Migraines May Be Triggered By Light

The glare of certain lights can trigger migraines. Obviously the glare of the sun can be the worst. There are ways to cut the glare and save your head. The first is obviously sun glasses. It is important to wear polarized UV glasses which block the glare. I wear mine all the time. I wear mine day and night, in Walmart, when I'm driving, when I'm fishing, and when I am out shoveling snow. I have friends that may never have seen my eyes!

Wearing a hat with a dark brim is another method of cutting glare to your eyes. Black absorbs light, while white reflects it. This is why athletes put black under their eyes when playing sports. We would look even more ridiculous than wearing sunglasses at night, if we blacked our eyes. Wearing a hat or visor (who wears visors any more?) can help prevent more light from reaching your eyes.

A third way to diffuse light and prevent glare is to wear a dark shirt. White or lighter colored shirts reflect light, and hence can create a glare that can cause eye strain. I'm not saying to wear a black shirt all the time, but wearing a gray or even a tan shirt can make a big difference. It is amazing how much of a difference this simple clothing choice can make.

Protect yourself from migraines triggered by light. There are lots of other ways to protect yourself from light overload. What are your favorites?

 

Migraine: Are You Wearing Your Sunglasses At Night?

There are not too many pictures of me without my shades in the last few years. It’s a common joke for friends and family to ponder whether or not, my future is that bright. I often wonder about that as well. Future or not, the simple fact is that I have a severe light sensitivity. Day or night, candle or headlight, have me wincing and turning away and cringing with the fear of the onslaught of another migraine.

Light sensitivity is a very common symptom of migraine sufferers and being light sensitive does not mean that I already have a headache or that it is coming on. Bright light is one of my triggers, but I know that the “triggers do not ‘cause’ the migraine. Instead, they are now thought to activate processes that cause migraine in people who are prone to the condition. For many people like me, light can be an enemy.

I have found the following ways to help prevent light from triggering a migraine. I try to wear a dark colored hat with a brim when I go outside in the sunlight. The darker the color, the more light is absorbed by the hat before it reaches my eyes. This is the same philosophy as athletes using black under their eyes to help them see.

I put my sun visor down and adjust the driver side mirror slightly to the left, when driving at night. This allows me to position my eyes to just focus below oncoming headlights. I can keep my eyes on the road without being blinded. Adjusting the driver side mirror allows me to prevent headlights behind me from sneaking up on me, or constantly blinding me (especially when THAT car stays in my so-called blind spot and will not pass me). Adjusting the rear view mirror to the night-time setting (usually there is a lever to flip it up) also helps.

And, I wear my sunglasses at night, and day. Not when I’m driving (well, sometimes I do). When I am in a restaurant, bible class at church, the mall, or out shopping I typically wear my shades. I don’t care if others think I am stupid, or if they think I think, I’m too cool. It’s better than the possible consequences. Walmart is the worst place for potential triggers, as the lighting is typically fluorescent and too bright (Not to mention the stress and the frequency that I walk into obtrusive odors).

If you have another “light” tip, please share.

 

Migraine; Behind The Shades

The "monster" is close. You can almost feel him behind you, waiting to strike at any moment. Up ahead you sense a bright light directly crossing your path, like a black cat seeking calamity. You know a fight is near, so you go into your cave. The shades are drawn (but the rest of the furniture is real).

No, really.
This is an over dramatized situation but to some, it is almost reality. Everyday migraine sufferers live with a monster on their back. Everything they do must be weighed against the possibility that they are going to have another migraine attack, and light might be the trigger.

Many migraineurs are susceptible to light causing a migraine. Whether it is the sun while driving a car, the florescent lights at work, or a flickering television or computer monitor at home.

Here are a few ways to reduce light induced migraines in your life;

• Wear polarized UV glasses which block the glare of the sun or headlights as you drive at night. Using very dark shades at night is not suggested, but wearing shades inside and out during the day may help.

• Wear a hat with a dark brim is another method of cutting glare to your eyes. This is much the same as an athlete putting black under his eyes.

• Wear a darker shirt. White or lighter colored shirts reflect light, and reflected light that can cause eye strain. Try wearing light gray or darker shirts that absorb light.

• Put your sun visor down and adjust the driver side mirror slightly to the left, when driving at night. This will help prevent headlights attacking from behind. The visor helps if you tilt your head up when an approaching car has their lights on. 

Use the shades to decrease or lessen your migraines. Tell us if you have additional tips.

 

Rods and Cones

The days are getting shorter as winter focuses it's bearings on our lives. The sunlight has a different quality as it moves lower in the sky, but it still can cause problems for a migraineur.

I feel like the sun gets in my eyes more this time of year. Maybe I just see it more clearly when I come out from my cave.

Rods of shadow speckle fleetingly through the leaves, tracking time upon the ground. Streaming waves catching the corner of an eye. The difference between light and dark shortened on the clock, allowing us to see the beginning and the ending of the day.

