The single worst night of my life

I'm hoping I never ever ever ever have another post with that title.

I've blogged before about having migraines. I've been suffering from them for 7 years. 7 years too long. Over the last 3yrs I have been able to successfully treat them with sumatriptan succinate (generic Imitrex). Sometimes they would reoccur in a couple of days, but I could always count on relief within 20mins of taking the pill (or using the epi-like pen). Last night I was hit with the WORST migraine I've ever had. I can't even begin to put enough emphasis on that sentence. I can now even say it was worse than labor pain - are you saying "yea right"?? Well it's true.

I sat down after giving Persephone a bath and immediately started feeling this pounding/throbbing in my head. At first I thought maybe it was just because I sat down too fast, but it kept on. I was trying to give it a minute or two to fade away, but it didn't. I started crying because the pain was scaring me. I thought my head was about to explode. Normally when I have a migraine it's always on one side of my head or the other, but this pain was literally around the entire top of my head and sometimes the pain would radiate down into my jaw. I was pushing my head with my hands, trying to apply some pressure to relieve the throbbing. I took off downstairs with tears pouring out of my eyes and was scrambling through my purse to try and find my medicine. Hardy was holding Persephone when I made my way into the kitchen and he immediately started freaking out. I took the pill and decided to wait a little while to try and let it kick in. I tried standing, laying down, closing my eyes, opening my eyes...every pain remedy I've used in the past and nothing was working. Finally Hardy suggested we either call 911 or go to the hospital. I was scared, I didn't want to waste money on an ER bill if it wasn't anything major, but he insisted.

Thirty minutes passed and what was once my reliable sumatriptan hadn't relieved ANY pain. It was just past 8:00pm, I was worried about screwing up Persephone's schedule. I tried to talk Hardy into letting a friend drive me and him staying home with Persephone, but he insisted on taking me. I kept thinking about how this was going to screw up her sleep schedule - so selfless, right?

We got to the ER at about 8:20, I signed in and the nurse called me back to get my weight and BP. I should have taken a photo of the BP machine with my phone - it said it was 178/108! I just knew I was dying...I thought this was it, my head is literally killing me. They got me in a room and the doctor came in to see me, he had me do a few cognitive tests to make sure I was functioning then said they would give me a pain shot and send me on my way. The shot was called toradol. By the time we got home, it had kicked in and my head was feeling little to no pain. I went to bed. At 12:45am I woke up to my head pounding again - not nearly as bad as it had been, but enough to make me restless. I ventured downstairs and just sat...tried doing some research online, debating whether or not to take some medicine we had in our cabinet and whether or not it would kill me.

Eventually I called the ER, explained I was in there just 4 short hours ago and the shot had worn off - WHAT CAN I DO?!? She told me to take some ibuprofen as that was basically what toradol was. So I took 800mg and paired it with 2 benadryl. I finally dosed off....

I woke up this morning feeling extremely sleepy, for obvious reasons, but my head feels alright. My neck is so sore from all the ways I was twisting and turning it to try and relieve the pain last night, and my head almost feels bruised from how hard it was pounding. The doctor in the ER didn't seem alarmed, just told me to get in touch with my doctor if this headache persisted into today. I will tell all of you, migraines are serious. I've heard people say they have them, but they just toss the word around because their headache won't go away. I do not wish this pain on anyone (maybe bad people who deserve it). If I could have just cut a hole open in my skull to help relieve the pounding I was close to it. I hope I never have to experience that again. In my entire adult life I've never had to go to the ER for myself. It freaked me out, made so many thoughts race through my already crippling head.

Of course I'm glad it's nothing major - at least I sure hope it isn't. But I'm pissed that I had to throw $200 on a credit card to visit the ER and the shot didn't even help me through the night.


*****Update

At about 1:30 this afternoon the crazy migraine came back. Caught me at work and it crippled me. The only relief I found was when I held my breath. A coworker drove me back to the ER where this time they ran bloodwork, did a ct scan, gave me an IV of zofran, toradol and demoral. Everything came back "normal", but my blood pressure was sky high in the 170's/100's just like last night. The doctor was so sweet and thorough and diagnosed me with hypertension (high blood pressure). Gave me a prescription of 5mg lisinopril and told me to follow up with a neurologist about my migraines. She said migraines and high blood pressure are the perfect storm and just feed off one another making for a horrible migraine. Please keep me in your thoughts, prayers, dreams or even poems...hell I don't care. I'm just ready to feel normal again.