Hello!

I've been reading the forums for a while and it has given me a lot of comfort and some ideas to try, so thank you so much for being here!

I will get a proper introduction done soon but in short I'm 27 and one of the "lucky" females plagued with this syndrome. I'm not entirely sure when my clusters first started because I've had various sorts of headaches ever since I was a little child, but I think it was about 8 or 9 years ago. I was officially diagnosed in autumn 2014 and oddly enough, I went into remission after that, which lasted till June this year. I used to have my headaches in spring and autumn, this time, for whatever reason, they hit me in the middle of the summer.

I haven't tracked my previous cycles properly, so I don't remember much about them other than the pain. The current one is in its 6th week now, which seems unusually long. It started with mild aches (about a 3-4) in the middle of the night in the first two weeks and progressed to hellish pain from there. The last two weeks have been utterly horrendous with 2-3 attacks per day, usually 7 or above on the pain scale. The only medication I have are 50mg Imigran (sumatriptan) tablets, which do help eventually but it takes far too long for them to take effect. My neuro didn't say anything about sumatriptan injections when I last saw her (I will ask about them at my next appointment) and oxygen isn't available as a treatment option in my country  , but I will discuss it too, because I've heard people have been able to acquire welder's oxygen in some cases. .

What I want to ask is, what are your usual signs that your cycle is starting to end?
Last week I started getting pressure type pain (theoretically could also be MOH, it feels a bit like I have a hangover) mid-day Saturday which graduated into a CH hit by around 10 pm (this happened on Sat, Sun, Mon and Tue). On Tuesday I went to sleep with the "regular" headache and woke up an hour later to a 9 CH which lasted for an hour and a half (I'm reluctant to class a pain as a 10, because deep down I know that however bad it is, it can always get worse  , so unless I pass out, it's a 9) and then nothing last night, which was a big relief, because I can't remember when was the last time I was able to go a full night without an attack.
My neck is still sore and I am feeling a slight pain in my head but at least I can function somewhat normally and I'm feeling better today than I have in weeks. So could this be a good sign that I'm finally over the worst part? I started taking vitamin D3 about 5 days ago and took some ginger tablets last night and today, and I've been drinking at least 2l of water for the past few days, so maybe that is having an effect too. I just want the hell to end.

G'day Spica, welcome, and I can honestly say I never had two cycles the same. The only similarity was they always finished with a bang, one helluva bang, and the only wimper was from me.

Let's hope your recent 9 means exactly the same thing and only wonderful days await you.