Life is a pain in the ...

[melannen]

Question for the collective wisdom of Dreamwidth:

If switching rapidly between cold, dry, dim air conditioning and bright, humid, 90 deg F outside air reliably gives you a pounding headache that settles in for 4+ hours and feels like your eye sockets are being slowly ground away by a belt sander and pooling in your teeth and jaw, with bonus mild nausea, light sensitivity, and the desire to rain down destruction on anything making even as much noise as a vibrating phone except that would require rapid motion so no, and standard painkillers don’t help noticeably but you spend the next day feeling like your brain is balanced on a fresh breezy mountaintop over a miasmatic swamp of pain - is that a migraine?

Because ever since I was tiny I’ve assumed it was just that America’s relationship with air conditioning is bad for humans and all other living things, but in my age I’m starting to think it’s 90% that America’s relationship with air conditioning was borrowed from one of the circles of hell, and 10% maybe you have a migraine trigger, sweetheart.

Anyway, in honor of my lost yesterday afternoon and evening, here is a poll about pain I’ve been meaning to post for a long time. Somebody did one like this ages ago on LJ and it was super interesting to see how everyone’s pain baseline was different, and I would love to see everybody’s answers now. Also, I keep playing with an OC who can sense others’ pain, and I feel like I don’t even have a good idea of, say, what percent of a crowd of people she would sense at any given time.

Poll is anon; comments can be anon or signed, if you want to elaborate. Feel free to share it around - I’m more interested in lots of answers than in a balanced sample, or I wouldn’t be posting on DW. And these are all going to be very subjective answers, because what I’m interested in is peoples’ subjective experience of pain, so don’t think too hard about accuracy if there’s an answer that seems more or less right.

For all pain scale questions we are using either the Hyperbole and A Half Pain Scale, or the Mankoski Pain Scale, your choice, so please read over those if you aren’t already familiar with them.

Poll #22103 Pain.

This poll is anonymous.
Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 87

What is your pain level right now as you begin to fill out this poll?

View Answers
Mean: 1.93 Median: 2 Std. Dev 1.55

0 0		14 (16.1%)
1		27 (31.0%)
2		20 (23.0%)
3		12 (13.8%)
4		10 (11.5%)
5		1 (1.1%)
6		1 (1.1%)
7		2 (2.3%)
8		0 (0.0%)
9		0 (0.0%)
10		0 (0.0%)
11 11		0 (0.0%)

What has been your highest pain level over the past week?

View Answers
Mean: 4.38 Median: 4 Std. Dev 1.76

0 0		0 (0.0%)
1		1 (1.1%)
2		11 (12.6%)
3		19 (21.8%)
4		21 (24.1%)
5		11 (12.6%)
6		12 (13.8%)
7		6 (6.9%)
8		6 (6.9%)
9		0 (0.0%)
10		0 (0.0%)
11 11		0 (0.0%)

What has been your lowest pain level over the past week?

View Answers
Mean: 0.86 Median: 0 Std. Dev 1.19

0 0		44 (50.6%)
1		26 (29.9%)
2		8 (9.2%)
3		5 (5.7%)
4		3 (3.4%)
5		0 (0.0%)
6		1 (1.1%)
7		0 (0.0%)
8		0 (0.0%)
9		0 (0.0%)
10		0 (0.0%)
11 11		0 (0.0%)

What has been your highest pain level you can recall in the past year?

View Answers
Mean: 6.41 Median: 6 Std. Dev 1.83

0 0		0 (0.0%)
1		0 (0.0%)
2		0 (0.0%)
3		2 (2.3%)
4		13 (14.9%)
5		15 (17.2%)
6		19 (21.8%)
7		10 (11.5%)
8		16 (18.4%)
9		9 (10.3%)
10		1 (1.1%)
11 11		2 (2.3%)

What has been your lowest pain level you can recall in the past year?

