt-es ist bei mir schmerz oder gar keine schmerz.  Bis jetzt ich bin glucklich, weil ich habe mein attacken nur in die frueh (2-3 heuren).  Ich nehme mien medickatmente und dann ich bin gute, ausnahmsweise manchmal abends oder nacht.  Ich kann emphalen Dr. Med. Thorsten Bartsch (Uni Klinik Kiel, Neurologie)-er ist sehr gut und kann vielleicht hilfreich sein oder Prof. Dr. med Heinz-Dietrich Diener, Uni Klinik Essen, Chef von Neurologie-er ist weltweit berumpt und kann auch sehr helfreich sein.  Viele gluck, mein Freund.  Ach, in Geilinkirchen ist Dr. med Heinz-Dietrich Zieger, wer hatte mich behandelt fuer 4 jahren und ist sehr gut und sympatisch.  Alles gute, Sandra.

Perhaps others might benefit from what you replied, Sandra.

Oh, wait. They can't read it.

For those interested, Google Translate gives you:

Quote:

Maalstroom arms! I am happy I have never gehapt shadow-it is with me pain or no pain. Until now, I'm happy because I lost my attacks only in the early (2-3 heuren). I take medickatmente mien, and then I'm good, sometimes exceptionally evening or night. I can emphalen Thorsten Bartsch, MD (University Clinic of Kiel, neurology)-he is very good and can perhaps be helpful or Prof. Dr. med Heinz-Dietrich Diener, University Hospital Essen, head of Neurological he is the world and berumpt can also be very helfreich. Many luck, my friend. Oh, Geilinkirchen is Dr. med Heinz-Dietrich Zieger, who had treated me for 4 years and is very good and nice. Everything good, Sandra.

I had a lot of luck with Panadol washed down with a cup of serious coffee.  Not sure of it's name in other countries but I'm assured it's commonly available.  Its sister product, Panadiene forte, is a mixture of panadol and codiene and, for those who can take it, can be even more effective.

Mind you, I found out the hard way that if two don't work then neither will six or eight but for me it worked a treat for shadows and even minor hits.

The link is to the manufacturer - START PRINTPAGEMultimedia File Viewing and Clickable Links are available for Registered Members only!!  You need to or END PRINTPAGE

AussieBrian wrote on Jul 22^nd, 2008 at 9:50am:

I had a lot of luck with Panadol washed down with a cup of serious coffee.  Not sure of it's name in other countries but I'm assured it's commonly available.

Others may know it as acetominophen, or Tylenol.

Oxygen will not kill shadows for me.

I find that Excedrin migraine (aspirin, acetaminophen, and caffeine) will shut them down for the day.

My husband is going thru same thing as you.  The neuro told him to try not to use tylenol/ibuprofen because could cause rebound headaches, so he usually just suffers.  He drinks couple cups of coffee in the morning but doesn't seem to help.  I told him to start using his 02, he's only used it for the bad ones.  He says seems to help, but he can't use the 02 during the day while he's at work.

Energy drinks work for me pretty good in knocking down the shadows.

I find that there are several things to help shadows.  I've taken effervescent pain relievers, ginger, hot (spicy) foods, coffee w/caffeine, that's about all I can think of at the moment.

I've been shadowing myself the past couple days and am craving hot & spicy foods.  Must be a self help thing. :-/

Melissa wrote on Jul 22^nd, 2008 at 1:24pm:

I find that there are several things to help shadows.  I've taken effervescent pain relievers, ginger, hot (spicy) foods, coffee w/caffeine, that's about all I can think of at the moment. I've been shadowing myself the past couple days and am craving hot & spicy foods.  Must be a self help thing. :-/

Eating hot, spicy foods, like Szechuan Chinese, gives me a burning pain the next morning in a certain area :) and wll help me to disregard any other pain for awhile )
:o

wrote on Jul 22^nd, 2008 at 1:52pm:

Melissa wrote on Jul 22nd, 2008 at 1:24pm: I find that there are several things to help shadows.  I've taken effervescent pain relievers, ginger, hot (spicy) foods, coffee w/caffeine, that's about all I can think of at the moment. I've been shadowing myself the past couple days and am craving hot & spicy foods.  Must be a self help thing. :-/ Eating hot, spicy foods, like Szechuan Chinese, gives me a burning pain the next morning in a certain area :) and wll help me to disregard any other pain for awhile ) :o

Hot & spicy foods work great sometimes, but one thing to really watch out for is any Asian foods as they contain MSG which can also be a trigger (and then you'll be hurting on both ends! ;)).  Other than that, I tend to lean more towards the foods with lots of hot peppers in them. :)

I am having my strongest shadow to date right now.  I ate at a Japanese Steak House, so I wonder if I had some MSG trigger.

Anyway, I've been out of cycle so long, I am a bit scared that I am about to go back in.  My last cycle was well over a year long.

Anyway, does anyone else have shadows ramp up into a cycle?  this is a first for me, usually I just wake up and BAM, Im in cycle.

4 Way nasal spray helps my shadows.

Msg is a known trigger for me. I found out years ago, and learned to cook and eat my own food, and avoid the hidden sources. My cycles got less and less frequent. Is it totally because I avoided msg? I doubt it.....but it didn't hurt.

Here is a link to "hidden MSG sources". Good luck avoiding them all! :)

START PRINTPAGEMultimedia File Viewing and Clickable Links are available for Registered Members only!!  You need to or END PRINTPAGE

Red Bull kills shadows for me for 2-3 hours before they start coming back.  Unforunately my hits intensify at night when I don't want the cafeine, so then I hit the O2.  Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.  Maxalt is my last resort.

mollybo wrote on Jul 22^nd, 2008 at 9:50pm:

Red Bull kills shadows for me for 2-3 hours before they start coming back.  Unforunately my hits intensify at night when I don't want the cafeine, so then I hit the O2.  Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.  Maxalt is my last resort.

You use Maxalt MLT??? (the stuff that dissolves in your mouth).  I used to use it too for a while and I dont remember many others using it.  I also keep Zyprexa as a FINAL resort.  It works very well for me.

Have you tried going completely caffeine / med free?

A lot of people with clusters have good results from completely detoxing from all kinds of meds / caffeine / etc.

In the book "Heal Your Headache - The 1 2 3 Program", Workman Publishing, 2002, David Buchhold, M.D. advocates detoxing as well. The book is more about migraine than clusters, but I think it has a lot of good stuff. Some excerpts:

"When you have a headache, you just want to get rid of it. If you're like most people, you rely on painkillers. If you use painkillers only infrequently, and they work, that's fine. But by taking certain quick fixes too frequently, you make your headache problem worse and more difficult to control."

"Treating headaches with painkillers is appropriate only if the need arises infrequently, and only if the treatment is safe and effective. This means taking a safe and effective medication at most two days per month for severe headaches and at most two days per week for mild-to-moderate headaches."

"For infrequent severe headaches, triptans are the best acute treatment, but these drugs must be used no more than two days per month or they'll lead to rebound."

"Insidous and cumulative, rebound is the single biggest problem with quick fixes and greatest potential impediment to headache control. Here's how it works. You take a quick fix to relieve a headache. The quick fix helps temporarily. As the quick fix wears off, your headache tendency increases. You bask in the glow of short-term headache relief, but rebound is a dark cloud on the horizon. Thanks to rebound, your headaches keep going - and growing."

"How do quick fixes cause rebound? Most work by constricting the blood vessels around your head that become swollen due to migraine. You can imagine what happens when the formerly swollen blood vessels escape from the temporary, artificial constriction brought on by the drug. They swell with a vengeance in a process known as rebound vasodilation."