Cones of color float upon the wind, dancing fluid movement till they reach the ground. Whirling flotsam transitions through the act of life and death. Looking straight ahead I see the pageant rolling with the currents. Twirling to the song of Autumn's tears.

Of course, the rods and cones are only in my eyes. Eyes that must be opened to view the spectacle abounding all around us. Closed to the pain that living life provides and seeking respite from the world. Dance in the light and dark that mark the passage of our creation. Be thankful of the progression that the changes in the season afford.



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Light Noise

I have long known that light effects me. Light noise is one of my biggest triggers and light effects me so severely, that I wear my sunglasses both outdoors and in. When I have a migraine I MUST have a dark space to go to even if I already have my sunglasses on. When I feel the onset of a migraine, I head for my cave to rest.

"This instinct may be sound: A new study suggests that even without the headache, migraine sufferers may process visual cues better in an environment with few visual distractions. In an article from HealthCanal.com, Migraine Sufferers: More Difficulty Tuning Out Visual Stimuli? “In a study published in the April issue of Investigative Ophthalmology & Visual Science (“Visual Noise Selectively Degrades Vision in Migraine”), researchers from Scotland’s Glasgow Caledonian University  asked migraine sufferers to pick out a small disk of light amid visual noise, an effect similar to the black-and-white snow on an off-air television. Without the visual noise, people prone to migraine could identify the light disk about as well as the control group. When the noise was added, migraine sufferers (“migraineurs”) performed significantly worse.”

Somewhere around a third of migraine sufferers experience neurological disturbances before a migraine starts. Auras are usually visual in nature and may appear as glimmering lights or wavy patterns that move across the field of vision. The study, done by lead researcher Doreen Wagner, Diplom-Ingenieur (FH) of Optometry, PhD student in Vision Science, showed that migraine sufferers with auras were the most adversely affected by the addition of visual noise.

Wagner said a current theory about migraines is that nerve cells in the brain of migraineurs are excitable and when exposed to certain triggers, the increased excitability may cause whole clusters of nerve cells to become overactive, similar to a spasm, and bring on the headache. In this study, “We believe that the noise on the display overexcites the nerve cells in the brain of the migraineurs. This in turn makes it harder for a migraineur to see the disk.”

“It might be helpful to avoid such ‘noisy’ environments which may impair their performance, scenes overloaded with visual distracters, for example computer screens and learning tools which have a lot of visual information on them.” she said."

 It makes sense to avoid light noise or visual distractions, in our daily lives. Especially if this is as much of a migraine trigger for you as it is for me. I just don’t think I can give up my computer, although I can;

• Adjust the brightness/contrast on my computer monitor.
• Take frequent breaks to prevent eyestrain.
• Look away from the monitor to a point in the distance and back, in order to lessen strain.
• Use software to transcribe my posts to the computer.
• Set my screen background to a simple clutter free picture that uses darker colors.

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Related Articles

• Reduce Eyestrain While Blogging (againstthegraine.blogspot.com)
• Migraine: Are You Wearing Your Sunglasses At Night (againstthegraine.blogspot.com)
• Migraine Associated Vertigo Symptoms (headacheandmigrainenews.com)

Tricks of Light

There are tricks to me handling Light because of my arch nemesis, the migraine. To suddenly be hit by an errant lumen could be my downfall on a day, when the enemy is nowhere to be seen.

Cloudy days and darkness may both provide perils to my eyes. For this reason I have the following tricks to prevent the onset of a migraine due to wayward light.

I wear my sunglasses inside and out. I don't know, or care, if others think I look cool. Going from outside-in is a change in light quality, until I get used to the ambient light, I take no chances.

I sit so that there are no lights shining directly into my eyes. This can be difficult at times, because I have this thing about sitting with my back to the door (too many westerns?). Diffused or filtered light is not nearly so bad on my head.

I close my eyes before turning on a light. It helps to face the floor as I open them as well. Any sudden or Phlit-ering of light can trigger a sudden migraine. Usually the sunglasses help with this as well. My family warns me before they turn a light on, or off in the room.

You may have your own tricks to prevent light from triggering your migraines. It's important to create habits that allow you to exist free from light triggered pain. Feel free to share any tricks you may have. You can email them to me if you don't want to put them in comments. You should subscribe to my blog if you would like to learn some of my tricks for other potential triggers!

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Reduce Eyestrain While Blogging

Wow, sorry for the interruption in these posts. My service provider went down and I am only now getting back online. This has disrupted my life more than anything other than an electrical outage.

Eyestrain can be a big problem, when working on your computer for long periods of time. It is important for me, a migraine sufferer, to be careful and not cause any more problems than I already have. My light sensitivity means that I REALLY have to be careful.