View Answers
Mean: 0.62 Median: 0 Std. Dev 1.10

0 0		57 (65.5%)
1		17 (19.5%)
2		6 (6.9%)
3		5 (5.7%)
4		1 (1.1%)
5		0 (0.0%)
6		1 (1.1%)
7		0 (0.0%)
8		0 (0.0%)
9		0 (0.0%)
10		0 (0.0%)
11 11		0 (0.0%)

What has been your highest pain level you can recall over your lifetime?

View Answers
Mean: 8.15 Median: 8 Std. Dev 1.57

0 0		0 (0.0%)
1		0 (0.0%)
2		0 (0.0%)
3		0 (0.0%)
4		2 (2.3%)
5		3 (3.4%)
6		9 (10.3%)
7		11 (12.6%)
8		23 (26.4%)
9		25 (28.7%)
10		8 (9.2%)
11 11		6 (6.9%)

What has been your lowest pain level you can recall over your lifetime?

View Answers
Mean: 0.16 Median: 0 Std. Dev 0.45

0 0		76 (87.4%)
1		8 (9.2%)
2		3 (3.4%)
3		0 (0.0%)
4		0 (0.0%)
5		0 (0.0%)
6		0 (0.0%)
7		0 (0.0%)
8		0 (0.0%)
9		0 (0.0%)
10		0 (0.0%)
11 11		0 (0.0%)

What would you consider an “ordinary” level of pain for you, on a day that is neither a good pain day or a bad pain day?

View Answers
Mean: 1.60 Median: 1 Std. Dev 1.42

0 0		19 (21.8%)
1		29 (33.3%)
2		21 (24.1%)
3		11 (12.6%)
4		4 (4.6%)
5		0 (0.0%)
6		2 (2.3%)
7		1 (1.1%)
8		0 (0.0%)
9		0 (0.0%)
10		0 (0.0%)
11 11		0 (0.0%)

Do you currently have any type of chronic disability, illness, injury or other condition of which pain is a symptom (i.e., migraines, fibromyalgia, idiopathic back pain, rsi)?

View Answers

Yes
51 (58.6%)

No
21 (24.1%)

Maybe/Not Sure
15 (17.2%)

Do you currently have any type of acute disability, illness, injury or other condition of which pain is a symptom (i.e., strep throat, sunburn, broken leg, gunshot wound)?

View Answers

Yes
14 (16.1%)

No
65 (74.7%)

Maybe/Not Sure
8 (9.2%)

Are you, or have you ever been, menstruating?

View Answers

Yes
84 (97.7%)

No
1 (1.2%)

Maybe/Not Sure
1 (1.2%)

Are you, or have you ever been, pregnant?

View Answers

Yes
15 (17.4%)

No
71 (82.6%)

Maybe/Not Sure
0 (0.0%)

Are you currently, as you fill out this poll, using any pain management strategies that have noticeably reduced your pain levels?

View Answers

Yes
34 (39.1%)

No
48 (55.2%)

Maybe/Not Sure
5 (5.7%)

Do you use any of the following techniques for pain management at least once a month?

View Answers

Pharmaceutical/drugs (including OTC, prescription, herbal, self-med with 'recreational' chemicals, etc.)
70 (84.3%)

Movement (physical therapy, massage, chiropractic, exercise, etc.)
62 (74.7%)

Mind-body techniques (Meditation, biofeedback, classical conditioning, counseling, etc.)
16 (19.3%)

Lifestyle changes (dietary, environmental or exercise changes, deliberate distractions, avoiding triggers, etc.)
47 (56.6%)

Electrical stimulation (TENS, spinal implants, violet wand,etc.)
6 (7.2%)

Alternative therapies (acupuncture, spells, crystals, energy work, etc.)
8 (9.6%)

Treating an underlying cause
30 (36.1%)

Something else you forgot
7 (8.4%)

Right now, are you experiencing detectable (level 1-2+) of pain anywhere in your:

View Answers

Feet and toes
20 (27.0%)

Lower legs
8 (10.8%)

Knees
19 (25.7%)

