Aye, My Eye
Sep 25th, 2005 at 6:38 pm by Susie
Between the ear cyst, my strained eyes and a screaming TMJ attack, I was too cranky to be around people today. So I settled in with a new library book, curled up on the futon. The extra pair of dollar-store glasses was perched on my nose in front of my bifocals while the Eagles game played in the background. And wouldn’t you just know it, that’s when I got another opthalmic migraine.
I haven’t had one in two or three months so it took me by surprise. It’s not so much the hallucination part - that only lasts a half-hour or so. It’s that it makes me so dizzy and nauseated for the rest of the day. (Man, it sure was one of those weeks.) I figured out what triggered it: I’d turned on the overhead light that’s connected to the ceiling fan, and the flickering light must have set me off.
I’m really hungry but I’m too sick to eat. Plus, chewing anything at all sends white-hot arrows into my brain via my jaw. Arghhh…. I’m going to take a nap and get up later to watch “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” Then I’m going to bed for the night.
At least the Eagles won.
Wow, Susie, I didn’t know you suffered from TMJ pain. I’ve been a chronic sufferer for over 20 years now (actually, before the condition was understood or named) and have tried every living therapy known to man. In a strange way, it’s what led me to blogging. Though there are times every day when I simply can’t stand to talk, I CAN write.
A year ago I ended up in the hospital ICU with the biggest blood clot any of the staff had ever seen. In the course of my treatment it was discovered that I have a condition called hyperhomosysteinemia, which is sort of the opposite of hemophilia — in the case of HHS, the blood clots much faster than normal. Anyway, the upshot is one symptom of HHS is TMJ pain. The treatment for HHS is daily doses of folic acid and B12 in a special compound that can be metabolized, and since I’ve been on the vitamin supplements my TMJ has improved quite a bit. I still wear an appliance whenever I’m not at work and I still ache most nights, but the searing, white-hot pain that I’d grown used to greeting me around 4 p.m. every day has largely disappeared.
Ask your doctor if you could possibly have hyperhomosysteinemia. Some of the symptoms you describe are also sometimes associated with HHS (including a deficient immune system that means you catch every dang bug that goes around). You never know! And you’re too valuable, Susie, we all need you 100%.
Right now I’m eating the sixth popsicle I’ve had today. When eating is painful, I resort to soup, Blue Bell Bullets or Fudgesicles!
How funny. I actually had Fudgesicles for breakfast today.
What is TMJ?
Google it. TMJ is typically used as shorthand for an pain involving the jaw joint or the breakdown of the articular cartilage there, rheumatoid arthritis can play a role (with susie’s history of alergies I’d say that was the culprit, but I ain’t no doctor, she may have just slept with her head propped up wrong last night). Every single adult ends up with it to some degree, some get to the end of their lives with only the occasional popping or grinding noises, others get accute episodes where it’s painful to move the jaw, and impossible to chew.
I’m so sorry to read of how bad you’re feeling. I hope things clear up soon and you’re once again as fit as a fiddle–and ready for love, as the song goes. Really enjoy your blog.
Lord, do I know those migraines! I actually had one take the vision out of my left eye. I could only see half faces. It was the scariest day of my life. I thought I was having a stroke. I ended up having a cat scan done that day. I was lucky, I worked at a hospital at the time.
Of course, the found nothing. That’s the problem with migraines, there seems no cause to them, none seen by any type of imagining.
Susie,
Don’t know if you’ve tried it, but I started having occular migraines due to rising eye pressure. I suffer from pigment dispersion syndrome and the pressure in my eyes was high. Since getting drops, all migraines have stopped.
Usually people with rising eye pressures don’t have symptoms, but I did.
Susie: Hang in there girl. My thoughts are with you as I know first hand what you are going though. Bb
Greyhair’s comment is funny to me because when I at 25 (but with a family history of glaucoma) got scary blurry vision the first thing I did was get tested for Glaucoma. Of course it also was visual migrane.
Hope you’re feeling better. Are you using any prescription medicine for your migraine? I’ve used Maxalt and Axert after having migraines for a decade, and now I find that a day-long debilitation will vanish in about half an hour.
I enjoy your posts a great deal–have been a regular reader for three or four months now.
The ceiling fans set me off all the damn time, esp if the overhead light is on. It’s especially bad if I try to read while the fan blades are in my peripheral vision. Sometimes it helps if I wear a cap with a visor in order to read. The reflection of it (or anything fleeting) on the edge of my glasses or on the edge of the bifocal lens also will do it.