Creativity And Clusters

Just a note on this new cycle.

For the last few months I have been working very hard on a new song. It is not directly about Cluster headaches, but it is about being the owner of a body riddled with odd health problems and how that effects how the world sees you and how you eventually see yourself.

I have been very focused on getting this piece of music done, or at least polished to a point that I would feel comfortable letting others hear it. But a couple of weeks ago that drive just left me... it drained away and I could no longer find it. I tried, but it was gone and the song sits NEARLY finished  like so many others from my past. I have been cursing myself... hating myself over it. Thinking that I am a incredible idiot and weak minded for not being able to push past my fear of what people will think of the final song, and I am sure that is part of it.

But this morning I realized something else.

When I was working on the song a lot and making great progress... I felt good. I was not in a headache cycle. I was free of not just the pain but also the "Aura" symptoms that go along with my clusters. Around the time that I started loosing focus on completing the song is about the same time I started feeling the effects of a new "cycle aura". Now reading this, you may think that those two things seem obviously related, but looking out from this flawed brain... its not always so easy. I am always trying to trick myself into thinking that I feel better than I do... That I have just a little more energy so that I don't let people down. Sometimes I fool myself into ignoring a LOT of discomfort. So waking up to the fact that you have increasingly felt like crap for several weeks and eventually giving yourself a break is not that odd really.

Spooky to think about the effect it has had over the last 20 years... Looking back, I realized that I was most productive musically before my cluster headaches began and  although I made some of my best music after the clusters started... I slowed down dramatically. And, I also stopped performing live. It was so long ago. I can't recall if it was a conscious decision, or more like something that just naturally happened. I can remember being afraid of what I would do if I were to get an attack on stage... The idea that I would be exposed like that, that I might let down my bandmates in such a dramatic way, the fact that almost no one would understand or be forgiving. I am certain that it dampened if not halt my performing in front of people.

I can recall that even though my headaches have slowed down a great deal and the chances of it happening were slim, when I did a recent reunion show with one of my first bands... I was scared to death that I would have an attack and not be able to perform. I almost said no to doing the show.

So, just a reminder to myself... finish the damn song! (but its OK to wait till you feel better).