"Caffeine - one of the most potent dietary triggers - has a paradoxical effect that makes it appear helpful for headaches in the short run even though it increases headaches in the long run. This is true of caffeine-containing beverages including coffee, tea and certain sodas such as colas, Mountain Dew and Dr Pepper. The reason is that caffeine constricts blood vessels. If blood vessels around your head are painfully swollen because of migraine, and therefore you have a headache, caffeine may provide temporary relief by constricting the vessels. This is why many headache sufferers, recognizing that a strong cup of coffee or a Coke may ward off an impending headache, gravitate toward dietary caffeine....The problem is that as caffeine and its constricting influence wear off, rebound vasodilation - increased blood vessel swelling - occurs. The occurrence of rebound vasodilation when the constricting influence of caffeine wears off is the reason caffeine contributes to headaches long-term. But because you may initially feel relief, you fail to realize that caffeine ultimately worsens your headaches and therefore must be eliminated."

Wishing you pain-free time,
Rosa

MSG explains why potato chips and some other foods have triggered hits.

Back in UK, I used Anadin Extra to kill shadows; it contains aspirin, paracetamol and caffeine. Now I just use energy drinks.

Mel, you mentioned ginger. Do you eat fresh ginger or do you use supplement?

Sanna

sandie99 wrote on Jul 23^rd, 2008 at 4:15am:

Mel, you mentioned ginger. Do you eat fresh ginger or do you use supplement? Sanna

Sanna, I PM'd you, but will answer you here too.

I use supplements and also have drank ginger tea.  I think any way you consume ginger will help.  

Of course, everyone is different, it won't work for everybody, but it's worth a try!

:)

Hi everybody, and thanx for the many replies!

I guess I forgot to mention in my original post that I am not much of a pill guy, so I try to take as less as possible. Coincidentally I took some paracetamol with coffeine today, but only because the shadows were a bit more there.
I love coffee, but only in the morning before noon, if I continue to drink it during the rest of the day my stomach gets upset. As for the energy drinks, I used a Red Bull rip off many times during my cycle, but now I'm out of it, I can't stand the übersweet taste of 'em haha.

I'm a little hesitant about using the oxygen for my shadows. Any advice on that?

Thanx, Pascal.

Thank you, Mel. :)

Ginger helps me with shadows. I'm yet to find the perfect way to drink the ginger tea, though. I've made it myself and I've tried one tea bag kind.

Sanna

I have been pf for 3 months but with shadows almost daily,  SOmetimes more strong than others  Sometimes feels right on the verge of a hit.  But I do not do anything except silently curse the beast.  I have imitrex with me always just in case.  I have a shadow now as a matter of fact.  They suck but its no CH.  Lets hope they go away

gizmo wrote on Jul 22^nd, 2008 at 1:18pm:

Energy drinks work for me pretty good in knocking down the shadows.

Ditto - a can of Rockstar is my cure for shadows.

Maalstroom,

I have this exact same problem and I have a theory…  Could this be a side effect of the Verapamil?

I went on Verapamil around 18 months ago and at one point my Zomig usage went down considerably.  At that point I noticed this constant or near constant shadow and I didn’t want to go off of the Verap.  We were playing with the word chronic and just a couple of weeks ago the Beast returned (for real)  so I’m starting to think my shadow wasn’t a CH shadow, but a secondary headache caused by the Verapamil which can cause a chronic headache.

I hear you… I’ve been waiting for the shadows to leave before ramping off the Verap, but it never happened.  I’m really starting to think it’s the verap.  Wadda you think?

If I wasn’t in an episode I’d ramp off the Verap to see for sure although when I finally do I’ll report back.

PF wishes to all my friends here!

Ron

Don't know why you'd be hesitent to use O2. It won't hurt you and most of the time will alleviate shadows. go ahead and use it for pete's sake... No need to suffer if you don't have to.

Melatonin at night (12-15 mg) will (most of the time) stop the night hits and let you get the rest you need).

Me, I can drink a POT of coffee right before bedtime and go right to sleep, but if you can't you can't.... Red Bull tastes like mildew (someone came up with that and it pretty well describes it) but there are several other energy drinks out there that don't taste as bad -- read the labels and look at the caffeine and taurine contents.. be sure there's at least 1000mg of taurine in them. Right now I'm using Chic (50cents a can and it has 1500mg of taurine - works for me)

Hugs BD

How did you take the ginger Sanna?

I'd like to try that for my shadows as I have them all the time. When I can't focus on anything anymore, I hit the o2 or an energy drink, but try to keep it to a minimum really.

