Poll The ME/CFS and FM Migraine Test: Do You Suffer From Migraines?

[Cort]

Approximately 12% of the population are believed to experience migraines. Most are not diagnosed

A simple self-administered test devised by neurologist, Dr. Richard Lipton, MD and a team of researchers at Albert Einstein University has been shown to be a very effective screening tool. It's used by physicians and dentists around the world as a tool to diagnose migraines. The three question ID Migraine screener can be taken at home but your results should be shared with a health care professional.

If you answered yes to two out of the three questions below you meet the criteria for migraine.

1. Has Headache limited your activities for a day or more in the last three months?
   YES / NO
2. Are you nauseated or sick to your stomach when you have a headache?
   YES / NO
3. Does light bother you when you have a headache?
   YES / NO

Please take the poll and let us know.

Chronic Migraines? Check out a questionnaire that can help you determine whether you have chronic migraines.

More about Migraines, FM and ME/CFS:

• Fibromyalgia Bad - Fibromyalgia with Migraines Really Bad
• Check out video's on migraine in our media section.

 

[TigerLilea]

There is no option for "I don't have migraines".

 

[Cort]

There is no option for "I don't have migraines".

It would be good to do a separate poll about the conclusions everyone draws from the answers. If you don't answer yes to two of the three questions then apparently you don't have migraines. I don't (thank goodness)

 

[lisapetrison]

Based on my own experiences and on the reports that I've gotten, migraine headaches in ME/CFS and related conditions seems to be associated with certain outdoor toxins and thus certain locations.

I thus am unsurprised that you haven't experienced them recently, Cort. I don't get them either, as long as I stay away from bad locations.

 

[Katie]

I used to get migraines for about 10 years. Blinding headaches and had to use imitrex. Interestingly after menopause I don't get them any more. So possibly hormonally related.
I still get headaches very often, occasionally very piercing but lasts only a few minutes. Scares the heck out of me when it fills like there's a knife in my temple.
I often get nauseated but have never been very nauseated or vomit with the headaches or in the past migraines.

 

[Cort]

I used to get migraines for about 10 years. Blinding headaches and had to use imitrex. Interestingly after menopause I don't get them any more. So possibly hormonally related.
I still get headaches very often, occasionally very piercing but lasts only a few minutes. Scares the heck out of me when it fills like there's a knife in my temple.
I often get nauseated but have never been very nauseated or vomit with the headaches or in the past migraines.

I am soooo glad I don't get migraines!

I would be at all surprised if hormones play a role...

 

[Cort]

Well I live outside now. My exposure is way down..

Based on my own experiences and on the reports that I've gotten, migraine headaches in ME/CFS and related conditions seems to be associated with certain outdoor toxins and thus certain locations.

I thus am unsurprised that you haven't experienced them recently, Cort. I don't get them either, as long as I stay away from bad locations.

 

[Coral Bohne]

There is no option for "I don't have migraines".

I have had on occasion what is a painless migraine/minor stroke extremely foggy, realize hours later I've been sitting and doing nothing for most of the day - and look in mirror to find a sagging right eyelid. Anyone else?

 

[sue la-la]

i'm ticking poll option "other anomalies"

i had frequent severe migraines for decades - light/sound sensitive, very painful, lasted 24-36hrs - sometimes triggered by menstrual cycle & emotional stress - they were much less frequent & severe when i removed food triggers (dairy wheat).

and now that i have moderate/severe me/cfs, i don't get migraines any more. (!?!)
yet i'm constantly hyper-sensitive to light, sound, smell, movement, etc

 

[Seeksassy]

Approximately 12% of the population are believed to experience migraines. Most are not diagnosed
How wonderful to be able to say no migraine in the last 3 months!! In fact it's been about a year (if my poor memory serves). The only trigger I have identified is poor sleep. Not good for
A simple self-administered test devised by neurologist, Dr. Richard Lipton, MD and a team of researchers at Albert Einstein University has been shown to be a very effective screening tool. It's used by physicians and dentists around the world as a tool to diagnose migraines. The three question ID Migraine screener can be taken at home but your results should be shared with a health care professional.

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If you answered yes to two out of the three questions below you meet the criteria for migraine.

1. Has Headache limited your activities for a day or more in the last three months?
   YES / NO
2. Are you nauseated or sick to your stomach when you have a headache?
   YES / NO
3. Does light bother you when you have a headache?
   YES / NO

Please take the poll and let us know.

Chronic Migraines? Check out a questionnaire that can help you determine whether you have chronic migraines.

More about Migraines, FM and ME/CFS:

• Fibromyalgia Bad - Fibromyalgia with Migraines Really Bad
• Check out video's on migraine in our media section.

There is no option for "I don't have migraines".

How wonderful to be able to check off no migraine for 3 months!!! If my (admittedly poor) memory is correct, it's been about a year. Headaches, yes; migraines, no. The only trigger I've identified is poor sleep, which is not good a good one when you have FM. I get them if I had 2 nights of next to no sleep. Once I realized that I through myself into a serious sleep hygiene routine, and it has helped. Thank god, because I wake up with them, vomiting, blind, and too late for medication to work; then off to the hospital. And sick for 2 days after. Even when I do catch them in time to take medication I'm still sick for a total of 3 days.