Thighs
11 (14.9%)

Hips
22 (29.7%)

Groin
5 (6.8%)

Butt
9 (12.2%)

Digestive tract
16 (21.6%)

Reproductive organs
9 (12.2%)

Abdomen generally
11 (14.9%)

Lungs
1 (1.4%)

Heart
1 (1.4%)

Breasts
6 (8.1%)

Chest generally
3 (4.1%)

Shoulders
29 (39.2%)

Upper arms
9 (12.2%)

Elbows
8 (10.8%)

Lower arms
5 (6.8%)

Wrists
17 (23.0%)

Fingers
15 (20.3%)

Neck
23 (31.1%)

Jaw, mouth, or teeth
22 (29.7%)

Nose or sinuses
13 (17.6%)

Ears or inner ears
6 (8.1%)

Eyes
7 (9.5%)

Face otherwise
5 (6.8%)

Head
18 (24.3%)

Scalp or skin
4 (5.4%)

Right now, are you experiencing distressing (3-4+) pain anywhere in your:

View Answers

Feet and toes
1 (4.0%)

Lower legs
1 (4.0%)

Knees
4 (16.0%)

Thighs
1 (4.0%)

Hips
5 (20.0%)

Groin
2 (8.0%)

Butt
0 (0.0%)

Digestive tract
2 (8.0%)

Reproductive organs
0 (0.0%)

Abdomen generally
2 (8.0%)

Lungs
0 (0.0%)

Heart
0 (0.0%)

Breasts
0 (0.0%)

Chest generally
1 (4.0%)

Shoulders
9 (36.0%)

Upper arms
3 (12.0%)

Elbows
4 (16.0%)

Lower arms
3 (12.0%)

Wrists
8 (32.0%)

Fingers
6 (24.0%)

Neck
11 (44.0%)

Jaw, mouth, or teeth
5 (20.0%)

Nose or sinuses
4 (16.0%)

Ears or inner ears
1 (4.0%)

Eyes
0 (0.0%)

Face otherwise
2 (8.0%)

Head
5 (20.0%)

Scalp or skin
1 (4.0%)

How to you think your lifetime experience of pain compares to most people?

View Answers

I have experienced a lot more pain than most people.
8 (9.2%)

I have experienced somewhat more pain than most people.
25 (28.7%)

About the same.
18 (20.7%)

I have experienced somewhat less pain than most people.
22 (25.3%)

I have experienced a lot less pain than most people.
9 (10.3%)

Not sure / no idea
5 (5.7%)

What level of pain do you think most people without a pain condition would consider an “every day” level of pain that isn’t worth worrying about?

View Answers
Mean: 1.50 Median: 1 Std. Dev 1.14

0 0		15 (17.4%)
1		35 (40.7%)
2		20 (23.3%)
3		12 (14.0%)
4		2 (2.3%)
5		2 (2.3%)
6		0 (0.0%)
7		0 (0.0%)
8		0 (0.0%)
9		0 (0.0%)
10		0 (0.0%)
11 11		0 (0.0%)

What is your pain level right now as you finish filling out this poll?

View Answers
Mean: 1.98 Median: 2 Std. Dev 1.51

0 0		13 (14.9%)
1		24 (27.6%)
2		23 (26.4%)
3		15 (17.2%)
4		8 (9.2%)
5		1 (1.1%)
6		1 (1.1%)
7		2 (2.3%)
8		0 (0.0%)
9		0 (0.0%)
10		0 (0.0%)
11 11		0 (0.0%)

One more question.

View Answers

TIL that filling out polls about pain is bad for pain levels.
15 (19.2%)

Heat waves are the worst.
37 (47.4%)

Tickybox feels my pain.
33 (42.3%)

Yes that's a migraine that's not normal pain!!
50 (64.1%)

I want to alpha read a story about an OC who does pain wizardry.
14 (17.9%)

Anything else you want to say?

