Comfortably Numb

I used to get migraines all the time, then they stopped suddenly and I was okay with that. Migraines are no fun, and my brain likes to push itself to the extremes when I get them. Then today, it happened. I got a terrible migraine.

It's a weird sensation that occurs over the several hours related to the migraine, and I've never fully documented it. It's quite odd really, and when my body reacts I can't help but get sucked in and become fascinated by how it's rebelling against me.

Early in the morning I had a dentist appointment and on the way there (I wasn't driving, thankfully) my vision started going. When my vision goes, I get a strange blindspot effect where it feels like part of one of my eyes has gone blind, it's almost like monovision. It makes it very hard to focus, so I sat in the dentist's office just staring at what I could find. I must have looked quite odd.

After the appointment my eyes went back to normal, so I hurried off to work.

Around 1, my vision started getting flighty again. I happened to be in the middle of a conversation with my website partner (online), so typing was no picnic. When I can barely focus on the screen, I end up typing like I'm blind, just hoping the words I make are spelled correctly and the sentences make sense. It was at this point that the numbing started.

It's common for me, when I get migraines, to go numb in different parts of my body. The worst episode occurred in Middle School, when the entire left side of my body went numb. There are, I imagine, few feelings stranger than having an entire half of your body go numb.

With all episodes, I never know what bit of me will numb. Today my entire right hand went out, which made typing quite odd. Parts of my face went out too, with my cheeks and around my eyes numbing for a bit.

I ended up getting slight lockjaw, the muscles in my mouth felt stiff and I didn't really want to speak at all. Of course, I had to, as it's quite necessary to communicate. That feeling subsided after an hour or so, while other bits of my upper body went through numb stages.

By 3 I was ready to call it quits. My vision had subsided enough so I could see and drive, although bright light still bothered me, and I knew if I stayed around it would not be good.

I got lucky in that today the sky was overcast and rainy, which made driving and being outside far easier than if it were bright and sunny.

I came home and took an Imotrex then tried to sleep off the migraine (my head had been throbbing for the past two hours off and on. Whenever I have a migraine, the headache part is not as noticeable compared to the flighty vision and numbing) for an hour or so.

I took a few Ibuprofen, and so far my head is still in a bit of pain and I have some light issues but nothing big.

This was a completely out of the blue occurrence and I really hope I don't get it again any time soon. I never found out the exact cause of my migraines, it could have been anything really. Nevertheless, the fact that they stopped after a while was a wonderful blessing, but now this random one has me back to paranoid.

Do you ever get migraines? Have you ever had any similar symptoms?