If we know our triggers and avoid them why do we still have migraines.

First topic message reminder :

I dont seem to have any triggers and am envious of those that can at least identify them (or some of them).
How well I would do at avoiding them if I knew them, I cant say, but I would try my best.

I know many of us do know at least some of their triggers, but still seem to suffer.
Is this because avoiding them is so hard, or is it, do we think because there are yet more triggers.

P

That is one isnt it.....a "triggered response.

There is so much in the media about migraine lately.
I DO hope it is a good sign..

Trouble is there is nothing new. Same old crap. At least there is more awareness but that doesn't do anything about the pain. Since I started getting my migraines - maybe 12 years ago (can't remember anymore), there hasn't been anything new, just more of the same.

P.S. Reminds me of hundreds of magazines out there with the latest "diet lose weight scheme". Lots of stuff but more fat people than ever. The migraine articles are getting to be the same.

It is I know, same old, same old.
The difference is, for whatever reason, migraine is hitting the press and media much more.

I imagine this is because of the cost to commerce and industry. It is huge, but still no one seems to care.

I think it is time we actually all became more proactive. Dont know how, but it might be the only way.

I think it is going to take a scientist/doctor/chemist or whatever that has really bad migraines himself to come up with something. You can't really "get it" unless you have them because people aren't dieing from them like they are cancer and heart disease.

in the u.s. we say "living in a bubble". that's what i need to do, for sure. a glass bubble where the weather can't get in, and neither can any smelly thing. (perfumed anything, cigarette smoke, chemicals and cleaning substances of all kinds.......)

eating is such a mine-field, but i have figured out over many years that anything with MSG makes me much much worse. there is MSG in nearly ever processed food in the u.s.

here, since the general public is sort of aware of the downside of this crap/er substance, they disguise it under about 40 other names. the list goes on and on.

being an obsessive label-reader doesn't even work all the time, because sometimes the offending substance is in such a small quantity that the manufacturer isn't required to put it on the label.

so i eat pretty much all-natural food, and hardly anything in a can or box. it helps enormously, but i still have daily pain.

i just don't have the killer type very often anymore; sometimes i go 6-8 months between those awful 40-hour ones, the kind i used to have every 3 weeks. i do hope this may keep someone else from this godawful suffering. dianne

Hi Dianne, thanks for you input.

So your migraines are fewer now. But they were only ever every 3 weeks. See mine are all but daily, so not much chance of working out a trigger. Beyond the hormones which were obvious.

Are you still taking daily triptans even though the migraines are better than they were? Or have you been able to cut back...

Thanks
Pen

unfortunately, pen, i still need triptans daily. that's because the pain usually comes in the middle of the night, like yours.

if i try to "tough it out", i'm lying there not sleeping for hours and hours. then, i'm non-functional the next day, so since i have a lot of triptans, i don't conserve them much.

when i formerly had the killer migraines every 3 weeks or so, i mean to tell you they were incredibly bad.

during and after every one i would think to myself "i can't possibly do this again". and then of course, i had to.

i'd throw up for 12 of the 40 hours, and barely be able to lift my head up off the pillow or toddle to the bathroom. all energy had totally evaporated, and no drug touched the pain. i am very very grateful that those days are mostly GONE. dianne

Interesting - another one getting them in the night.

I think a lot of us get them then. And many of those that do are women who have them hormonally.

I was told by my GP in conversation, that something in the circadian rhythm is probably responsible, hormones of course get shot at us during the night.

I would like to know more about this.

Me too. I have never had one develop in the day time. I do know that if I take an abortive before bedtime I have never had a migraine develop. I don't want to be taking them on a daily basis though.