Think I'll be going to get some ginger tea!

wrote on Jul 22^nd, 2008 at 10:40am:

AussieBrian wrote on Jul 22nd, 2008 at 9:50am: I had a lot of luck with Panadol washed down with a cup of serious coffee.  Not sure of it's name in other countries but I'm assured it's commonly available. Others may know it as acetominophen, or Tylenol.

Thanks for that, Brew, and any word on overseas names for the panadol/codiene mix?  Back when I could still handle the stuff I found it dinkum effective, but only in combination with that magic ingredient - serious coffee!

Meant half the quantity worked twice as fast and that can't be a bad thing.

Now here's a thought.  Given the 24hr pressure that some shadows/hangover-hits/after-burn can inflict, would a 'Tylanol patch" help or hurt?

AussieBrian wrote on Jul 27^th, 2008 at 12:54pm:

wrote on Jul 22nd, 2008 at 10:40am: AussieBrian wrote on Jul 22nd, 2008 at 9:50am: I had a lot of luck with Panadol washed down with a cup of serious coffee.  Not sure of it's name in other countries but I'm assured it's commonly available. Others may know it as acetominophen, or Tylenol. Thanks for that, Brew, and any word on overseas names for the panadol/codiene mix?  Back when I could still handle the stuff I found it dinkum effective, but only in combination with that magic ingredient - serious coffee!

I'm not a big fan of Codine but here is a link to covering the various formulations of Codine and Acetominophen available here in the States.  All of this stuff is by perscription only.

START PRINTPAGEMultimedia File Viewing and Clickable Links are available for Registered Members only!!  You need to or END PRINTPAGE

-Dennis-

BarbaraD wrote on Jul 26^th, 2008 at 8:20am:

Don't know why you'd be hesitent to use O2. It won't hurt you and most of the time will alleviate shadows. go ahead and use it for pete's sake... No need to suffer if you don't have to. Thanx for the advice, Barbara, I took it to heart and have used the o2 for 'em. It did help. I was hesitant, for this was my first cycle using the Oxygen, and not knowing if it would make things worse or better. That's why I asked you guys and dolls. Red Bull tastes like mildew (someone came up with that and it pretty well describes it) but there are several other energy drinks out there that don't taste as bad -- read the labels and look at the caffeine and taurine contents.. be sure there's at least 1000mg of taurine in them. Right now I'm using Chic (50cents a can and it has 1500mg of taurine - works for me) Hugs BD Like I said, I hate the taste of 'em, and would never drink it except while in cycle. I used a Red Bull rip off with a very sweet flavoured chemical which was horrible, and the only reason I did not throw them up while chugging it down, is that it DID help with the lesser hits. Hope you'll be painfree soon, Barb.

CH Ron wrote on Jul 26^th, 2008 at 6:47am:

Maalstroom, I have this exact same problem and I have a theory…  Could this be a side effect of the Verapamil? I went on Verapamil around 18 months ago and at one point my Zomig usage went down considerably.  At that point I noticed this constant or near constant shadow and I didn’t want to go off of the Verap.  We were playing with the word chronic and just a couple of weeks ago the Beast returned (for real)  so I’m starting to think my shadow wasn’t a CH shadow, but a secondary headache caused by the Verapamil which can cause a chronic headache. I hear you… I’ve been waiting for the shadows to leave before ramping off the Verap, but it never happened.  I’m really starting to think it’s the verap.  Wadda you think? If I wasn’t in an episode I’d ramp off the Verap to see for sure although when I finally do I’ll report back. PF wishes to all my friends here! Ron

Being that I'm one of them, I can assure you that many of the folks here who get shadows do not use verapamil.

kevmd wrote on Jul 23^rd, 2008 at 10:47pm:

I have been pf for 3 months but with shadows almost daily,  SOmetimes more strong than others  Sometimes feels right on the verge of a hit.  But I do not do anything except silently curse the beast.  I have imitrex with me always just in case.  I have a shadow now as a matter of fact.  They suck but its no CH.  Lets hope they go away

i've been out of cycle for 7 months and i still get shadows.