Sunday, August 02, 2009

What a night...

Apologies for the long, boring story that follows, but I've had a lot of email and a lot of concerned friends. Thank you so much - your concern for me touches me and makes me feel very loved. I'm fortunate to have such good friends! So I thought I'd just do a post here to let you all know I'm not about to die.

If you've been following my saga at all either here or over at Facebook, you know that I've had a migraine for a solid week. Bad. It started to get a little better mid-week, then worse toward the end of the week. Yesterday, it was so bad that I seriously considered I was going to have a stroke, or had an aneurysm, or some other terrible diagnosis. I take medication twice a day prophylactically, as well as having meds on hand for acute flareups. Nothing was helping, and the amount of Advil I was taking on top of it all was going to tear my stomach to shreds.

So about 5 pm, Bob decided enough was enough, and off to the ER we went.

Well, the first thing that happened was, it was Saturday evening in the ER. Not the quietest place to be. In the waiting room was a spanish-speaking family there with about 20 members of their immediate and extended family. Including every whiny, obnoxious child they could drum up. Thankfully, I was seen fairly quickly. Only to be placed on a gurney in the hallway - they were full. Normally, I can roll with the punches, and I wouldn't care. But with a migraine from hell, every single noise and light was amplified. All the crying, screaming, and the radio transmissions (and there were a lot last night considering my sleepy little town) seemed to make everything worse. So much so that I started crying (no help for the headache at all!) and asked Bob to take me home and let me have my stroke in peace, LOL. Drama queen much?

I got a nice young fresh-faced doctor who immediately gave me morphine (which I absolutely HATE!) along with an anti-nausea medication. It didn't touch the pain, but did give me loads of nausea along with a pretty decent buzz. I floated along above my body noting that the poor girl there had a really awful headache. That buzz lasted about an hour, at which point she gave me dilaudid - even stronger than morphine. And a sublibgual anti-nausea med. Both of which served to make me even more woozy, and more nauseous. But didn't touch my headache.

I finally realized that Bob keeps earplugs in the car, so asked him to go get them. While he was gone, some guy started freaking out. I didn't open my eyes, but heard a lot of "f" words and mother"f" words. Needless to say, they didn't allow Bob back into the patient area for a good long time. But I finally got my earplugs which helped a little.

FINALLY, around midnight, enough folks either got sent home or admitted that I got moved into a real room, where they could close the door and turn off the lights. But the damn nurse kept lowering the head of the bed to make me more comfortable, when all it did was make me puke. Duh - get a clue. I kept asking her to leave it up, too. Oy!

Anyway, finally the doctor says she's run out of narcotics to try - to which I say good! I didn't want them in the first place - I had told her I don't react well to them. So she decides to give me some heavy duty steroids. Now, as an asthmatic and a former respiratory therapist, me likey the steroids. Great, I say. In goes the IV, and along with the steroids goes some Reglan, another heavy-duty anti-nausea med. Finally, a little relief. I once again say to the doctor that it's so unusual for me to have a migraine of this length and maybe something else is going on? So she shuffles her feet and says... in a big Aha! moment... I'm going to order a CT scan! Great, now we're getting somewhere. And the headache is finally starting to get a little better with the steroids on board.

30 minutes after the CT, mystery solved. I had a migraine on top of a massive sinus infection, and they were feeding off one another. So I couldn't get rid of the migraine because I have a sinus infection feeding it. But I don't have any of my usual sinus infection symptoms, which was really weird. So anyway, after getting home at 3AM, (and how happy am I that we can leave the kids home), I am now on antibiotics.

And she still forced a narcotic prescription on me in case I had some more severe pain over the next couple days. LOL. I didn't fill that one. Sure, narcotics have their place - after major surgery, or for people with a low pain tolerance, or for those with debilitating illness. But I don't care for the way they make me feel. No thank you.

Anyway, end of story, and g-d willing, end of headache. Hopefully between the drugs and the glasses, I'll be as good as new in a week or so. Thank you again for your thoughts and emails over the last week. You are awesome!

11 People Gabbed:

Stacy~ said...

Oh hon, sorry you've been suffering through such pain. I don't get bad headaches, but I worked with someone who got cluster headache. She used to get oxygen tanks from the hospital. It gets so bad her face would be swollen and at night she'd take to banging her head against the wall to "re-route" the pain of the headache. It sounds excruciating. I hope you'll be better soon. Sending lots of healing vibes your way {{{Lori}}}

Lori said...

I actually get the swollen face, too, sometimes, Stacy. It totally sucks. But alls well that ends well. I got a diagnosis, so that's what's important. And in the famous words of our governator, "It's not a tumor!" LOLOL!!

Blanche said...

(((Lori))) I'm so sorry and hope you feel better soon!

Amy C said...

Lori, I hope you are feeling better. I get headaches, but just your typical ones, nothing a little naproxin won't take care of, but sometimes they feel worse than others. I cannot imagine a migraine.

I hear you about taking meds. About the only thing I ever take is naproxin. I've been prescribed pain meds and muscle relaxers in the past and don't take them. Like you said, can't stand the way they make me feel!

Hugs, Lori.

nath said...

Awww Lori!! Poor you! :( Ugh, horrible.

I hope you are feeling better now!!! and good for you for insisting that something was wrong!

Wendy said...

I will never bitch about a headache ever again. Ever. Cuz if I suffered from migraines like the one you just described I would seriously hurt myself and/or others.

Hope you're feeling better!

Nikki said...

Oh, Lori you poor thing! {{{{{HUGS}}}}}}}}. I've been worrying about you. I'm glad you finally went to Doctor---Sinus infections are no fun--they sure can give you a mother of a headache.

I'm glad you are feeling better.

Take care of yourself!

~ames~ said...

Eek! That's scary!

Hopefully you're on the mend.

{{{LORI}}}

Casee said...

Whenever I think my migraines are bad, I'll come re-read this.

That is horrible!! I'm so glad you're feeling better.

xoxo

Christine said...

Lori,
I'm so sorry you had such a miserable, painful week! I cringed when I read they left you on a gurney in the ER hallway. I thought, "Noooo! That's the worst place! The lights, the sounds, the smells!" You poor thing! I get migraines too, but I don't think anywhere near as bad or as frequent as yours. I'm so grateful yours was only sinus infection and migraine hell and not anything more serious. Not that your situation wasn't serious, but at least not life threatening, you know?

Only once have I had a migraine so bad that the thought that it was more than just a headache went through my mind. I thought aneurysm, too. I remember telling my husband where our important documents were and apologizing that my life insurance and 401(k) was so small. LOL!

Hope you're headache free now. Hugs!

Rosie said...

Holy sh*t! I'm just catching up and even though I knew you had the migraine, for some reason I didn't get it was lingering for days. What a bitch of a thing. Glad to see you are feeling better.