View Answers

(responses to responses to the freetext question: a) "Back" is not listed as an option because I forgot it. Oops? Pick the closest one?
b) There's no good way to compare the experience of pain, but one of the things I like about the Mankowski scale is that it talks about effect on your life rather than some sort of 'how bad does it hurt' - everybody may hit "I can't sleep" at a different pain level, but "I can't sleep" is fairly a measurable standard.)

Comments

[cathexys]

As someone who suffers from migraines and that crazy change in weather/temperature that you're describing (often with a heavy dose of allergies) I can differentiate between the two. Moreover, I think the treatment (beyond pain relief) may be somewhat different: migraine is the opening of blood vessels in the brain that have been too restricted (if I recall correctly), which is why coffee is both a trigger but also can treat an impending migraine... Personally, my sinus/weather/allergy pain often reacts well to Mucinex (I didn't get at first that is was mucus thinner meant for your chest only and used it habitually for my sinuses and have yet to learn that I should cease my off-label use :)

[melannen]

It's not really related to weather or allergies or sinus, though? Like, it doesn't happen if the weather swings naturally, and I can be out in the heat/pollen all day or week and it's fine, or move from the upstairs warm house to the cool basement - it's just specifically the moving between A/C and parking lot repeatedly over a short time that does it (associated in my head with shopping centers, because 90% of the time that's what does it, since I don't have a/c at home.)

IDK - reading the descriptions of different types of headaches is always very unhelpful to me. I also get stress headaches and dehydration/blood sugar ones, and rapid barometric pressure swings give me heebie-jeebies instead of headaches. But the "summer shopping center" pain is special.

[jesse_the_k]

fucking yes that's a migraine

My doctor says, and my experience bears it out, that lots of my headaches resolve with triptans. For me, a headache can trigger a migraine: it may start with the classic cluster symptom of tight band around head, and then I get the aura, hyper sensory sensitivity, and one-sided pain.

[jenett]

I am a person who gets migraines that are mostly not about pain - there's a lot of fairly recent research on migraines that notes that some of them are headaches that include neurological weirdness, and some off them are neurological weirdness that sometimes include pain, and these may need different approaches.

Indoor climate doesn't usually trigger me, but I am exceedingly intolerant of heat and especially mugginess, and weather pressure changes are one of my most reliable triggers these days (and the one I can do least to avoid.)

My doctor recommended a supplement called Migrelief (mostly for the B2 and magnesium combo, but it's easier as a single pill, and sometimes the feverfew doesn't hurt...) which is an easy thing to try out if it won't mess with other meds (and those things probably won't, but check first anyway, etc.)

I've been on it for a couple of years, and it's gotten me down from migraines every couple of weeks to a few wibbles every few weeks, but not enough to disrupt what I'm doing. Disruption level stuff is only every 4 months or so now unless I hit another trigger (sleep debt is a huge one for me, or certain kinds of background noise/vibration/light combos.)

This is good, because most of the migraine meds do a lot more for the pain-type symptoms than for the aura ones.

[melannen]

I've never really had any symptoms other than pain (+ sensory sensitivity), which is part of the reason it never really occurred to me that it maybe wasn't just 'normal' headaches! I read a lot of Oliver Sacks' stuff on his aura migraines, though - sounds like both a really cool thing brains do and really annoying to live with.

I could usually avoid the A/C to outdoor temperature shifts by not living in a place with A/C and not going to A/C places on really hot days, but now I work in an air-conditioned building so I have to leave the building sometimes. I guess I'm lucky it's so specific that it only happens a few times a year in the summers.

[melannen]

My pain is usually more-or-less symmetrical the whole time (although sometimes it moves, or is worse on one side than the other) so maybe it's not a migraine? The sensory sensitivity sucks, though.

I'm not sure it's worth messing with special meds since it only happens a couple times a month in the summer, and it's not debilitating - I can grit my teeth and get through it without anybody noticing I'm in pain as long as I don't have to do anything that takes a lot of concentration. (Uh. Is that the level at which most people think they need meds? I'm bad at this.)

