Since I was a child I remember getting “sick headaches.” We would go out and play baseball on a sunny Saturday morning and then I would spend that afternoon and night in my room with a cold rag on my head silently suffering. My mother had headaches all of her life with terrible nausea, but thankfully, I never had the nausea. As I grew into young adulthood, I realized the patterns and triggers in my headaches so I was able to control them to a degree. They were manageable, but never gone.
As a working adult with all of the pressures of job, family and life in general my headaches increased in frequency and intensity. Nothing helped prevent or relieve them until Imitrex hit the market. It was like a miracle drug. The relief that I experienced with 30 minutes of that first injection was unbelievable. Never before had I taken anything that did anything to stop the pain.
Over the last 18 years or so Imitrex* has continued to help, but I have had to take more, and more often, because of the “rebound” affect. I think my use over the years has also made me more sensitive to migraines and as a result I actually have them more often.
My story revolves around my use of Imitrex and my current attempts to break my “addiction.” I have tried just about everything and look forward to hearing from anyone who has beaten the “Triptan dependency.”
*Note: The FDA approved Imitrex (Sumatriptan) on Dec. 28. 1992.
