I've been considering writing a post entitled "A Migraine in the Life of Jess" for a coupla weeks now. It's been a really rough time lately; I've had migraines for days at a stretch, interspersed with only hours of relief in between. I mostly abandoned the project because outlining one such day doesn't really get the point across. Even trying to reconstruct one "day" that's really an amalgam of all of them isn't too impressive:
7:09 am—woke up and wanted to die; hit snooze
7:18 am—woke up and wanted to die; hit snooze
...
9:06 am—woke up and wanted to die, but realized that I was already late for work, so rolled out of bed and got ready for the day (verrrry sloooowly)
10:45 am—arrived at work and wanted to die; worked anyway
[granted, the day thus far doesn't differ so very much from my typical day, except for the wanting to die part]
all day—was on the verge of tears due to pain and the frustration caused by my broken computer and other nonsense
1:30 pm—Tianna went and got us both lunch because I couldn't bear the thought of going out into the sunlight
3:00 pm—convinced Tianna to rub my shoulders while she was on the phone
4:30 pm—decided that I could make up my hours later in the week and went home
4:45 pm—took nausea medication that had the added benefit of knocking me out
5:30 pm—went to bed
8:30 pm—despite the medicine, was awakened by pain
10:45 pm—got online to see who was available to give me a priesthood blessing
11:00 pm—received blessing (I can't even find the words to describe how grateful I am for friends who are worthy priesthood holders and love me enough to come when I need them)
11:30 pm—after further writhing in pain, went back to bed
What the above outline doesn't really communicate, however, is the emotional effect of it all. Though I've become rather adept at working through pain, several days of it in a row really gets beyond my ability to manage. I start being snippy with my friends and coworkers. I rarely laugh. (And given that laughter is the only means by which Tianna and I can successfully navigate the crazier days at work, this adds to the stress.) I lose my ability to handle problems well; when merely functioning requires all of my emotional strength, I have none to spare for the stress of broken computers and messed up books and unwieldy software and processes we just haven't ironed out yet. The world contracts to a focus on the pain, interrupted by the day-to-day tasks that would normally be my focus. And while I have complete faith that God can banish my pain, and I utter near-constant prayers that He will do just that, I have learned from vast experience that He usually chooses not to, so I lack the faith that He really will do as I beg Him to. This also means that I am reluctant to request priesthood blessings: what's the point of involving more people in a process that I don't really think will have any effect? I guess I have a threshhold for such thinking, though: once I am reduced to lying in bed writhing in pain because I am actually in too much pain to hold still, I realize it's time for a blessing. And I did get one last Wednesday. And it helped: the pain abated enough for me to be able to sleep again, and it was mostly gone in the morning.
Friday, though, I woke up with another migraine and about panicked. That's another thing I've noticed about extended pain: courage fails me, and I am actually afraid of having to endure more. Just thinking about it now is raising my heartrate and bringing tears to my eyes. And trust me on this: hyperventilating never helps a migraine. Fortunately, that morning, after several desperate prayers, I was able to return to sleep, and when I eventually got up a few hours later, the pain was mostly gone. I honestly think that Heavenly Father realized that another migraine just then would send me right over the edge to Crazy Town.
These drawn-out periods of near-constant migraines have another effect on me, though: I become much more grateful for the time when I am not in pain. Those few hours in-between migraines are filled with prayers of gratitude. And when I beg Heavenly Father to let me have Saturday so that I can attend a very special baby blessing and spend some time with my friends, I realize how precious those things really are. And I become much more grateful, not only for the time that is free of pain, but also for the ability to accomplish a great many things through the pain.
People ask me sometimes how I deal with all the migraines I get, and I always tell them that I manage because there is no other option. When you have a headache every day, sitting out of life until the pain stops just isn't a viable option. So you learn to cope. I may get to work very late, but I stay late, too, because I can't short my hours every week. I do my very best to be polite with the people around me, even when I'm in pain, because to do otherwise would make me a very unpleasant person. I drive in the sunlight (with my dark sunglasses) and learn tricks like turning down the brightness on my computer monitor so that I can still work. I feel confident that anyone in my situation would do the same because the only other option would be to lay like a lump on the couch until I died. And during the times when I am utterly overcome and can't function at all, I am grateful for friends who stand by me, people who willingly step in when all my coping mechanisms have failed. Most of all, I am thankful for Christ and the knowledge that He has suffered everything I am asked to suffer, and that He would not leave me to do so for no reason.
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