Do migraines ever make you mean or irritable?

Hi All,

Ever since the stimulator wire broke, the headaches have been horrendous and unrelenting. I am in a lot of pain. I am normally a pretty calm and easy going person. I do not get angry easily. But for the past few days, I have found myself really losing it- flying of the handle and yelling for no reason. During the worst of these bouts, I simply had to take a very small dose of my night meds and go to bed in order to calm down.

This whole thing is a bit baffling to me. I have been irritable during headaches before, but have always known it was the migraine and rarely spoke about it. This is somehow different. I yelled at my rooommate this morning and upset her. Once I realized what was happening- I apologized and cooled off. I do not like this feeling- it is almost feels like the higher leverls of pain are driving me crazy. The pain has not dropped below a 9.5/1O in days and I have had slurred speech for five days. (Now on short course of decadron- started about an hour ago.}

The only thing that helps at all is taking some diazepam or benedryl and rest. Music and distractions help too.

Has anyone else ever experienced this. If so, how do you handle it.

Pain free dats,
sailingm

Yes, specially in early stages of the new bout, I get restless and irritable.
I am normally extremely patient specially with my children and now grandchildren. But the other day I found myself raising my voice to my 5 Yold g-daughter, not really loud, just sounding seriosuly impatient when she was not responding to her mother calling her repeatedly, acting a little silly.
I came instantly to my senses, when she gave me a very surprised look - it was not like me - I felt terrible about it. I wa also quite surprised by it as it just came out of nowhere.

I get terribly restless, just as you describe, and so at times I just walk about doing nothing much just to to distract myself from an uncoforatble feeling and emerging pain in order not to give in to it, even if my pain levels are seldom very high. In the end I sort of wear myslf out, and give in to it and wait for this next bout of M to pass away as long as it takes.

The strange thing is that over the years M and every symtops around it changes all the time, so there is always something new to discover - this is why this site is great - we can check with each other such things.

Did you see the one aboout the green blood and Dr Spock? I could hardly believe it when I read it.

Senna

Yes, sometimes when I have a dozy coming on and especially if I`ve had one for over a week.

Yup I get cranky and snap. Which is why I avoid public if I'm in a bad way. Pain just does nasty things to people and causes us to act in ways that aren't normal. When I don't feel good, I usually start with an apology for anything I might say or do that would be unkind.

Hang in there. And just try to be cognizant of what's happening.

When my migraines are coming on, I become sweetness and light. The happiness just radiates out of me. All my friends flock over to bask in the glow of my sunny personality.

Just kidding :-) I actually sometimes have a personality change during prodrome where I become very irritable and annoyed with everything. People tend to get as far away from me as possible.

I like to think I'm fairly even tempered most of the time but I definitely get irritable before and during a migraine. When attacks came on during the day, my family could tell hours before I could that one was on the way as the bad tempered-ness would start, so it's not necessarily linked to pain. Pain can make me pretty snakey as well, although I'm fairly used to that now and tend to take it out on people less often than I did.

HAHa, that sounds like the tampon commercial where the girl is talking about how much she "loves" that time of the month! But SM, I get very irritable during prolonged periods of pain. I dont know how you could not be irritable with the levels of pain you endure. I am sure your roomate will forgive you. Dont have any suggestions, just empathy!
hugs,
Cindy

That is exactly how it happens with me. I am a pretty laid back person. But when a bad one is coming (the prodrome) and even during long bouts of intense pain I get CRAZY irritable, frustrated, short tempered. I find myself yelling at my family. It makes me feel like a jerk. My husband knows that it is the pain and cuts me some slack. But when it is my poor 2 year old daughter I feel like a real jerk. I always try to apologize and explain that I am sorry and I shouldn't have yelled. I often wonder if it why she has a hell of a temper.

Good luck, don't worry too much. Your loved ones will understand. Especially after you calm down and apologize. How has the stimulator been working? (minus, of course, the broken wire). I am looking for more help. Perhaps a stimulator for me. Or the med pump.

Mary Anne

I have never had an irritated day in my life with migraine Yeh, and my nose gets longer every time I say it. I handle the stress by choking everyone around me until they quit moving and making sounds. Then when it is quiet, I go fishing or target shooting. If I am fishing, I use dynamite and if I am taget shooting, I use stinger missles. Do I get irritated when getting a migraine? Never! If it is a real bad M, I just sit quietly and you had better stay away. Don't even talk to me.

Hal

I wish i could say I handle the pain well, but I don't.

Especially when the pain gets to a high level quickly, or the pain continues for days without any relief.

In those situations, I often snap at people.

You know it's like those irritating things they do and say that usually don't bother me that much drive me crazy!

I can remember many times when I have had to visit the ER and the doctor is on the fence about giving me the pain meds I need, just wanting to seriously punching him in the nose.

Is that horrible?

