CH

One of the biggest things in my life is called CH. Clusterheadache, which have been making my life harder since fall 2001. Not that I knew it's name until January 2002.

Ever since my life has been a battlefield. I have kept a headache diary since 2001, but it would be too depressing to count how many pain-free (PF) days I've had since... It's not that much.

Luckily for me I was episodic in the beginning, which meant that there were actually weeks and months without CH. But these days it's a distant dream... I turned chronic in fall 2003.

I have met so far 6 doctors, four of them neurologists, about CH. I have tried so many meds that I have lost count! Those who have no idea what CH is, take a look at www.clusterheadaches.com, you'll find more about it there. But in the meantime, imagine the most horrible pain you can, multiply that by million and place that pain inside your head several times a day, every day, for weeks and months. That should give you some idea what CH is all about.

CH is called also horton's neuralgia and suicide headache, among others. I can relate to the latter name. CH attacks are so severe that it has crossed my mind on several occasions that having no life at all would be better than the life I have. That's the reality with CH. It makes you down and depressed, it makes you tired, it makes you cry. In the end of the day, you're ready for nearly anything to end the pain... I am lucky to have a painkiller (maxalt) which helps me.

If I could get a dollar every time I've heard that CH is "just a headache" or "it's just like a migraine", I'd be a multimillionaire by now. I have sometimes migraines, too, and I can assure you that those two have very little in common.

These days my biggest weapon against CH is simply positive thinking. It has made days easier, I can tell you! Books by Joseph Murphy, Annastina Vrethammer, Louise L. Hay, Barbara Berger, among others have helped me. I have deliberately tried to change the way I think. It doesn't make CH vanish, but it makes my life better.

First post

My entrance to the exciting world of blogs!

There was a lot of discussion about blogs today during my university lectures. In the first one, web course, we were taught how much impact one blog had when people were trying to find information about their closeones after tsunami last December. During media & civic participation lecture about media activism and alternative media all I could think of was how much impact blogs can give to marginal groups. Give them the voice they won't get from the mainstream media.