migraine and menopause?

 

Maybe it's just an inner ear problem?? I get that sometimes with all the bells and whistles, ie: dizziness, nausea etc. I have to just lay down. I had it once for 2 weeks, doc gave me Meclizine which dries up the fluid in your inner ear canal. I have found I get this way sometimes so I just take some Benedryl and lay down til I feel better. I fell off the bed once I was so dizzy.

Hi Emma,

Yep, if you have migraine without headache with aura (aka painless or acephalgic migraine), vertigo can most certainly be your aura (aka vertiginous migraine or MAV).

Most women find that, post-menopause, their migraines diminish. A minority find the opposite to be true. I'm not too familiar with migraine and the period just prior to menopause. You may want to seek out and consult a headache specialist (a neurology subspecialty). Who knows, maybe hormone replacement therapy would be an option???

That's very interesting that diet coke makes you feel better. The vast majority of people have the exact opposite reaction. It contains a bunch of triggers, including aspartame (neuro-excitatory molecule). But if it works for you... more power to you.

Now I've always heard that soda is bad for the bones. It chelates out calcium. If this is true... and you are extremely sensitive to calcium fluctuations I could see how diet soda may help. A lot of us migrainuers find that taking supplemental magnesium (citrate or malate), helps with the migraines. You should ask your neuro or GP about this (we usually start off taking 400 mg and build up to b/w 800mg and 1.2g / day). It may take upto a 3 months to notice a difference.

Best of luck!

Hi Emma,

You are very welcome and you're probably right. It's likely the caffeine (completely forgot about that.... woops) is helping. The chelation occurs pretty slowly (many, many years of drinking soda daily to normally be an issue... slow, but insidious), so you would have to be VERY sensitive.

As far as food triggers go, there is a lot of information out there (plug "migraine elimination diet" into google and you will get more information than you will know what to do with). Here is a link to a site that gives a good basic outline:

http://www.neurologychannel.com/migraine/elimination-challenge.shtml

(add alcohol to that list)

It's estimated between 25 and 50% of people with migraine have at least some food related trigger. Dr. Buchholz (at John Hopkins) is a strong proponent of the connection between migraine and food triggers. If you want to persue the migraine diet, you may want to read one of his books.

Best of luck!