My poor hubby, but he deals with it so well. He has to put up with alot of BS from me when I feel particularly bad.

I am so lucky to have him.

When I am feeling like this, I try not to answer the phone because I am afraid I will say the wrong thing to someone.

I have done that to my mom a couple of times and later had to call and aplolgize for my actions.

She is wonderful, she understands because she has seen me in a bad way many times.

I do my best, but sometimes I truly can't help myself.

Don't be too hard on yourself Sailing, people that know you should understand.

Had the stimulator been working for you before the wire problem?

I meant to ask you that along time ago.

Take care and know that we all understand what you are dealing with.

You are a wonderful person, but pain just gets the best of you sometimes.

Completely understandable.

Hope you get your stimulator fixed soon.

Cindy

Hi All,

Thanks for all the advice. In some ways, I am glad to know that it is not just me. I just hate to act that way to anyone. I know it was the migraine talking, but I still don't like it.

As to the stimulator- one wire broke last year when I fainted and hit a doorpost. ( We did have a surgery date, but postponed until fainting situation was diagnosed. } The other wire was working. It makes a huge difference in the headaches- mainly that medications actually work. Ever since the other wire broke two weeks ago, the headaches have been unbearable- absolute torture. The only thing helping is diazepam, tylenol 3, and benedryl. (I have been on long acting pain meds, but they stopped working and I got off them. I do not want to go back to that right now} I have certainly had to take more medication than I would like to- but I am not sure what else I can do. My neuro is out of town and I know it is time for an IV of Depakan. I may check with his office and see who is covering his patients- just to see if anything can be done sooner. If not, I suppose that I will just have to wait it out. It is hard to think or even do the small things. I don't know how I would have made it through everything without a wonderful roommate, some other friends, and y'all.

Pain free days,
sailingm

I think chronic pain can make even the nicest person be irritable! It sure does for me...it is not so much the level of the pain, but the combination of the pain being high and prolonged. Sounds like you need to get your doctors together and brainstorm how to get you feeling better, sailingmuffin. When I am going through a tough pain time, I will go to my doctor every 2-4 weeks until we get me feeling better. If they don't have any suggestions, I will start bringing things up that I haven't tried yet--whether it is a name of a med, an additional diagnosis, or a treatment. I don't understand why you don't want to go back on long acting pain meds though...I still think your doctors must have been underdosing you all along or using the wrong meds if your pain was at 8 or 9 or whatever consistently. Sure, you don't want to be brought to little or no pain as then the dose is too high, but most people on chronic pain management with opiates (and using a breakthrough med) should be able to get their pain down to a level that they are mostly functional, whether that is a 5 or 6 or whatever. I find new doctors whenever mine aren't treating me the way I deserve. As long as you don't get pain meds from more than one at a time, I don't see a problem with doctor shopping. Best wishes.

I have to confess that I am never sure what makes this beast break out from me.
Is it the migraine or the fibro?

But having had a longer break for once....well 6 days, I think it is the migraine.
The fibro is constant, the migraine not quite so.

I do confess, I get less tolerant, and more argumentative just before and when a migriane strikes.
I had one this morning and am aware that yeserday I did not like my husband at all.
He must have been behaving very badly.
This continued this morning, but he is much nicer now...

I think perhaps it just might be me, not him.
Dont tell him will you??

pen wrote:I do confess, I get less tolerant, and more argumentative just before and when a migriane strikes.
I had one this morning and am aware that yeserday I did not like my husband at all.
He must have been behaving very badly.
This continued this morning, but he is much nicer now...

I think perhaps it just might be me, not him.
Dont tell him will you??

I know exactly that of which you speak, Pen.

I am always slightly annoyed by ignorant people And when I'm migraining, the slightest things irritate me even more, so I get REALLY annoyed and irritated very easily by ignorant people and/or people doing dumb things. You know, like people who don't use their blinker when driving as they're talking on their cel phones and cutting me off.
On Friday, I was in this orientation class, with a tone of paperwork to fill out, and the poor lady next to me could not figure out how to fill out a W-4 form for taxes. I had to try hard to not be overly irritated with her - and I know that's the migraine making me even less patient with someone else's difficulty. After all, not everyone can be as brilliant as I am. I think I was especially annoyed, not because she couldn't figure out the form, but because she asked me to help her but then wouldn't listen to me when I was trying to explain to her what to do. At least it was a good exercise for me to learn to be more patient, LOL Didn't help my migraine any tho.

Anyway, I think the migraines make me more short-tempered, more likely to be impatient, more apt to get annoyed. Then 90% of the time, I have to swallow all of that, along with the migraine pain, because I don't get alot of sympathy at home when I have a migraine. It's either "put up and shut up" or else go lock myself in my bedroom for hours at a time as the only way to get peace, and even that doesn't work because my nephew will still run around the house screaming. So yeah, I do get pretty cranky.