a very lucky me
so i am slow in writing about this, but a couple of weeks ago, i won two prizes! can you believe it? me either.
someone should take me to vegas.
so first, i won the board game Quelf from the fabulous $-saving site Want Not. i haven’t played it yet, but i’m excited to. it looks like fun. and i LOVE playing board games. so it’s kind of fun to have a really new
one!
and *then* i won the Club 17 drawing from Holy Mama! she sent me this fabulous set of bath gels. they look delicious, the flavors are things like lilac & almond blossom, water lily & jasmine, and lemongrass and white tea. basically, it’s going to mean a lot of fantastic shower experiences for me. i’m mean and told spencer i wouldn’t share.
*******************************************************************************************************************
in other news, i am feeling markedly less awful lately — no, the preventative isn’t working. but my doctor in chicago said i could take the muscle relaxant (baclofen) everyday if i needed to – without the risk of rebound headaches! hallelujah. it doesn’t get rid of the majority of the pain, but it does take the edge off. we’ll take what we can get! it helps me get more things done. is this my excuse for neglecting my blog? no, not really. i have missed you all, don’t worry. i just had a little streak of feeling like i had nothing to say!
happily, that’s over with and i’m back to my long-winded ways. 
tagged!
one of the blogs i’ve started reading (somewhat) recently, LibAnn at Not Much More Than This, has tagged me! i like to be tagged. makes me feel like i’m not all alone out here in the blogging world.
Here goes….
Finish These Five
Rules
Each player answers the questions themselves. At the end of the post the player then tags 5 people and posts their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment letting them know that they’ve been tagged and asking them to read your blog. Let the person who tagged you know when you’ve posted your answers.
The Five
Ten years ago… I was going into my senior year of high school (yes, really) and rarely had migraines. oh, how times have changed! I believe i was working full time over the summer at Toys’R'Us – my first job.
Five things on today’s “to do” list…
- attend church.
- appointment with bishop (like our pastor)
- appointment with elder’s quorum presidency (can’t think of a good equivalent here)
- maybe some unpacking?
- choose a dessert to make tomorrow!
Snacks I enjoy… banana and peanut butter smoothie, ice cream, i LOVE chips and dip — so much so that i often have to *walk away* if they’re at a party…i can do some serious damage.
Things I would do if I was a millionaire… tithe 10% to my church, give a bunch to migraine research, invest a bunch, buy a house and land for my husband and i, probably in northern california, maybe a new car? and i’d buy my siblings and my husband’s siblings all houses as well.
Places I have lived… Ohio – Columbus, Athens, and Bryan; california (sacramento), utah – pgden, provo and SLC, pennsylvania.
I’m tagging…
Muum@ Muum’s Musings
Edge @ Mothering on the Edge
Gretchen @ Richard & Gretchen
Heather @ Magically Mama
Dorothy @ Inner Dorothy
Filed under blogs, meme | Comments (9)check this out…
my article is up today on the How to Cope with Pain Blog! It’s 5 tips on how i handle my worst pain symptoms. let me know what you think over there!
Filed under blogs, headaches, migraines, pain | Tags: article | Comments (5)Pain — has an Element of Blank — By Emily Dickinson
Pain — has an Element of Blank
It cannot recollect
When it begun — or if there were
A time when it was not –
It has no Future — but itself –
Its Infinite contain
Its Past — enlightened to perceive
New Periods — of Pain.
the nausea seems to have passed! thank goodness! it wasn’t taking it at night that helped, because unfortunately for me, the effexor is an extended release. so i was nauseous no matter when i took it. BUT my body slowly got used to it. and now i am much improved. if we could just do something about this pounding pain in my temple… 
the moving in is coming along, slowly but surely. i disappeared for a little while there — we were at a family reunion (spencer’s family) up in sundance. ooh, it is gorgeous up there! so pretty. did i take any pictures? no. but when my dear husband posts some, i’ll link to them for you. the reunion was good, but it was a little disconcerting to come back to an apartment full of boxes. so much work yet to do! today i did the first set of laundry and grocery shopping since we’ve been in the new place. seems crazy to be bringing more things INTO the house!
on a parting note, my husband posted this photoblog entry the other week — he calls it ‘Waiting’. love it! i promise i’m not angry, just bored. and i’m sure i didn’t realize he was taking my picture.
Filed under Family, blogs, headaches, pain, randomness | Tags: Uncategorized | Comments (5)nausea is going into overtime
the past three days, my nausea has been pretty much nonstop. it varies from an annoyance to ’stop the world, i want to get off’. it makes it difficult to find food to eat. many of you know that you have to eat regularly or the migraines just get worse.
so this morning, i was able to put 2 and 2 together and figured out that this nausea really got going once i started taking the effexor. dum dum DUM. so of course i look up the common side effects online, and 31% of people taking effexor experienced nausea. bummer.my nausea pill (Reglan) helps, but only for an hour. and i can’t take it that frequently.
so, starting tomorrow i’m going to try taking it at night. hopefully that’ll help!
Filed under Uncategorized | Comments (11)doctor appointment – update
well, it was a good appointment – on of the rare ones where i come out feeling more hopeful and positive about improving my situation. we made quite a few changes, most of which will be taking place gradually over the next month.
1- changing my anti-seizure drug from zonegran back to tegretol. the zonegran has been preventing seizures just as well as the tegretol did, but the tegretol also provided a bit of help for the migraines. the zonegran didn’t help at all.
2 – the emsam has been done for some time now (thankfully), and we’re on to try the next preventative. hurrah! it is Effexor XR! it’s a depression and anxiety medication, which the headache clinic has had some success with using as a migraine preventative for chronic migraines.
3 – Surmontil is done. hasn’t been helping.
as for the future plans, if the Effexor doesn’t help, i’ll probably go back in the hospital in september and try another of the MAOIs. i really don’t want to … but at least i’ve got least i’ve got a while to prepare for it, if it comes to that.
that might not seem like an out of the ordinary doctor’s appointment; and really, it wouldn’t have been. but what made it different was how much pain i was in – even more than normal because i’d been travelling. and having been basically off an anti-depressant for the past month, my mood swings have been wildly out of control. so having my doctor say that he understands that the pain and frustration of these chronic migraines is difficult enough even before dealing with the side effects of the MAOIs. having him say that meant a lot – i guess just having my experience validated and acknowledged. it’s hard to know if i’m doing the right thing by not pursuing the MAOIs right away – the side effects are rather discouraging.
so that was it – we’ll keep our fingers crossed as always for good results!
Filed under Uncategorized | Comments (7)
