Posted by Miguel (209.42.225.98) on January 31, 2000 at 21:13:32:
I just landed on this site, well, my GF did and showed it to me, which immediately caught my eye (the good one left after the last attack). Anyway, I browsed through a few posts. It seems that it might be helpful to me to see what might work for others, as well as perhaps share some of my experiences.
A bit of a backgorund. I have suffered CH since I was 21 yrs.-old or so. I am 40 now. Today I finally broke down and went to a "headache" clinic, got CH-specific, or at least the best they can come up with for this unexplainable phenomena, and got my first CH-oriented prescription drugs, Amerge and Stadol. As I understand, most times the prescriptions need to be changed 3 or or even 5 times until something is found that may help...so I will start with these. In so far, only 800 mg of Advil and 1 Actifed tablet combination made the episodic CH's at least bearable.
This CH thing is kind of mindboggling (no pun). There are all sorth of hypothesys and things flying all over about it, but it comes to this...nobody seems to know for sure. What bothers me the most is that the majority of drugs of choice were developed to treat something else, thus the side effects are mostly unwarranted, i.e.: Verapamil, opiates, etc.
Another thing that seems to help, at least for the pain to go away quicker: exercise...20-50 push-ups followed by 200 sit-ups and then again another 20-30 push-ups. I figured after reading some literature that although walking around with an O2 bottle will seem odd, as well as impractical, perhaps hyperventialting, while gaining something from it (as with exercise) may be better. Clearly, it will be just as odd if when I feel one of these coming in the middle of a meeting I said...sorry guys....and start huffing and puffing on the boardroom table, lol! or pull over on the side of the road and go for it...I can see the trooper writing an "Inpeding the normal flow of traffic tix" - now would that be considered a non-moving violation?
Also, and I amsure that this board has seen all of these before, caffeine works for me. Pepsi does better than coffe though, strange. I think that the CO2 in Pepsi may increase the absorption rate of caffeine (?), although unlikely, sugar free Pepsi, of course.
I thought the post regarding hypothalamic function, or dysfunction as my case might be, was quite interesting. That gave me the idea of Oxytocin. I wonder if it is produced in great quantities during intercourse.
These things are all intruiging to me since I did cardiovascular research for a period of 14 years. Current CH scientific knowledge does not seem to follow scientific logic at times. Even worst is the treatments utilized, systemically active drugs for extremely localized ailments, WOW!!! Lets cut our pinky because our nose is dripping seems like to me. Current, or at least seeminly current drug developments with Zomig, and other similar drugs, 5HT receptor-interactive drugs, although apparently effective, leave puzzled. Why are only the 5HT receptors of the trigeminal region affected? Why only one side at the time, at least in most cases? The same rationale applies to all other receptor-derived physiology and pharmacology.
Perhaps I am incorrect in guessing the following, at least from my notes over the last few years; The pain is localized perhaps because the cause of the pain, as in what trigers ad perpetrates it, occurs locally, an agent, be it hormone, bio-messanger, or perhaps even viral/bacterial (don't laugh...gastric ulcers were not considered a baterial disease until very recently). It is produced in very small quantities, which are readily taken up by tissues and receptors in those tissues nearest the origin of the compound/agent production. In such manner, its systemic propagation and its esuing systemic effects are diminished. Perhaps some of the other problems associated with CH, i.e.: nausea, temp regulation probs, etc...are just the excess agent making its way to the rest of the system, different organs, different responses. I still have so many questions about CH...cuz it really does not make much sense, i.e.: Why passing weather fronts seem to trigger my CH and make it quite intenese? Baroreceptor involvement? Why cheese?!?!?, chocolate (substitute for love - oxytocin secretion again - just now - Ding! This makes me wonder if CH sufferers which happen to be nursing, although fem are apparetly affeted to a lesser extent by CH, experience CH during the initiation and progress of nursing?)...
Well, I think I have written way too much for my first post here. I chuck it to today's caffeine overkill to keep this phantom of CH in check, sorry :-)
Miguel