[ellen_fremedon]

Yeah, I get a visual migraine every 6 months to 2 years. I don't get pain with them, unless I try to keep reading or working and give myself eyestrain, but I get an aura that expands to fill half my visual field with pulses and sparkles for 30 minutes to an hour, and I'm light-sensitive for a couple of hours afterwards.

I've never been able to figure out what triggers them, but as they happen so rarely and don't cause pain I haven't really tried.

[sarken]

fwiw, I've never had my migraines be on one side of my head. Mine are almost exactly like what you've described in the post, with the exception of the nausea being more debilitating than mild.

[lannamichaels]

Because ever since I was tiny I’ve assumed it was just that America’s relationship with air conditioning is bad for humans and all other living things, but in my age I’m starting to think it’s 90% that America’s relationship with air conditioning was borrowed from one of the circles of hell, and 10% maybe you have a migraine trigger, sweetheart.

I don't know if that's a migraine, but I'm pretty sensitive and I don't have that intense long-lasting reaction just from switching between temperatures, so that's a data point?


re: the pain scale: I am reminded of that time I was chatting with someone who had an acute injury that went away and she was complaining about the stuff she couldn't do while she had the injury, all the life changes she had to make, the accomodations, the changes to her plans and how she lived her life, and I was just ...you ever could do any of that stuff? because my entire life experience since I was a child has not ever allowed me to do any of that. Because pain. Lots of pain.

Sometimes it's hard for me to believe that healthy people exist? But I wonder if the reason $relative doesn't take my medical problems seriously is because he has never encountered this kind of thing ever and doesn't have the empathy to listen to anyone tell him he's wrong.

[jenett]

What helps me is to reduce the other possible triggers as much as I can - put on sunglasses before I hit bright light, do what I can to reduce background noises of the kind that cause me problems. (Dear work, the drilling today did not help.) Keeping hydrated helps, too - I'm currently having the kind of not-quite-nausea migraine symptoms that make me want salty foods, and sometimes electrolyte drinks help a bit with that.

Bodies. So weird.

[jenett]

Oh, that thing, yeah.

(I've done six months of persistent migraine aura issues, and I've had years of a day or two of 'so much pain I can't move' menstrual cycles, and ... a couple of years of "Everyone just hurts like this, right, aching is a thing?" that turned out to be thyroid and vitamin D related and largely fixable?)

And ... no. Most people apparently don't get that. Who knew?

You knew the answer already, yes?

[jesse_the_k]

That would be the level at which most people use meds, yes.

Some people actually get to concentrate on things without the gritting of teeth. (I almost remember that myself.)

[mecurtin]

Pain management strategy not mentioned: heat, cold.

All those options, and nothing for back pain! Clearly you don't have back pain (I'm currently dealing with an acute outbreak).

Chronic & acute pain really do require different scales. Labor, for instance, is an acute pain, where the problem is to get you (and passenger) through a comparatively brief but *intense* experience.

Chronic pain can be "only" a 5 but still seriously debilitating because of the way it drains your ability to think and function.

[jesse_the_k]

Yes! Migrelief made a huge difference to my migraines, which where particularly common around my period. Still have a mess of unopened bottles--happy to send to anyone who wants them.

[jesse_the_k]

Heat & Cold are my #1 strategies, because they're so effective, and cheap.

[stellar_dust]

Please tell me you have tried wearing sunglasses consistently? (Not trying to minimize, it very well might be migraines -- I just don't think I've seen you wear sunglasses even one time in the last 20 years, and if you get headaches when moving from a dim room to bright sunlight, sunglasses should be your first step.)

[jenett]

One thing that might be worth trying (if you can take them) is the largest dose on the bottle for ibuprofen or naproxen sodium (ibuprofen is slightly preferable) at the very first hint of a twinge of a migraine problem.

(Whatever it is that the bottle says is the max dose to take at one time - on mine, that's usually two of the pills. Consult your doctor, who may rec going higher if you think it might be working.)

