Mary Anne's Story - migraine type headaches following injury

I knew all about Migraines, since my best friend Marci since high school suffered from migraines a lot. I got used to plans being cancelled as she would hole up in a dark room and moan until they passed. I always felt sorry for her, and she was always so envious of me because I never got them…that all changed after my horse wreck.

I was dismounting off my mustang when a freak wind blew in and toppled over an aluminum ladder that was leaning against a neighbor’s tree. At the same time, the wind caught the pasture gate swinging it wide, and Racer spooked and bolted. Instead of vaulting off him, I instead tried to climb back on him (what was I thinking?) and clung to his neck for a brief second or two before slipping and hitting the woodpile... ouch!

When I woke up I was in the emergency room, and my husband was being told that I should by all rights be dead. I had a huge bloody lump on the back of my head, I had bit my tongue bad enough they had to stitch it closed and I was black and blue and sore as heck. They did all the routine scans, gave me a passel of pain meds and sent me home after 48 hours.

Hello migraines… when the first one hit me, it hit me so hard it dropped me from a standing position to my knees. Gasping for breath from the pain, I found that moving my head in any position right or left was excruciating. All I could do was curl into a fetal position and tuck my head down. Mike found me this way, and worried, he rushed me back to the hospital where I was admitted for more tests. They feared a brain bleed. They didn’t find the bleed, and after changing my pain meds they sent me home.

For the next four weeks I would suffer from these migraines from hell. The pain is really indescribable. I had to literally sit in a dark room, and hold my head completely still, shut my eyes, swallow my pain meds and pray for the pounding and the aching to go away. I would see, when my eyes were shut shooting stars and I was in a dark crevice of pain. There could be no sounds, no light, and no activity. I would shake afterwards and end up getting violently sick to my stomach. The headaches progressed to what the neurologist called headache-type seizures, and would completely shut me down. More pain meds were prescribed, more tests done, they were sure I had a brain bleed. At that point and time, I wasn’t even sure I still had a brain. If the headaches weren’t incapacitating me then the medication was numbing me beyond all feeling. Thinking became a chore and life turned into a struggle.

It was during a sleep study when they were trying to recreate the point where the headache seizures would start, that I first heard about a doctor who practiced acupuncture. He was an orthopedic surgeon, who had been involved in a horrible car wreck, found conventional meds and pain management failing him and decided to let a Master of Acupuncture work on him. A year later, he traveled to the Orient to study under this same master, and came back to Oregon and set up his practice. My neurosurgeon who was at his wits end with me, suggested I call him.

I went home and did just that. In the initial phone call, this doctor spoke to me for over an hour. Asking me very pointed questions about the accident, the headaches, the seizures, the anti-epileptic medication I was now on to reduce the amount of seizures I was having. I remember hanging up and being amazed that not only did he talk to me, but he listened as well.

I went to see him the next day, he performed a treatment on me and when I got home, I went into my bedroom and slept like a stone. I would go and see him for 6 months twice a week paying out of pocket, as my insurance would not cover this treatment. On my last visit, he shook my hand, told me I would be okay from now on, and I left. To this day, I have not suffered another migraine, nor have I had a headache since. Can I explain it? No, I cannot. Inserting heated needles into my neck, arm, shoulder, back, legs, feet (not all at once) stopped a pain so intense that not even the strongest painkiller on the market would squelch it. He also detoxed me off all the medication, the amitryptilin that I could never even go to sleep without, the anti-epileptic drugs, the pain killers, everything, he told me to throw it all away, put me on a holistic diet for 4 weeks while I was detoxing and it all worked.

Those of you who are reading this and who suffer from migraines, you have my heart. I only had to deal with them a very short time. I can’t imagine having to live with them for the rest of your life. That would be a living hell.