Living With Migraines

What Are The Symptoms Of Migraines?

The primary symptom of migraines is an intense headache, typically on one side of the head. Pain is generally described as throbbing or pounding. It can start as a less intense ache that gradually develops into mild, moderate, or severe pulsing pain. If left untreated for a long, the headache pain will become mild to moderate to even severe. Pain may shift from one side of your head to the other, it may affect the front and back of your head, or you may even feel like your whole head is being affected. Some people feel pain around their eyes, temples, face, sinuses, jaw, or neck. Mostly, the migraines last about four hours, although they may last much longer in severe cases.

Symptoms of Migraine

Now there are few symptoms that solely affect a stage of migraine. Each stage of migraine may come with unique symptoms. Please continue reading this article to know more about the symptoms of migraines:

Prodrome symptoms:

• Problems concentrating

• Irritability and depression

• Difficulty speaking and reading

• Trouble falling asleep

• Excessive yawning

• Nausea

• Fatigue and tiredness

• Sensitivity to light and sound

• Increased food cravings

• Increased need for urination

• Muscle stiffness

Aura symptoms:

• Numbness and tingling in arms or legs

• Experiencing visual disturbances such as blurry spots, sparkles, or lines

• Temporary loss of eyesight

• One side of the body feels weakened

• Speech changes

Headache symptoms:

• Pain and stiffness in the neck

• Depression

• Giddiness

• Anxiety

• Increased sensual sensitivity to light, smell, and sound

• Nasal congestion

• Insomnia (trouble falling asleep)

• Feeling nauseous

• Throwing up

Postdrome symptoms:

• Loss of concentration or focus

• Depression

• Adrenal Fatigue

• Lack of cognition

• Euphoric mood

Other symptoms of migraine headaches include:

• An upset stomach

• Pain in the lower abdomen

• Loss of appetite

• Feeling very warm (sweating) or cold (chills)

• Pale skin color (pallor)

• Feeling tired

• Dizziness and blurred vision

• Tender scalp

• Diarrhea (rare)

• Fever (rare)

What Are The Causes Of A Migraine?

The causes of migraine headaches are quite complicated and not fully comprehensive. A headache occurs when specific nerves in your blood vessels send pain signals to your brain. The brain releases inflammatory substances into your head's nerves and blood vessels. It's unclear why your nerves do that.

What Triggers a migraine?

A variety of factors can trigger migraine attacks. Some common triggers include:

• Emotional stress

Emotional stress is quite possibly the most common trigger of migraines. During unpleasant events, certain chemicals in the brain are delivered to fight what is going on, which is known as the "flight or fight" reaction. The secretion of these chemicals can bring about a headache. Different emotions like nervousness, stress, anxiety, and excitement can increase muscle tension and enlarge blood vessels. That can make your headache more serious.

• Missing a meal

Delaying your meal or not eating at the proper time might also trigger your migraine headache.

• Sensitivity to particular additives and preservatives

Foods and beverages such as aged cheese, chocolate, pepperonis, hot dogs, luncheon meats, fermented foods, pickled foods, fizzy drinks, and alcoholic drinks contain chemicals such as nitrates that may be responsible for triggering up to 30% of migraines.

• Caffeine

Too much intake of caffeine or a sudden withdrawal from caffeine can cause migraine headaches when the caffeine level suddenly drops. Your blood vessels are believed to become sensitized to caffeine, which means they need caffeine for functioning. When you don't get enough of it, a headache might occur. Caffeine is in some cases prescribed by healthcare providers to help with treating intense headache episodes; however, it should not be used very frequently.

• Daily use of pain-relieving medications

Using pain-relieving medicine on a daily basis can cause a rebound headache too.

• Hormonal changes in women

Migraines usually occur in women when they are approaching menstruation and during menopause. During menstruation, the sudden drop in estrogen also triggers migraines. Hormonal changes may be brought about by birth control pills and hormone replacement therapy. Migraines are usually worse between puberty and menopause since the estrogen imbalance typically doesn't occur in young girls and post-menopausal women. If your hormones are causing migraines, you may tend to have fewer headaches after menopause. Hormonal changes s show no proof of triggering migraines in men.

