Cluster

YIKES!

I have had a tough couple of days. A long time ago I visited a neurologist because I was having AWFUL headaches...he determined it was migranes and gave me meds.

It wasn't migraines. He also said I could possibly have "Cluster" headaches. I still got headaches and gave up trying to treat it.

This summer has been called the headache summer. I got them ALL THE TIME. I just learned to live with it. When I didn't have a headache it was heaven! I started getting them everyday this past week....I decided to google and google and google to try to figure out what type of headache it was so I could treat it because Advil, Aleve, Excedrin, and Tylenol would not work. The headache would be behind my eye a lot of the time and light and noise would make it even worse. Falling asleep wouldn't help. I'd wake up with the awful headache. This was torture.

Figured it out last night while I was dealing with a headache that lasted for about two days.

I DO have cluster headaches.

Good thing: they are benign.
Bad thing: NO over the count meds help AT ALL.

 Cluster headache is one of the most painful types of headache. Cluster headache is sometimes called the "alarm clock headache" because it commonly awakens you in the middle of the night with intense pain in or around the eye on one side of your head.

Bouts of frequent attacks — known as cluster periods — may last from weeks to months, usually followed by remission periods when the headache attacks stop completely. During remission, no headaches occur for months and sometimes even years.

Fortunately, cluster headache is rare and not life-threatening. Treatments can help make cluster headache attacks shorter and less severe.

• Excruciating pain, generally located in or around the eye, but may radiate to other areas of the face, head, neck and shoulders
• One-sided pain
• Restlessness
• Excessive tearing
• Redness in the eye of the affected side
• Stuffy or runny nasal passage in the nostril on the affected side of your face
• Sweaty, pale skin (pallor) on the face
• Swelling around the eye on the affected side of your face
• Reduced pupil size
• Drooping eyelid

The pain of a cluster headache is often described as sharp, penetrating or burning. People with this condition say that the pain feels like a hot poker being stuck in the eye or that the eye is being pushed out of its socket. People with cluster headache appear restless, preferring to pace or sit and rock back and forth to soothe the attack. In contrast to people with migraine, people with cluster headache usually avoid lying down during an attack because this position seems to increase the pain.

Some migraine-like symptoms, including nausea, sensitivity to light and sound, and aura, may occur with a cluster headache, though usually on one side.

Cluster period characteristicsA cluster period generally lasts from six to 12 weeks. The starting date and the duration of each cluster period may be consistent from period to period. For example, cluster periods may occur seasonally, such as every spring or every fall.

Most people have episodic cluster headaches, which means the cluster headaches occur for one week to a year, followed by a pain-free remission period that may last as long as six to 12 months before another cluster headache develops. Chronic cluster periods may continue for more than a year, or pain-free periods may last less than one month.

Want to know how to treat these headaches...extra oxygen and melatonin....lol . . .. There are also different treatments that don't sound familiar....melatonin it is. 

SOURCE

um yuck. Well at least I know now. I had to skip small group yesterday :( I fell asleep at 8pm...woke up pain free....THANK YOU. 

here is to a cluster free day...I sure do hope.