Please God, make the phone stop ringing

I'm pretty sure you're supposed to be an interesting person in order to have a blog. I've been called weird a lot in my life, so maybe thats enough of a qualification.

So who am I? I'm Alexis, I'm 25, I'm a grad student studying counseling, I'm a receptioninst at an ultra-conservative right-wing law firm (yea, i know, roll those eyes as hard as you can), and I'm a migraine sufferer. Its pretty much the reason why I'm starting this thing; I think my boyfriend is getting a little tired of me breaking down crying so often (sorry babe!) and being so cranky about all these new rules I'm having to adjust to in order to control the triggers. So here I am. I decided last night that it might be a better idea to write about it rather than cry about it.

So when did all this start? Well, I've had migraines for about as long as I can remember. Mind you, they didn't happen this frequently or this severely. I'd say it was only about 2 or 3 years ago that things really started to slide downhill, and I started noticing that I was going through bottles of Excedrin like it was nothing. Two years ago I finally broke down at work and gave in to the idea of seeing a doctor for the problem. That led to seeing a neurologist and an acupuncturist on the regular. Still, the migraines happened pretty often and not even two months ago I wound up in the hospital hooked up to an IV for 4 days getting some DHE treatment that was supposed to re-wire my brain, apparently to teach it to not be so damn sensitive to pain or something. After all that the neurologist added on another prescription to my already staggering daily amount of pills (seriously people, I probably take like 20 pills per day that either combat the migraines themselves or combat the side effects of the pills which combat the migraines; its fucking ridiculous). These pills changed my taste buds, so now my beloved sodas taste like shit. And now, I dream about them. Terrific.

Taking my health seriously for once means making lots of changes, most of which I'm not too keen on. I have to go to sleep every single weekday at 10pm without fail. I simply cannot function properly on less than 9 hours of sleep. I have force myself to exercise at LEAST twice a week, and I fucking hate sweating (unless I'm having sex of course). I had to give up all caffeine. I've had to drastically cut back on dairy products (this one might confuse you, but I'm lactose intolerant so I wasn't doing myself any favors anyways by continuing to eat cheese and ice cream). I've had to watch my sugar intake like a hawk. I HAVE to drink 80oz of water every single day; any less is a disaster waiting to happen. I have to take all of my pills like clockwork. I had to admit to myself that pot was a trigger, and thus had to cut back on my habit (that was a real shitty conversation with my boyfriend; I don't think I looked him in the eye once during the whole thing. Its funny how admitting problems is viewed as shameful).

Probably the worst part of all this has been dealing with people who don't understand. There are plenty of people in this world who suffer from migraines just like I do, but theres also a lot that don't and never will. Those people think that a migraine is just "a bad headache". At the job before this one, I had a boss that was of that opinion. Every single time I had to leave early because my head hurt so bad I could barely look people in the face, he would make some shitty comment to me as I walked out the door. At my current job, a coworker friend told me that up until I went into the hospital many of my other coworkers thought I was faking everything to get attention and special privileges. Some of my own family members think I'm a faker, that all I need to do is suck it up and deal, that they get bad headaches too but thats no reason to act the way I do. Its bullshit, and I marvel at their utter inability to empathize with somebody in pain and in need.

So anyways, here I am at work on a Wed morning, making my first blog post ever *trumpet blare* Yesterday was the 4th day in a row that I had a migraine, but I figured out it was because I didn't exercise but one day all last week. As soon as I felt better yesterday I hightailed it to the gym and did some cardio and weight machines, so I'm just hoping for the best today. So far I'm down 20oz of water and have 60oz more to go. I had a little bit of dairy yesterday so that means absolutely none today. Fuck, its like a never ending checklist. I'll let you know how it goes.

Peace.