I haven't seen any talk in here about muscle relaxers.  I did, however, see something on the net that said it was a possible med for CHs.  Before seeing any of this, I experimented on myself and found Soma effective in reducing or eliminating shadows and also effective in blocking how my CH over my eye connects and radiates to my neck.  Anyone else try muscle relaxers?  I'm curious if one is proven better than others.  Also just want to hear opinions on muscle relaxers.

Brett

"The use of baclofen in cluster headache.   Hering-Hanit R, Gadoth N.   Department of Neurology, Meir General Hospital, Sapir Medical Center, 59 Jabotinski Street, Kfar Saba 44288, Israel.   Cluster headache is a rare, clinically well-characterized disabling disorder that occurs in both episodic and chronic forms. The very painful short-lived unilateral headache attacks are associated with autonomic dysfunction. A large number of drugs such as ergotamines, steroids, methysergide, lithium carbonate, verapamil, valproate, capsaicin, leuprolide, clonidine, methylergovine maleate, methylphenidate, and melatonin are considered beneficial for prophylaxis. Nevertheless, this extremely painful condition is occasionally refractory to conventional treatment. The antispastic agent baclofen has been shown to possess an antinociceptive activity. Its efficacy in neuralgias, central pain following spinal lesions, painful strokes, migraine, and medication misuse chronic daily headache suggests that it may be useful for prevention of cluster headache attacks. Therefore, we treated 16 symptomatic patients with cluster headache with daily baclofen, 15 to 30 mg, in three divided doses for the cluster period and 2 weeks after. Within a week, 12 patients reported the cessation of attacks. One was substantially better and became attack free by the end of the following week. In the remaining three patients, the attacks worsened and corticosteroids were prescribed. One of these was also given verapamil. Three of the 16 patients had an additional cluster period, which cleared with a second course of baclofen. In this pilot study, baclofen seemed to be effective, safe, and well tolerated for cluster headache, and seemed to retain its efficacy on repeated clusters. "


From my experiance Soma is useless for CH,except for mabye helping
to sleep through a shadow or very low level hit.Technichally Soma is
not addicting but it is VERY VERY habbit forming.Be CAREFUL with it!!!
Enough soma to kill a higher level hit or make you sleep through a
high level hit would most likely stop your heart first!!!!! Soma is a
smooth tissue muscle relaxer.Your heart is a smooth tissue muscle!!!!!


As far as I know,Baclofen is the only one that has been studdied in
connection with CH.I do know of one person who swears it works for
him,but I know many who have tried it with no success.

Whatever you decide to try,PLEASE only take it as it is prescribed
by your doctor!!!!!!!!!

I survived ch for years on muscle relaxers such as soma. Aborting an attack with soma is like putting the beast in a box and saving him for later. Although it was good for aborting, take enough and I could sleep through the night. Live to work another day so to speak. I also was strung out on zanax, a lot easier as far as rebound headaches go, I had to take more and more of it to stay ahead of the clever bastard. Eventually all of these tranquilizers and muscle relaxers seem to catch up with me and I would have to go off of them for a week or so before they would work again. It was bad news

All in all these types of drugs did nothing more than put me in a coma for the night so I could sleep. At the time it was the only way I knew to survive. After finding a Doctor that recognized the symptoms of ch, and learned to medicate myself properly my life has been a lot easier.

Superdave