Dealing With Headaches

Well, the good news is that there doesn’t seem to be any proof that magnet therapy causes migraines. Otherwise…

There are certainly a lot of complimentary and alternative medicines for headaches and migraines in the world. They’ve been here long before contemporty medicine and will most likely still be here after modern civilization crumbles due to catastrophic environmental upheaval that happens so quickly that society cannot adapt…

..oh, sorry. I also write science fiction stories and work for a New Zealand environmental blog and I just get carried away at the slightest provocation sometimes. Like this incredible heat wave that is currently choking the area where I live.

Back to Magnets

Magnet therapy has been used to cure everything from gout to grumpiness. It does seem to have positive some positive effects for tired backs of dogs and horses. However, if you’re looking for a headache or migraine cure (and if you’ve come to this blog, the chances are good that you are) you’re better off with an ice pack and a dark room.

However, magnetic therapy is a lot cheaper than going to the doctor and has not been proven to have any bad phsysical side effects, so many people have tried it and (until health care costs come down) many people will continue to try it.

Back in January of this year, a study from the University of Virginia came out backing magnet therapy for many medical misadventures, including migraines and headaches. Apparently, maganets that are ten times the strength of good ol’ refrigerator magnets can penetrate the first skin layers to have an actual effect on your circulation.

All clinical trials until then had shown that magnet therapy couldn’t do much except for a placebo effect.

Why Am I Banging On About This?

I’ve noticed the magnet question being raised on a number of blogs and social bookmarking services, even though there has not been any recent study of magnet therapy that I can find. But magnet therapy products can sell over $300 million annually, so somebody is certainly doing a private study or his or her own.

Either that, or perhaps that someone is a mad scioentist hoping to plant microscopic metal filings in out blood so he can control our every movement through the use of magnetic manipulation…

…oh, I’ve done it again, haven’t I?

Off to splash cold water on my face.

Mine went crap, thanks. I became more aware of my headaches this week than I have in the past month. My apologies for the smaller than usual number of blog posts this week. If 451 Press wasn’t down, then I was. Perhaps 451 Press or Word Press or the server gets migraines, too. I had some real beauties this week.

Keep a Headache Journal

I think I’m going to have to start keeping a headache journal again. I thought I was done with that crap years ago when I lived in England and decided, one fine Boxing Day, to do an experiment. I had a suspiscion that lack of caffeine was giving me the migraines. So, I stopped ingesting any caffeinated product cold turkey.

Not something I recommend.

I’ve been assured by authors, anti-caffeine activists (which I’m sure exist on some corner of the web) and everyday people that the migraine goes away after four days. A mere four days. Of course, in migraine-time, four days is the equivelent of one year in real life time.

I’ve cut back on my caffeine intake to about six cups of black tea a day. So, why did I get such blinding headaches this week? That’s the six and a half dollar question.

Theories

One of the theories I have about why I get so many headaches and migraines is that it’s other peoples’s fault. Somehow, their stupid thoughts float through the air like so much ozone and infect all of us who happen to have at least one thought in our heads. And the originators of the thoughts don’t get headaches or migraines because their brains never can hang onto an idea. Those painful thoughts just slip away into the atmosphere.

I also couldn’t help but notice that, except for a few internet sites, not one thing has popped up in the local or national media about National Headache Awareness Week. Way to go, guys. Then again, you did pick a bad week, what with natural disasters, NBA finals and that Presidential election bugaboo.

So I had a great National Headache Awareness Week. I even was too ill to send a submission in to the June Headache and Migraine Blog Carnival, darn it!

And people wonder why I get migraines.

I’m a freelance writer, and so I have a stack of rejection slips so thick I could paper the house with them. Although there is a company that turns rejection slips into toilet paper that I’m looking into. But I got the most mind-boggling rejection slip of my life so far yesterday.

This Ties In With Migraines, Trust Me

I’m currently trying to sell a speculative fiction short story about an incredibly beautiful Arabian-mix mare who also happens to need to feast on human flesh. (Well, no horse is perfect, right?) And, yes, I did send a specualtive fiction short story to a publication that published speculative fiction short stories. But this was the reason the editor rejected my story:

“It seems unlikely to me that a carnivorous horse would look anything like an Arabian.”

That just blew my head off. I didn’t realize the editor knew of a herd of carnivorous horses to make her basis of comparison. Silly me. I just used my imagination (and the legend of the eigth labor of Hercules, where he had to tame flesh-eating horses).

At first, I thought (hoped) she was being funny, but later on in the letter I realized she was being serious. Perhaps she wanted to sound like she was authority in the matter of the body shape of flesh eating equines. However, she failed to describe the suitable physical structure that a carnivorous horse should have.

That’s when the migraine started. This was worse than criticism headache. At least there’s usually some sort of reason grounded on the planet earth in order to receive criticism.

And, as a bonus, she took the time to correct “a few typos” and then send me back my corrected manuscript. By the way, she had two typos in her rejection letter to me. I’m starting to wonder if I would have a lot less migraines if there were a lot less people in the world.

So, please, everyone, enlighten this obviously ignorant freelance writer and tell me — what does a carnivorous horse look like?

Actually, the NHF’s YouTube channel went up late last month and I’ve only just discovered it now. What can I tell you? I get headaches. They eat up your time researching for blog posts and goofing around on YouTube. The National Headache Foundation wanted to be sure there were some videos available in time for this week, National Headache Awareness Week.

There are only eight videos up as of this writing, but they do give some good general information geared at people who DON’T get chronic headaches. At least, this is my impression. For example, the “Headache Overview” film (seen below) mentions that most people get at least one headache during the course of their lives. I think those of us who get chronic headaches already figured that out. But there is a lot of ignorance and intolerance about migraines and chronic headaches by those who don’t suffer from them, so any easily digestible information is welcomed by me.

So, celebrate National Headache Week by taking in the National Headache Foundation’s YouTube channel. It’s yet another good excuse to devote precious hours of your mortal life at YouTube.

(And try to ignore the background music sounding alarmingly like an eighties soft-core porn film’s soundtrack. Not that I would know.)

It comes around so quickly, doesn’t it? And now we’re caught buying National Headache Awareness Week presents and have to listen to National Headache Awareness Week carols…

It’s June 1-7

Well, I suppose we don’t really have any carols or presents to give during National Headache Awareness Week. I wonder what celebrations and traditions should we do this week?

I know — if we meet anyone who says, “A headache isn’t so bad,” we smack them over the head will a ball-peen hammer. This will definately make them more aware of headaches in the nation.

My Health Insurance Company Hasn’t Forgotten

I know my health insurance company is celebrating National Headache Awarenwss Week by sending me information to drive me around the bend. Today, my mail was graced with a thick package about my prescription drug plan. this included a list of drugs approved to be covered by the health insurance company. It was entitled, logically, enough, “Approved Drug List”.

But then they also sent me an equally long list entitled “Non-Approved Drug List”.

Why?

I have two college degrees. Perhaps they know this and think that I’m too much of genuis to have any common sense left in my head (perhaps if I did, I wouldn’t get headaches). If I can’t find the name of the drug on the “Approved Drug List”, doesn’t it stand to reason that if it’s not on the list, it probably hasn’t been approved?

How many trees had to die to make up the “Non Approved Drug List”? And how much extra postage did it take to ship the “Non Approved Drug List”? I want to know, because I’m the one paying for the tree killing and the extra postage. I thought I’d be paying for doctor visits and Prozac, but how naive could I be?

And people wonder why I get migraines.

Off to bang my head against the keyboard now. That way it will hurt a lot less.