Tomamax

I'm sitting at my desk listening to soft music throuh my headphones with my door shut, sipping hot stong coffee waiting for the topamax and imitrex to take hold. My migraines are back. With a force that is beyond anything that I have ever experienced. I don't mean to be dramatic about it, but this time it is scarry stuff, even for me, the girl who gets every odd diesease.

It started a week ago. My right side of my face went numb. Not all day, just on and off. I ignored it. It went away. But on Friday my right arm was numb, I was stumblinging, I had trouble getting words out and was scared. The doctor's office told me to go to the ER asap, where they thought (at first) I was having a stroke...but quickly decided that I was probably having an aypical migraine which acts just like a stoke. My brother Kennan came down and sat with me, Mike came from work, and we waited while they did all the big tests. My options at that point weren't great: brain tumor, stoke, or atypical migraine. Huh, which one would I prefer to be having??? I had the head CT, the MRI and an MRV which is a brain scan that looks deeper into the veins to make sure I wasn't clotting anywhere. I had nothing abnormal. So, I am the mystery migraine patient. They gave me drugs and said, please come back if symptoms get worse. They also told me that they had no idea how long my right side would feel paralyzed. Maybe a day, maybe week, they had no idea.

Saturday I still felt weak, but I wanted to try to fit back into my regular life. So, I went to softball practice. Which wasn't as bad as I thought. I could throw the ball--I had to think about it really hard, but I could hit the target. Mike was helping me and he had me bat, which I could hit the ball. Not bad. But it wore me out, and trying to field balls in the outfield was odd. I felt like at any moment I would fall down, so I sat it out. At home I went to grab a glass of water and my entire right arm was shaking (think MS where you have no control) it lasted about a minute and then was gone, so I wasn't too freaked out). I was still having headaches, but this isn't something new, I have migraines, I get migraines...so I proceed with my day.

Mike and I had longstanding plans with friends of ours to go to have dinner and go to the INXS concert (which was AMAZING) and there was no way that I was going to miss that. We dropped the kids off at Mike's sister's house (thanks Julie and Todd) and headed to dinner and the concert. During the concert is when I started falling apart. My right leg was shaking hard and I couldn't stand. And I had a hard time walking. We stayed through the concert (me looking at an older 60ish woman dancing the row ahead of us an jealous, secretly wondering if I was not going to be permanently paralyzed and an invalid forever). But after the concert we went back to the ER.

ER. Saturday night. In Milwaukee. At 11:30pm.

With all the gun-shot traumas, drunk people, car accidents, and whatever else was going on all night long. No one saw me for hours. Well, they saw me momentarily, told me that they looked at my charts from the day before, that I didn't have a brain tumor, so I shouldn't worry. And I said, but you told me to come back if it got worse! And they said, well, we have gun shot victims, so you'll have to wait. At 3am, I said I wanted to go home, that I would see my neurologist on Thursday. Then I talked to two more doctors who were nice, but they didn't have anything new to add. I stayed and waited until 6am and then we went home. We had church with Mike's parents at 10:30 and needed some sleep. And, it was clear no one could or would be able to do anything for me.

So, it is Wednesday. My feeling in my right side still hasn't fully come back. I get moments where I cry because I am scared. But I know logically that I am not dying some horrible death. I am back on anti-seizure drugs to treat the migraines. No more depacote (I protested) now I am on topamax (which should make me lose weight :-) and I take imitrex as an emergency drug, so as soon as I feel a migraine coming on I take a pill. I have to say, this hasn't worked real well, as I still have the same headache for a week. So, I think they are going to prescribe injections that I will take at home. We'll see. I see my dr. tomorrow. I can't wait.

In the meantime, I am trying to adjust. I haven't worn high heels in a week, very, very sad. I will try and play softball tonight, but Mike has permission to bench me at any moment. I have trouble typing with my right hand and am slow. And I get really tired. But, in a weird way, I am adjusting to this. I have started to notice people that are in wheelchairs more--and I have more empathy for them. That even though I am definitly "off" I am still upright. I still can go to work. And there are moments, even thought they are brief, where the headache clears and I can get back to work.

Like this one. The drugs, the caffiene and the sugar have all kicked in.
I'm going to do some work while I am high.