Gluten-free diet

Hi Jillian, I am in need of support and encouragement. I am so frustrated and stressed out right now. A little more insight on my personal life will be required in order for you to understand and help me though. Due to my illness and my limited income, I have lived with my daughter since my divorce ten years ago. She is almost 25 now, but also has a daughter of her own who is 17 months and her daughter's father lives with us as well. My mother is still living, though my father died quite unexpectedly, but that was 20 years ago, but I do what I can to take care of her. She lives in a senior community. I am engaged to a wonderful man. We have been together for eight years now, but he lives in Ontario, Canada. He has four children, ages 15-22. He is a self employed contractor, so if we want to be together, it is better for me to go to him. Lastly, I had my fur baby, Joey, for the last fourteen years and he took such good care of me. Four weeks ago, I had to have him put to sleep because he was not doing well, having difficulty walking, getting up. Being in chronic pain myself, I could not bare the thought of him suffering, but I am still struggling with that decision and loss.

All that being said, I just spent 17 days in Canada, out of all of them, I had only 5 days that I was not in getting, having, or getting over a migraine. And they were so much worse than I've been accustomed too. Prior to this discovery of a gluten sensitivity, I lived with chronic head/neck pain at a level of 3-5 every day. If the weather changed or I had added stress it jumped up to an 8-9 and I took my rescue meds and distracted my way through the rest of my day as best as I could or went to bed early.

Now, I've had some days with no pain, but going from 0-8 is seemingly so much worse for me. My rescue meds are not helping and I am unable to distract and muddle through. These migraines put me down and out.

The frustration is, I can not figure out what is causing or triggering my migraines. I am still working through the elimination diet. While in Canada, keeping track of my diet and the weather, it seemed if I ate ANYTHING other than a fresh salad, I got a headache. Foods I had deemed ok to eat while at home, were not ok while I was there. What I call my comfort food when I don't feel well, ginger ale and gluten free ginger snaps, seemed to make my headache worse or that was my deduction because the weather was not a factor.

I feel like I am missing something. Perhaps, an allergy. I will also admit my life and how I live it is quite stressful, however, I also do not see a way to change it. My fiancé will be moving down here with me after we are married, but that is going to take some time because he will have to find an employer willing to sponsor him because I can not because I am unable to financially. There is light at the end of the tunnel though.

Also, I need to mention that my Neurologist will no longer give me the botox injections because he said I would have to have MARKED improvement this time around because it has been a year and a half that he has been treating me and he feels they are no longer working and wants to refer me to a pain clinic. Though he will continue to prescribe the Nameda he started me on as a preventative and Zanaflex at a dose of 10 mg at bed time and 2mg during the day. My PCP prescribes my abortive meds of Phenergan and Tramadol. I also take Ibuprofen and Benadryl with them (the Tramadol makes me itchy).

While reading through the list of foods the can be triggers, I noticed the majority of them are because they contain histamines. Do you know if taking anti-histamines H1 or H2's can be helpful in blocking the food histamines? For instance, Lorantidine or Formotidine.

To add to my frustration, while I was in Canada and having such a rough time with my migraines, I started to get all over body aches, as if my whole body is on red alert constantly. And I was exhausted, but for no other reason than being in pain.

I am back home now. The body aches continue, the migraine broke this past Sunday morning, that is how I was able to make it home. Though it was short lived because it stormed last night. I am crying, depressed, and so frustrated. I thought I had such a break through with the gluten discovery and perhaps the Daith piercing. But I honestly feel worse now than before I made that connection.

I was reading here, looking for more answers and have found that a lot of chronic migraine sufferers take Amitriptyline. I remember taking that several years ago but was switched to Celexa. I have had the discussion with my PCP about not feeling as if it was helping as much. Adding Abilify to the Celexa was part of the reason I had an MI and went into CHF, so that is not an option, but switching could be and I thought I would ask my doctor about it. I am going to try to see her tomorrow (Tuesday).

I appreciate just having the opportunity to get my frustration out. My daughter only sees my pain and crying, my fiancé feels helpless, and my mother swears it is ALL stress related and trying to explain any of this to all of them is not helpful for me. I apologize for the length of my ranting, but truly hope that it was somewhat insightful so that you can help me or point me in the right direction, because I am just at my wits end. My entire body is screaming at me to do something and I am at a total loss of what to do.

Thank you so much, this means so much to me.

Suellen

Jillian, My research skills were better today and I was able to answer my own questions regarding histamine in food and how to find out if it is a problem and what to take if I think it is.

I have an appointment this afternoon with my PCP. Thank you again for just being here to listen, I appreciate it more than you know.

Suellen