Hey all!

Wanted to quickly introduce myself to the boards as I have been an avid reader for a little while now.

I started getting some headaches about 3 years ago and kind of pushed through for a while before seeing an MD. I finally saw my GP and of course he prescribed fiorocet, which did nothing. I was pretty blasé about the whole thing, so I took that for a while and dealt with the headaches as a fact of life. After about a year of that - I discontinued the medication and went rogue using excedrin migraine. I didn't really understand that I had CHs at the time, so I thought the excedrin was preventing these short 30minute headaches from becoming monster headaches. Eventually, I started getting monster headaches even with the excedrin, so I decided to find a specialist. I found one in NY who did an MRI which showed nothing sinister and he put me on a trial of Relpax which is supposed to work after 30 minutes. My headaches are usually done in 30-45 unless they are the big ones, so that was worthless.

I recently moved from NYC to VA, so I looked for a specialist down here and found someone who instantly diagnosed CH and prescribed Oxygen.

I did some reading prior to seeing the new doc, so I knew Oxygen was probably the way to go. I have had it for about 2 weeks and can only say that it is heaven-sent.

Currently, I am only using the O2 since I am towards the end of a Cluster and only having 4 or 5 shadows a day (I call them tremors). Nothing too serious, but exhausting all the same. We may try some more serious medication for aborting when I start getting the monsters again, but for now this will do as a trial.

I will also bring the D3 information to my doc at my next visit as that seems intriguing and I am totally for it.

Anyway - that is my deal. It feels great to be able to talk with others who know what I am feeling. Obviously my live-in girlfriend sees what I go through, so she kind of gets it. However, my coworkers, friends, etc. - they don't. There are only so many times I can hear someone tell me that they "get migraines too"...Not to downplay the pain of a migraine, of course.

Much love.

Hi and welcome

START PRINTPAGEMultimedia File Viewing and Clickable Links are available for Registered Members only!!  You need to or END PRINTPAGE - this has a load of great info about using oxygen and it may help you get even more benefit from your O2 setup.

It's not too surprising that most people just don't get what it is like to have a CH since they will have never experienced anything remotely like it. There are topics here where people have posted all sorts of weird and wonderful comments from people along the lines of "...get migraines too..." that can make interesting reading.

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

Welcome.  Glad you decided to join us. 

The D3 is the way to go, but while it's building up in your system to the required level, the best abortive is imigran/ imitrex/sumatriptan -  all the same thing depending on where you live in the world) auto injections.  They will abort the worst CH in a few minutes. 

As for your friends and co workers - instead of saying you have a headache, tell them you have a neurological condition called trigeminal autonomic cephalgia.  They won't say they also have that.