<\/p>\n
If I were not a medical professional but a satirist, I would describe my signs and symptoms like this: a monster lives inside my head. And this monster is extraordinarily demanding.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
It insists on ambient temperature (as described in the Environment and Health chapters of medical textbooks), hydration well beyond what a normal person requires, timely meals, and optimal sleep. It grows irritable when its host is exposed to excess heat, sunlight, cold, overthinking, stress, prolonged conversations, over socialising, anger, sadness, or crying \u2014 the list goes on. The beverages the host relies on \u2014 tea, coffee, alcohol \u2014 are this monster’s sworn enemies. The host is a multitasker who wants to make full use of her\/his brain, but the monster demands peace and quiet. The list of its grievances is never-ending. The moment it feels provoked, it unleashes immense pain in the host’s head.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The clever host tries to appease it \u2014 offering water, adjusting the temperature, or getting some sleep \u2014 but by the time the pain sets in, the monster has already initiated its vicious cycle, one that will haunt the host for days.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Medically speaking, the pain is typically throbbing, unilateral, and localized to the temporal or occipital region, often accompanied by tightening of the neck muscles. It may or may not present with nausea and vomiting. The host frequently cannot tolerate any form of light during an episode.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The monster commandeers one or two productive days from the host’s schedule, demanding nothing but complete rest \u2014 no thinking, no screens, no light, no sound, no reading, no conversation. It essentially asks you to lie still like the dead. In reality, this is rarely possible. And here lies another cruelty: with only a headache as the presenting symptom and no definitive laboratory diagnosis, requesting sick leave once or twice a month \u2014 sometimes more \u2014 becomes embarrassing. So, the host turns to medication. Analgesics are, without question, one of allopathy’s greatest gifts to humankind.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The host has lived with this monster since the 1990s. For years, it responded to Nimesulide \u2014 until the drug was banned. The first investigation took the host to an ophthalmologist, since visual acuity defects are a common differential diagnosis for headaches in children. The first ophthalmologist diagnosed hypermetropia and prescribed corrective lenses. The monster was unimpressed, and the pain continued. A second ophthalmologist, however, found the host’s vision to be perfectly normal and correctly identified the true culprit. Aceclofenac with paracetamol was prescribed in the 2000s, along with advice to avoid known triggers. Over time, the monster developed resistance to these analgesics \u2014 much like bacteria develop resistance to antibiotics. The host then moved to naproxen, which helped somewhat, until sumatriptan was introduced and proved to be something of a wonder drug. It came, however, with its own side effects.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
With age, and as environmental temperatures rose, there were days when even triptans failed. That was when the host understood something important: this monster behaves less like a disease and more like a strict teacher. It demands discipline \u2014 a lifestyle built on balance, moderation, and consistency, the very principles of primordial and primary prevention.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
This monster has a name: Migraine<\/strong>.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Its etiopathogenesis is still debated among neurologists, and every patient carries a unique constellation of triggers. It is a genuinely disabling condition worldwide, one that quietly erodes quality of life. For those living in poverty, migraine compounds the problem \u2014 reduced productivity limits financial advancement, and managing the illness demands resources many simply do not have. The stigma surrounding it is an added burden. Because it cannot be confirmed through a single lab test, it is profoundly difficult to make others understand what it means to live with this expensive, invisible monster. There are pharmaceutical companies selling ayurvedic balms\/oil for daily application with cannabis sativa as one of the ingredients. So to get rid of one monster get dependent on another. As soon as you walk in pharmacy asking for triptan the seller identifies you as a potential client of alternative medicines. The cost of all are high.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n As global temperatures continue to rise with each passing decade, the burden of migraine grows silently alongside them. Evidence increasingly links migraine with elevated risks of depression and stroke. Death is, of course, the only permanent end \u2014 but until then, improving quality of life is what matters most.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n For this illness, prevention remains the closest thing to a cure.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" If I were not a medical professional but a satirist, I would describe my signs and symptoms like this: a monster lives inside my head. And this monster is extraordinarily demanding. It insists on ambient temperature (as described<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":902044,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[362],"class_list":["post-902043","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mental-health","tag-headacheorheadsplit"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/iapsm.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/902043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/iapsm.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/iapsm.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iapsm.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iapsm.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=902043"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/iapsm.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/902043\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":902046,"href":"http:\/\/iapsm.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/902043\/revisions\/902046"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iapsm.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/902044"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/iapsm.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=902043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iapsm.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=902043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iapsm.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=902043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}