An August Migraine

There is discomfort. My mind and body are asleep but there is something wrong. My body is feeling overly warm and uncomfortable. There is pain somewhere. All is dark. The tiredness that grips me is still overwhelming the pain and discomfort, but not for much longer.

There is noise. Clattering from above that rings down into my senses and calls me up. There is still only darkness but my mind grabs onto this intruding sound to bring me body, mind and soul back to wakefulness. More clattering and my mind becomes alert, though my eyes remain closed, too tired to open.

There is great pain in my head. It is great pressure and pain. I am hot under the bed clothing. There is an urgency to go to the bathroom and relieve myself as well, adding to the discomfort.

I feel weighed down by outside pressure. My body aches as if the flu virus has finally caught me after many years of avoidance. Most of all there is the pain that is standing on my head and grinding me down into a helpless bag of bones. It won’t go away. More clattering tells my mind that my son is doing dishes upstairs.

I am now fully awake. A roll of my head to the left tells me it is about 1:00 p.m. and sends waves of pain through my head from the movement. My 7:00 a.m.-3:00 p.m. sleep has been interrupted by a migraine. It is not without precedence. Migraines sometimes come in the few hours near the end of my sleep cycle. My head is pounding with each beat of my heart. I feel listless and mortally tired. After a stumbling trip to the bathroom to relieve myself I fall back into bed hoping for more sleep and relief of the pain that seems to have settled in. Sleep comes again but is fitful and not regenerative.

At 3:30 p.m. I drag my unwilling body from bed and upstairs to see what the weather is doing. Changing weather patterns often produce migraines for me, second only to perfumes and other heavy scents. When I am having or about to have a migraine my olfactory senses become hypersensitive. Anything that would cause even slight olfactory irritation now is a horrendous offense. I climb the stairs from the darkened basement where my ‘bedroom for a night shift worker’ has been set up. Each step produces painful pulsing in my skull and the light coming from under the door at the top of the stairs is unwelcome.

The sun is shining and seemingly no storms are on the near horizon. Walking around the kitchen to the dining room and then the living room my wife’s voice shrills out a happy,

“Hey, how ya doin’?”

She has just arrived home from work a few minutes earlier and is lounging on the couch with a glass of ice water and a television remote. As I come into sight she sees that I’m not doing so well and says a little more quietly,

“Oh, a bad one?”

I mumble a response. All of the smells in the house are alive to me, some good and others bad. Sausage that I cooked at 5:00 a.m. for my wife and kids who were soon to be getting up is lingering and bothers me. Dish soap used by my son only an hour before tortures me. The smell hurts. I have a hard time putting words into sentences right now. My head is hurting and word finding is often difficult at these times. Even with the words found speaking them clearly is not happening now. I know what I want and need help with but am having trouble getting it out. Finally the words,