Posted by Charlie (206.162.24.97) on September 24, 2000 at 00:03:35:
In Reply to: Hi Sheryl! Welcome. What do you need? posted by Charlie on September 23, 2000 at 23:45:21:
When I was diagnosed, aeons ago, not many drugs were around that worked. Dr. Wright taught me a biofeedback technique that was very helpful. It sounds nuts, but I was told to "think" of forcing blood-flow from behind my eye, down my neck and into my arms and hands. When properly done, your hands will warm and you may have a slight decrease in the throbbing in your eye. It takes intense concentration and can be exhausting but it almost always about halved the duration of the attacks. He said to try to think of it as "filling" your hands with redirected blood kept away from the head. Anything you do to retard blood-flow from your head is the idea. The real trick is to keep at it even through some pain as it usually will take hold and shorten these things. It isn't a miracle cure but it was effective, as I could use this in conjunction with drugs. Sometimes, when awake, I could entirely abort the attacks. It takes no special training. Just keep at it longer than you feel necessary and you should have some success. I got my attacks down from about 40 minutes to no more than 15 or 20 most of the time. Good luck! - -Charlie