Turns out I may have been panicking about my neck....

After posting a couple of days ago and feeling quite depressed at my painful neck artery, I decided to run some quick checks on what other people are experiencing.

Now it turns out that my right side Carotid artery is probably a little distended due to all this blood pounding to the top of my head during migraine headaches.  (I should mention, I'm in my late 40s.)

This 'excessive dilation', that eventually leads to there being a distention of the Carotid artery, is more than likely the result of the long term nature of my migraines.  

So I was relieved to learn that pain from this excessive dilation (and eventual distention) of the neck artery during and after migraine is apparently quite normal, and a survival mechanism that results from whenever there is any experience of pain in the head.  

This is how we are made: to flood our brains with blood at the least sign of threat to cranial survival.

I found a great article on this very subject that is really helpful: Vascular Neck Pain by Leonard  L Lovshin M.D.

After I read it, I sat and thought hard about the progression of my headaches over the years and recalled they were always as a result of a kind of 'nervous exhaustion' scenario, typically striking after I'd tried to pack too much into my life and not taken time out to relax.  

(Before I even had full blown migraines, I had pre-migraine symptoms that consisted of episodes of Vertigo that lasted for about 3 long and horrible days.  I used to get terrible nausea for no apparent reason, at least once a month, or more.  I'm only now discovering the significance of those symptoms.  

I had my first, really awful ice-pack-inducing migraine about 8 years ago, while I had pernicious anaemia.  The anaemia was so bad, the migraines were not that important by comparison.  Plus I always managed to get rid of them after say half hour with an ice pack on my head and some paracetamol.)     

So today, after a very restful night's sleep, I went food shopping.  I felt fine, my hair was OK and my complexion was back to normal.  The bright lights in the shops, my hot overcoat, and all the crowds, surprisingly, didn't have any adverse effects on me.  

Then, in the aisle between the pasta and the coffee, I remember turning round (too) quickly to go back for something, and suddenly I got this awful whooshing sensation in the top of my head and I felt that I was momentarily losing my balance.  I slowed down and waited to feel better.  It was nothing really but it showed I wasn't totally out of the woods.

Turns out, I might not bother to have the Carotid artery scan after all (?), as I really don't have the time and I would rather keep an eye on our dear dog.  

New Medicines

I decided to buy some more pills today.

This time I bought 5-HPT, which is supposed to be really good and I hope it will work in conjunction with Rhodiola Rosea, as I really like that.

The other thing I'm going to start taking is Potassium.  The reason for that is, its another in the group of Electrolyte process minerals and it has a bearing on salt intake.

Because I'm pretty certain of one thing, Sodium is somehow a part of my migraines.  As, so often they begin in the night, when I'm too hot.  I don't have a lot of salt in my diet, as we're a household that is very anti-salt.  But the fact is, salt is really important to temperature control and what I've noticed in the last 3 years is that I don't really perspire like I used to.  I get really hot, hot enough to have caused me to perspire say 5 years ago, but now a rising temperature is not the trigger for perspiration, in the way it used to be, at all.  I'm going to have to look into that, because that too is a survival mechanism and mine seems to be up the creek? 

I'll make sure I provide relevant links to what I've read about Potassium next time.

Have a great weekend !