Out of Nowhere

I had just gotten over a sinus infection at the tail end of June in 2017. The only thing I changed was to take a nose spray for it. When the infection left, these daily headaches started.

At first, I tried stopping the nose spray because that was the only thing I had changed. The headaches started to get better until a front came in. I was laying in bed, attempting to nap, when it felt like something exploded behind my left eye. Out of nowhere, these headaches came and never left.

Ever since, I have dealt with these daily headaches. I got diagnosed with chronic intractable migraines in December of that same year, after trying a few antidepressants and an MRI. Like a few others, my MRI showed nothing major, other than being born premature.

I have tried at least five different medications, ranging from those antidepressants to even the new CGRP medicine. The pain dulled a bit, but it never truly went away. It hasn't thus far. When I get moments of very little pain, I often wonder, 'Is this what it is like to be healthy?'

Despite my pain, I am still going to school to become a Meteorologist and living my life to the fullest. I learned that if I do anything fun, then I could get a worse migraine the next day. Yet, this only limits my exposure to these events, not eliminate them. I can tolerate pain a bit better now as well. Mentally, I'm hanging in there, but I want people to believe me when I deal with these struggles.

I get that my migraines are invisible and that it is rare for me to show any physical signs of suffering. But I get dizzy and rather sensitive to light, along with irritability, sound sensitivity, and fatigued. These symptoms, for the most part, are not visible like a bruise or cut and I now have to convince people that they are happening. These migraines are not just a headache and cannot be fixed by a simple life change. For me, I don't know where they started, but as I reflect back on these past two years, I am glad that no one else in my family has to deal with them as much as I do.