June 23rd 2007

I started an experiment recently, I made a large wall chart and listed on it things that I wanted to accomplish each day. Also on the chart were rows where I could mark on what days I experienced headache pain, how long it lasted, whether I woke with a headache or not, and what type of headache it was.

Looking at it now, it's a bit depressing. In the week I have been keeping up with the chart, I've only have one day that I felt like I was mostly headache free. And on that day, I accomplish quite a bit. Creative endeavors, learning new things, keeping up with housework, exercise... basically all of the things I aspire to get done on the day-to-day basis.

However looking at the days on which I woke up with a headache, or ended up with some type of headache pain throughout the day, my productivity fell off dramatically. This isn't really new information. I mean I understand this happens to me. But it's just kinda strange to see it in black and white its not like I was taking it easy on the days where I was hurting either I still was trying to get stuff done on the chart but everything seemed to be in slow motion on those days and I just couldn't bring myself to move at the speed or with the efficiency that I would have liked.

I guess I should mention that the headaches i am mainly having recently feel more like migraines in the fact that they are on the wrong side of my head, more spread out, and I seem to be more sensitive to motion. Thumping the heel of my hand into my temple for example causes a moment of dizziness and disorientation and no momentary disruption of the pain like I'm used to with a cluster. Hitting yourself dosent really "stop" cluster pain btw... it just sorta "stuns" it for a split seccond, Its actualy really hard to explain but the short story is... Hitting yourself in the head durring a cluster attack feels good... Hitting yourself in the head durring a migraine dosent. I can off-and-on still feel little twinges of cluster like pain behind my right eye throughout the day but they havent been erupting into full-blown cluster attacks just the dull nagging pressure, pain, and disorientation the I refer to as "feeling stupid".

You know, sometimes I get really tired of trying to describe these things it feels like I'm trying to justify them or justify my lack of energy and productivity. It strikes me that none of this really matters. Who cares where the pain is or what it feels like. The bottom line as that almost every single day of my life I feel like crap and I really want it to stop.

Update: Capsaicin spray

We located the Sinus Buster Headache Formula capsaicin spray at Vitamin World at the Willow Bend Mall in west Plano.

Haven't tried it yet. Will post results when he does.


***Edit***
See this post for my experiences with Sinol and Sinus Buster as they relate to cluster headaches.

Capsaicin spray

Doc's cluster headache cycle is just not going away. No screaming bad ones, but he has a headache almost constantly since about February. Saturday we went to three different health food stores looking for this capsaicin nasal spray which is said to help with migraines and anecdotally with some peoples' clusters too. The first one was just a distribution center in an office park (closed), the second one was Roy's Natural Market (closed on Saturdays... seriously, WTF?), and Whole Foods did not carry it. We may have to order it online.


***Edit***
See this post for my experiences with Sinol and Sinus Buster as they relate to cluster headaches.