Trials are worth it

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I'm getting emotional as I sit down to write this because the last few months have been a hard journey for me. The first week of December I woke up one morning with a headache ... it felt like your general run of the mill, I'm about a to get a cold kind of sinus pressure, so I ate some breakfast and popped a couple ibuprofen like I do if I'm in a situation like this (very rarely). Thirty minutes went by and right about the time I'd typically be feeling relief there was none. So I waited it out, the 6-8 hours before I could take a second dose and the same thing. A few days later Nic and I went on a date to the movies, the first movie we'd seen in a theatre in years, and I could hardly sit through it I was so miserable. The lack of lights in the room, the bright light of the screen, the over-the-top booming voices coming from the speakers were beyond my limit. It was then I realized, I'd gone about 4 days straight with a headache that never went away and no cold symptoms after all. As a mom of two kids does when life goes on I pushed through it. I pushed and pushed and pushed all the way until that next Wednesday when I noticed additional symptoms of blurred vision and disorientation as I was driving home from preschool. As you can imagine, with two kids in the car, it terrified me. I'd never forgive myself if anything happened to them because of me. The next morning Nic got up for work and headed out the door and I figured I'd just try to relax with the kids and turn on a movie for them. A couple hours into the morning, I couldn't even see straight and I called Nic in a panic because I knew something wasn't right.

After two hours in an urgent care and a huge amount of disappointment, the PA on staff told me "welcome to the club" and labeled it my first migraine. He sent me along with a prescription and told me to go hide in a dark quiet room and get some rest. So that's what I did ... for the next 3 days. Every morning I'd wake up thinking, this is it! This must be the day it will be gone! Then that dull ache behind the front of my forehead would be there the moment I opened my eyes. In December being that it was Christmas time, the Bishop at my church challenged everyone to think about the impact Christ had on their life. I spent those days in that dark room in constant prayer and thinking of Him. The one thing I kept coming back to is that in every trial in my life He was always there. He'd never left me and I knew He wouldn't this time either. 

 By that Sunday it was very obvious that particular medication from the urgent care was doing nothing for me so the next step was the ER. I at least knew they would do a much broader work up than the urgent care did. I NEEDED to find some answers. Neurological exam, normal ... blood work, clear ... head ct, clean ... pregnancy test, negative. Again, their diagnosis, a migraine. They gave me what they deemed a "migraine cocktail" of 3 medications and had me wait there. When they came back to check on me 30 minutes later and asked how I felt, with tears in my eyes I said, "the same". My options at this point were to stay longer if I wanted to and take the next dose of medication there after several hours or head home and do it there, so I opted to go home. I'd much rather be in the comfort of my own bed than in a freezing hospital room.

Because one of the medications was benadryl, the sleep delirium it would put me in made it impossible to take during the day so I took the medications before bed. They mentioned to switch from ibuprofen to tylenol and it took at least a month and a half to discover that when my pain level decreased, that was the only thing actually helping me along. I have a decently high pain tolerance so it wasn't excruciating but just really effected my quality of life. I'd try to stay positive but I never once felt like myself. The list of things that made my headache feel worse were growing by the minute, many of which were things that brought me joy ... I hate to admit it but my noisy kids, playing the piano, listening to music, looking at a computer screen to blog, being in my cold garage to exercise, playing with my kids in the snow, etc. The list of things I "shouldn't do" felt longer than the things I could. It was maddening! 

In the midst of that I continued to press on, paying close attention to my diet, taking long breaks from exercise to see if anything made a difference. I went to bed earlier getting as much sleep as possible, tried meditation and yoga. With every possible cause I could think of, I would be determined that this would be it! Like going to see an eye doctor for example. With the blurred vision I was convinced that the headaches were related to a sudden onset of poor eye sight (something I've never had before) and maybe all I needed were a pair of prescription glasses. Even that came back normal. Which I'd like to think is pretty impressive of these baby blues with blurred vision. haha 

For a while I thought maybe it was hormone related ... I had stopped nursing Lyla a month before and maybe postpartum depression could explain crying myself to sleep at night because another day with this dull ache living in my head felt like torture. 

I saw a very passive aggressive neurologist who again, deemed the source of the chronic headache from you know where a migraine and started me on yet another couple of new medications. SO.MANY.MEDICATIONS. I was sick of it. I tried all of them, for long periods of time, some that came with horrible side effects that made me feel like I was drugged at a rave and none of which ever helped except for tylenol to reduce the pain level. Of course, that one and only medication that seemed to make the headache more bearable, the neurologist told me to wean off of. 

Lovely, so there went my tylenol. And on came what I'm sure was an even worse withdrawal headache from being on it for 3 months straight. I am grateful for medication but I kept praying that I could somehow heal my body in a much more natural way ... food, sleep, something ... insert essential oils.

I've always been a huge skeptic of essential oils. I know the power of a placebo effect and I just haven't been convinced enough to try them in my home but here I was praying for a NATURAL remedy and was growing desperate to try anything. My sweet sister-in-law sells them and shared a headache blend with me that I've been using the last couple of weeks. I could hardly stand it at first. On the list of many things, one thing that triggers the headache to feel worse are strong smells and let me tell you what, rubbing very potent essential oils on your temples RIGHT next to your nose ... it was NOT pleasant the first few days. When I reached back out to her she said to try it instead on my feet below my big toe and I've been doing it every couple of hours ever since. Each day my headache has felt a little better, even with moments of no pain at all!! No one is more surprised than me of this or MORE GRATEFUL!

Not only have I been told that neither side of my family has a history of migraines but the most frustrating part in all of this was believing in my heart it wasn't a migraine and being told by doctor after doctor that it is. For so long I wondered if it was just because I wasn't willing to accept the diagnosis which made me not believe it. I still don't have any answers and don't know what caused it in the first place and maybe I'll never know, but if there is one thing that this whole process has taught me it is this: (besides not to be so skeptical of healing that can come from essential oils!) but that prayers are answered. That my trials make me teachable. They make me humble. They put everything into perspective and they change what I value most, how I spend my time, and make me realize what is most important in life. My trials develop my character. They require me to rely on my faith in God and put my trust, my health, and my life in Him. They are important. Trials are worth it!