Migraines at a young age

I am pretty sure that I have suffered from migraines since I was a kid.  They were only self-diagnosed as such 5 years ago, but I know that I suffered with them for a long time before that.  The memory does fade slightly as to when they started.  I remember going to the doctor with my mum as a kid as I had jaw ache a lot.  Mum thought that maybe I had too many teeth all vying for space or that there was a problem with the alignment of my jaw.  The doctor we saw was a doctor from the old school.  A very old school.  He was like an old, kind, but misguided wizard.  After sitting behind his large wooded desk and listening to our story, he turned to face a plethora of ancient books, some without names, which covered the entire wall behind him (at least that's how I remember it as a kid).  From one shelf behind him he dragged out a particularly large book, blowing the dust from the top before opening the cover.  He moistened his index finger and thumb by licking them with his parched tongue, which looked as old as the books.  Peering over the top of his glasses he slowly turned the large pages.  By contrast, my current doctor googles for answers, although I am not commenting on which is the better method.

His conclusion was that I grind my jaw at night and would need a mouth guard to stop this from happening.  I knew that I wasn't grinding my jaw but was so in awe of this caricature of himself, that my mouth refused to budge from being tight shut.  Thankfully, whilst driving home, my mother listened and we never did get the mouth guard for me to wear at night to stop this mythical grinding from taking place.

Fast forward a decade or two. I can't remember getting much pain after that until I was in my 20's.  By then I just thought that I was getting headaches.  Must be too much work, or too little sleep.  The childhood jaw ache was long forgotten about.  Over the counter drugs never even dented the pain.  I wasn't the sort to go to the doctors, but in hindsight, that is exactly what I should have done.  It got to the stage where I had more days in pain than not.  I learned to deal with it and get on with my life.  I worked my way though many kooky methods to just to try and get a clear day without the pain.  Run to the top of the stairs and grab hold of the banister. Swing up and down and round and round to stretch my shoulder joints and pull out the pain.  Bang my head against the wall to knock the broken bit back into place.  I used to have an old computer where you had to hit the side of it to make it turn on.  I guess that I was applying that same logic to my head.  Needless to say, these methods never worked.

The worry was that it might be more than a simple headache.  I would analyze myself for other symptoms.  My vision was always clear, although it did hurt to re-focus from near to far.  My hearing was always clear and noise never made the pain worse or better.  No tingling in my fingers or toes.  Heart beat strong and unwavering.  Fitness level as good as it ever had been.  I was stuck in limbo, waiting for the pain to go, or something else to go wrong.  Always scared to visit the doctorsas they might tell me something that I don't want to hear.

Thus began a long and ongoing treck to find the perfect cure.  What I did do was visit alternative health experts.  I use the term expert sparingly and will explain why in my next blog...