It sometimes short circuits migraines. (I seem to remember from last time I poked at this that asprin and acetominophin don't do quite the same thing, but there's a fair bit of discussion out there about this one. I can't take either anyway.)

A blast of caffeine (I have been known to keep a stash of chocolate covered coffee beans for this purpose, but soda or coffee or tea also work) also can help a lot if you get it right at the start.

If they don't work, they don't work, but for some people, you can stop the whole thing in its tracks.

[recessional]

So I'm answering while including answers to stuff I've seen in threads because that way I'm not going in like twenty threads. Also ironically I'm currently having a migraine while being stuck being in a Starbucks out in Surrey for a long series of reasons, and won't be able to go home for another hour or more, so since I know that can make me unaware of my own sharpness I want to preface this by saying that there is none intended, in case that happens.

1. No, that is not a universal, or even remotely common, response to AC. To the point where despite a social circle comprised of 40%+ migraineurs maybe two of them I know get it, but at WAY less than what you describe.

1a. So yeah: that's a migraine trigger. In fact it's a known one. You can actually mitigate it if you take that into account.


2. You literally have all of the classic signs of the migraine bar two (aura, and one-side-only). Literally:

a pounding headache that settles in for 4+ hours and feels like your eye sockets are being slowly ground away by a belt sander and pooling in your teeth and jaw, with bonus mild nausea, light sensitivity, and the desire to rain down destruction on anything making even as much noise as a vibrating phone [aka: noise sensitivity] except that would require rapid motion so no, and standard painkillers don’t help noticeably but you spend the next day feeling like your brain is balanced on a fresh breezy mountaintop over a miasmatic swamp of pain

That is classic migraine bar aura and hemispheric specific pain.

2a. Those two things are not diagnostically significant in absence. (They're diagnostically significant in PRESENCE: if you've got auras and headaches you've either got migraines or brain cancer, and it's probably migraines, for example. But not in ABSENCE.) I have never, ever gotten hemispheric-specific pain (the characteristic nature of my migraine pain is that it sets into my cheekbones and eye-sockets); I used to get auras but traded them for Huge Catastrophic Mood Drop and a stiff neck somewhere in my late twenties. (Probably because by that point I'd had major depression for, oh, fifteen years and it started being a more "natural" nerve misfire, but that's speculation on my part.)

2b. The "heebie-jeebies" from weather are probably also migraines, just not as significant a trigger - or they're linked to the same nerve overstimulation at a lower level than actually required to trigger the pain episode. (See also: my current biggest and most inconvenient migraine symptom is mood collapse.)


3. There are no guaranteed triggers/lack of triggers. Migraine is a neurological condition, not actually a pain disorder. It most frequently manifests as pain! That's how we came to know about it. But that's not actually It's Fundamental Nature. That means literally any nervous stimulus can trigger it, and it can also literally manifest as ANY nerve based fuckery.

Pressure, humidity, etc, are fairly COMMON triggers, probably as they basically involve a lot of nerves being stimulated all at once quite close to the actual brain and without a reliable way to actually notice consciously or to make it stop. However, even with these, different DEGREES of the above will shift in different ways.

3a. Triggers can also be psychosomatic/psychological and mutually reinforcing (because the brain hates us). . . . which means that if you already strongly associate those conditions with getting a migraine? And then experience those conditions? It may also reinforce it as a migraine trigger. But if you lack the same direct conscious connection between lesser versions of humidity/temperature/pressure switch it may not be getting that reinforcement.

3b. Also if you haven't tracked it with the idea of migraine in mind, there may be more overlap than you think.


4. Yes, "I can suffer through it as long as I don't need cognitive function although it is definitely Suffering and it impacts my life" is a good threshold for treatment, especially if the treatment doesn't come with side-effects WORSE than that. :P

4a. It is also a level of pain that most people only have very rarely and for very short periods of time. Much like the most common BDI score is "0", the most common pain level is "0". :P


tl;dr yes you have migraines triggered by repeatedly going through significant heat/humidity shifts, and if anything your numbers are the other way around. ;)

[melannen]

I can't believe I forgot heat/cold! It wasn't on the couple of reference lists I checked either.

