Living With Migraine in My 40s
In 2004, the Boston Red Sox won the World Series, the film industry released Shrek 2, Mark Zuckerberg launched The Facebook (Yes, this was what it was called.), and I turned 40 years old. I knew my major and minor migraine triggers and had developed good relationships with the group of people I called my migraine team.
I did my research when it came to migraines. That’s one of the best ways to battle the illness. I utilized information on the internet and learned a great deal at a Lunch and Learn seminar presented by a local school of medicine. I avoided exposure to my triggers as much as possible and went to the doctor armed with knowledge that helped me ask good questions.
My doctor was an important part of my migraine team. I found a doctor who listened to me and helped me manage the illness with abortive triptan tablets and injections. When I noticed the frequency of my migraines increasing, my doctor added a preventive low dose of propranolol to my migraine management plan. The propranolol helped and was inexpensive, unlike the triptan medications.
Game Changers in My 40s
1. Generics: Before generic migraine medication was available, pharmacological treatment of migraine episodes hit the pocketbook hard. I evaluated each migraine to determine if the circumstances were worth the price before swallowing a pill or jabbing a syringe in my leg. If I had the time and opportunity, I opted for the free option of sleeping it off in a dark room.
Sleeping off a migraine wasn’t free though, was it? It took hours to abort an episode. I lost time and time was valuable. While I placed myself in isolation, my life sat on a shelf and the rest of the world kept living. For reasons I do not know, sleeping off a migraine became less effective in my 40s. I ended up vomiting and in so much pain, I had no choice but to use the high-dollar injection.
Generics entered the market in 2009. Hallelujah! Triptan drugs were most effective if taken at the earliest hint of a symptom and now I could do that without worrying about draining my bank account. The tablets became my go-to abortive and I rarely needed to stick a needle in my leg. Most of the time, I could take a tablet and keep functioning even when I was at work. I didn’t miss curling up in a ball of pain or stumbling to the toilet to vomit.
2. Workplace Rights: Adding generic medication to my arsenal helped in the workplace, too. I worked through a lot of pain in the early years of my career. At one job, my supervisor told me that management considered taking time off for a “headache” to be sick leave abuse. At another job, HR did nothing about a co-worker using home fragrance products in her nearby office.
In 2009, the ADA Amendments Act took effect, broadening the definition of disability, and bringing the possibility of migraine protection under the Americans with Disability Act. Companies began to acknowledge migraine disease. Human resource departments began working toward reasonable accommodations for people with migraines and understanding that the seriousness of the illness could lead to the use of FMLA.
As more people learned to respect migraine disease and the people who have it, I began to add co-workers to my migraine team. I didn’t feel alone in this fight anymore. I had a supportive spouse, friends who looked out for me, and co-workers who understood my illness was real. When we work together as a team, everyone wins.
Originally published at WebMD.com on 6/3/24.