 

[Hezza]

How wonderful to be able to check off no migraine for 3 months!!! If my (admittedly poor) memory is correct, it's been about a year. Headaches, yes; migraines, no. The only trigger I've identified is poor sleep, which is not good a good one when you have FM. I get them if I had 2 nights of next to no sleep. Once I realized that I through myself into a serious sleep hygiene routine, and it has helped. Thank god, because I wake up with them, vomiting, blind, and too late for medication to work; then off to the hospital. And sick for 2 days after. Even when I do catch them in time to take medication I'm still sick for a total of 3 days.

Mine, too are directly connected to a bad nights sleep. Thankfully I do not have the vomiting! But the eye pain is something of a bear!! I always connected it to Dengue fever having been my trigger virus but it may have nothing to do with it... Who knows??

 

[tatt]

I dont get migraines, I do avoid light when I have a headache but I'm light sensitive anyway. My husband used to get migraines maybe 10 a year, then I dragged him along to a shiatsu weekend with me. I had to drag him because that sort of thing is far too woo for him. He had a treatment from the guy running the course and has had so few since that you could probably count them on one hand. That was about 30 years ago. It was a year before we really were sure they had stopped.

 

[Cort]

i'm ticking poll option "other anomalies"

i had frequent severe migraines for decades - light/sound sensitive, very painful, lasted 24-36hrs - sometimes triggered by menstrual cycle & emotional stress - they were much less frequent & severe when i removed food triggers (dairy wheat).

and now that i have moderate/severe me/cfs, i don't get migraines any more. (!?!)
yet i'm constantly hyper-sensitive to light, sound, smell, movement, etc

I beginning to wonders if being hypersensitive to light, sounds, smells, etc. is in fact a form of migraine? it is such a similar symptom without the head aching problem.... I think there are like over a hundred different kinds of migraines.

 

[Cort]

I dont get migraines, I do avoid light when I have a headache but I'm light sensitive anyway. My husband used to get migraines maybe 10 a year, then I dragged him along to a shiatsu weekend with me. I had to drag him because that sort of thing is far too woo for him. He had a treatment from the guy running the course and has had so few since that you could probably count them on one hand. That was about 30 years ago. It was a year before we really were sure they had stopped.

Wow....

That says something about woo-woo treatments!

 

[tatt]

Wow....

That says something about woo-woo treatments!

Could be entirely coincidence, of course - but I don't think migraine headaches normally just stop.

 

[Merida]

I have had on occasion what is a painless migraine/minor stroke extremely foggy, realize hours later I've been sitting and doing nothing for most of the day - and look in mirror to find a sagging right eyelid. Anyone else?

Coral,
I found that the sympathetic nerves to the eyelid muscles originate in the hypothalamus. Hmmm. Then, these nerves travel in a circuitous route and become one of the cranial nerves that branches from the brainstem area - then to the eyelid muscles. Trying to figure out which cranial nerves serves the eyelids. Maybe several of them? The sagging eyelid is reported by people diagnosed with Chiari. It has a name - ptosis . I appreciate that I have had multiple cranial nerve symptoms on and off - like twitching tongue, and facial tingling.

 

[Croatoan]

I think this poll clearly point to CFS being a serotonin based disorder.

On light sensitivity and serotonin. Light decrease the rate of serotonin catabolism: (This is why light keeps us awake becasue serotonin is not metabolised to melatonin.)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0006899383906601

On serotonin and nausea
http://link.springer.com/article/10.2165/00023210-199708050-00005#page-1

 

[Cort]

I think this poll clearly point to CFS being a serotonin based disorder.

On light sensitivity and serotonin. Light decrease the rate of serotonin catabolism: (This is why light keeps us awake becasue serotonin is not metabolised to melatonin.)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0006899383906601

On serotonin and nausea
http://link.springer.com/article/10.2165/00023210-199708050-00005#page-1

Interesting...Of all the things serotonin - I never would have thought - but the Lipkin gut study appears to be pointing in that direction as well.

 

[Merida]

I had horrible migraines beginning at age 21- about 1971. My doc, a great diagnostic person, prescribed Tensenol, made by Foy Laboratories in Philadelphia. Stopped the migraine in 30 minutes. Was great. Can't find this drug anywhere.
@tatt
Amazingly the migraines just stopped about age 35. But since the injury in 1998 I have constant head pressure which can get migraine-like.

 

[Cort]

I had horrible migraines beginning at age 21- about 1971. My doc, a great diagnostic person, prescribed Tensenol, made by Foy Laboratories in Philadelphia. Stopped the migraine in 30 minutes. Was great. Can't find this drug anywhere.
@tatt
Amazingly the migraines just stopped about age 35. But since the injury in 1998 I have constant head pressure which can get migraine-like.

Darn...Did you have ME/CFS/FM by then? And if you did did Tensenol help at all?