• Light

Since eyes are over-sensitive when looking directly at lights, hence flashing lights, fluorescent lights, light from the TV or computer, and sunlight may trigger you.

• Other

Other possible triggers include:

• Changing weather conditions such as storm fronts, barometric pressure changes, strong winds, or changes in altitude.

• Being overly tired, taking overexertion.

• Dieting or not drinking enough water.

• Changes in your regular sleep pattern.

• Exposure to loud noises.

• Exposure to smoke, perfumes, or other odors.

• Certain medications cause blood vessels to swell.

Typical Migraine Treatments

Treatments of migraine can be complicated as in order to treat the condition well, it is important to determine the underlying cause, which is usually unknown. Considerable sufferers will try a multi-faced approach to addressing frequent migraines. Treatments for migraine include:

• Lifestyle Changes

Several individuals work to make lifestyle changes to avoid their known migraine triggers. For example, if individuals recognize overstimulation of their senses as a migraine trigger, they may work to prevent excessive exposure. Likewise, suppose a female is dealing with migraines monthly associated with hormonal fluctuations during her menstrual cycle. In that case, she may have to see a doctor find a way to stabilize her fluctuating hormone levels.

• Over-the-Counter Pain Relievers

Over-the-counter pain reliever tends to be the best for treating migraines. Typical migraine headache medications don't always help relieve it completely, or at least not along with the symptoms that can come with the headache. Taking over-the-counter medications like ibuprofen or even aspirin for more than ten days a month to help with migraine pain can sometimes trigger more headaches.

• Prescription Medications

Doctor-prescribed drugs for migraine headaches usually fall into two types:

• medication to relieve the pain or symptoms during the attack

• medication to prevent the attack

The medications often recommended to foil the risks of having a migraine headache or reduce the severity are those fundamentally intended to treat different issues. For instance, a few specialists will prescribe beta-blockers for hypertension, or antidepressants are typically given for depression. Although some of these medications show efficacy for some people, most come along with highly disturbing side effects.

Several medications may be prescribed for people during a migraine attack, such as opioid pain medications, triptans intended to block neural pain management paths to the brain, and even anti-nausea drugs. These drugs can be effective, but all of them can come with undesirable side effects.

For example, opioid pain medications are highly addictive and not ideal for long-term treatment. Onabotulinumtoxin A, also referred to as Botox-A, is another medication option for some types of migraines. Botox must be injected into targeted points in the neck and head, and its effects can last for about three months. Unfortunately, even Botox can have a few undesirable side effects, such as eyebrow drooping or blurry vision.

Ketamine Latest Therapeutic Solution for Severe Migraines

Doctors have been using ketamine as an anesthesia medication for decades now. The anesthetic is categorized as a "dissociative anesthetic" as it induces sedation uniquely compared to other medicines of the same class. While ketamine at high doses can cause a trance-like state or sedation, lower doses can effectively relieve intense pain.

The drug has been used in place of opioids to help prevent pain for people coming out of excruciating surgeries. Instead of affecting the opioid receptors, ketamine affects the N-Methyl-D-aspartic acid (NMDA) receptors in the brain, so it acts as a signaling molecule via this receptor to prevent pain. The drug has naturally received attention for treating complex types of pains, such as migraine pain.

Get Ketamine Nasal Spray From a Compounding Pharmacy

With so much promise that ketamine offers as a potential agent to help migraine sufferers, more patients who regularly deal with these debilitating headaches are taking note now. If you are one of those patients whose headaches have become intolerable and who are ready to find a migraine treatment that may offer relief, please reach out to us at Harbor Compounding Pharmacy. Our specialized pharmacists can work with you and your doctor to determine if intranasal ketamine spray could be right for you.