Use the following recommendations to reduce eyestrain and eye fatigue:

• Close drapes/blinds to reduce glare.
• Adjust lighting to avoid glare on screen (light source should come at a 90 degree angle, with low watt lights rather than high).
• Avoid intense or uneven lighting in your field of vision.
• Place monitor at 90 degree angle to windows (where possible).
• Reduce overhead lighting (where possible).
• Use indirect or shielded lighting where possible.
• Walls should not be painted with a reflective finish.
• Use a glare screen or monitor shield to reduce glare from overhead lighting.

Migraine: 5 Things I Dislike About Walmart

There are more than 5 things that I hate about shopping in stores, or in the mall. Or, more often than I care to think about, Walmart.

"Walmart-itus" is what my family calls this aversion. Yes, I could shop somewhere else, but I know that I won't because "I am Lazy". It's on the way to... everywhere I go. So for the sake of convenience, I put up with the potential triggers and well thought out and marketed layout to get my daily essentials.

Here are 5 reasons I dislike shopping at Walmart, in no particular order. You may have some of your own that should be added to this list.

1. The lighting. The fact that it is fluorescent is bad enough, but they use too much lighting.
Even my non-migraine friends dislike the lighting in these stores.

2. The new layout. I've been in three different stores that recently remodeled. Each one of them has a very similar layout (except the oddball, which is lefty instead of righty). They moved electronics to the very back, forcing me to travel through All of the clothing departments, just to look at the new geek stuff. Haarummph.

The food and the toiletries are on opposite sides of the store, forcing a sea of people going back and forth! As my niece, Katie, always says, "Mylanta!!" (Don't ask me, its just her way of exclamation). Please quit trying to herd us poor shoppers back and forth in front of items we are not searching for.

3. Parking. Need I say more?

4. The lack of sound dampening. Metal roof and structure open for all to see. Tile on top of a concrete floor. As an architect, I always see things in a different way. Looking at ways things could be done better. So, I know there are ways they could suppress some of the noise, so that I don't hear the 10 year-old throwing a tantrum at the other end of the store.

5. The smell. No, I'm not saying that Walmart smells baaaad. I am just saying that my olfactory senses are offended at every turn by a new and overpowering odor.

Most of the time, it is several strong aromas at the same time. I use to like the coffee isle. I really like the smell of fresh ground coffee beans. Now, they have it facing the candy shelves. Somehow the smell of mint trumps the wonderful smell of coffee and I am allergic to wintergreen. Actually I'm allergic to salicylates and salicylic acid (wintergreen).

Don't even get me started on the smell of fingernail polish and the smell of permed hair at the front of the store. Talk about olfactory overload.

You don't want to get me started on the overpowering perfume or musk worn by the cashiers and the other shoppers. Some people really need to learn some proper product application techniques.

Migraine: Keeping Hope

I returned from a sixteen hour round trip to Jefferson Hospital in Philadelphia, earlier this week. Eight hours each way to spend less than seven minutes combined with both a doctor and a nurse. This was a pre-admittance visit. I had tried to handle the preliminary stuff over the phone, but it was a no-go.

Sometime next week I will be going back to Philly and will be staying somewhere between one and several weeks. I am apprehensive and hopeful at the same time. The expectation is that through an IV, they can hydrate and detoxify my system, and then, try several different medicines within a short period of time.

It wasn’t really a New Year’s resolution, but as of the first, I stopped taking any pain medication and I quit drinking caffeine. Caffeine has not been a problem for me, as I usually have a maximum of 1 cup of coffee or a soda in a day if at all. I have quit all together a few times for years at a time. I have done well with no pain meds, and have been able to subsist using meditation and exercise. My thought is that the detox should be simple if there’s not much to detox.

Many years have passed since a doctor has looked me in the eye and told me, with a sense of certainty, that there was something that could be done. Hope. I’ve claimed to have it, but I know I don’t always trust in it.

What is hope? Not desperation, not optimism, realistic hope? Eyes wide open, encouraged, organized, and realistic, faith in a pragmatic outcome is my personal definition (after a day of research). I don’t discount my Christian faith. As a believer in God and Christ, my comfort in the truth of eternity is my hope in an eventual cure. But I have a hope, a practical belief, that the answer to my pain is also in this world. Someone, somewhere has the key to unlocking this mystery.

Is the answer in Philly next week? I am hopeful. But, even if it is not, I still have hope. Five years ago, the word migraine was a shadow without any understanding by the general public. Today, there are more professionals seeking the answer than ever before. I have to keep the hope, and writing this down has helped me make it through another day.

Here are a few of the sites I found helpful today. I am not endorsing, just referencing;

http://changingminds.org/explanations/emotions/hope.htm

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2008/12/31/f-vp-handler.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hope

http://expreacherman.wordpress.com/2006/11/20/what-is-hope/

http://www.desiringgod.org/ResourceLibrary/Sermons/ByDate/1986/537_What_Is_Hope/