I do have back pain sometimes! I even used it as an example earlier in the poll. I was just going vertically while listing body parts and the spine is easy to forget going vertically. :(

It is tough to compare different types of pain (which is part of why I asked "right now" for some of them.) But I do like the Mankoski scale because it talks about function as well as some kind of objective severity, so if you can't concentrate around it, it ups the level even if on a scale of, like, absolute paininess it wouldn't score that high.

I find for my own pain, I can be experiencing was is actually pretty severe pain and not find it particularly distressing if it's in a context where a) I know what's causing it and b) I know it has a specific endpoint. Stuff like painplay obviously, but also like, I am sitting on my leg in a weird way and too lazy to move even though I know moving it would make it stop immediately. Or even like, I have a really bad sore throat but it's the same sore throat I have every fall and I can time it to the minute vs. this is a new and different infection.

Whereas if it's objectively mild but I feel like it will never stop and/or I don't know what's causing it, it can be really distressing without being all that strong. Pain + fear? Pain + control, maybe?

At some level of strength it's still REALLY DISTRESSING regardless of chronic/acute/control, though. Yesterday's headache got there.

[recessional]

But I wonder if the reason $relative doesn't take my medical problems seriously is because he has never encountered this kind of thing ever and doesn't have the empathy to listen to anyone tell him he's wrong.

Almost certainly, yes.

IME the largest part of people not getting it (whether in regards to chronic pain or mental illness) is in fact this, exacerbated by the fact that we use the same words to express wildly different ideas. Most people can in fact "just stop thinking about it", and do not in fact have to account for the extra exhaustion of any pain level at all.

There is a smaller but also difficult contingent of people who have and are always suffering to a degree, but because of the above confusion really DO think This Is Just Normal, and have internalized fully the related lack of sympathy/empathy, and if anything get mad at other people because Why Should They Get Special Treatment. These are often THE VERY HARDEST and also the angriest.

But most people are not in pain during the day. Like any pain. Most people go through a day without suffering pain, and only suffering discomfort that has a readily apparent cause (like being hungry, or stubbing their toe). Ditto mood shit.

[recessional]

Also: on DW and even back on LJ people with chronic pain (and other health conditions) are WILDLY WILDLY OVERREPRESENTED compared to our prevalence in even generous surveys in the general population. So you know.

[melannen]

I am not a person who can wear sunglasses consistently because I cannot keep track of sunglasses consistently, so unless I want a weekly "buy new glasses" budget it never lasts very long. :P Sun hats don't help, though, and the eye doctor said if I wear sun hats consistently (which I do) I shouldn't need sunglasses. Admittedly, I didn't mention the headaches to him. But it's not just a brightness thing, because going from bright to dark without the A/C factor doesn't do it, and I'm pretty sure it has happened when I was wearing sunglasses at least once or twice.

[deird1]

Taking this poll as me today is totally different to taking this poll as me six years ago. I just felt totally weird because I kept ticking the "0" box and feeling like I shouldn't be...

Six years ago I had chronic back pain, along with semi-chronic knee and hip pain. These days, I have occasional knee and hip pain, with very little back pain. (Improvements brought about by intense physical therapy, followed by regular core strength exercises. I do daily planking and accordion playing to keep my back strong enough not to spasm.)

[stellar_dust]

If it's the combination of temperature shift and brightness shift, I think you might need to really consistently mitigate the brightness shift to see a change in effects (that is, I'm not surprised that you would still get problems with sunglasses if you've only tried sunglasses like 3 days a year). Maybe ask about headaches the next time you go to the eye doctor, and see if they think it's worth trying transitions lenses or something, so you don't have to worry about a second glasses-type thing? Eye doctors also often have some insight into headaches and neurological stuff, and could refer you a specialist (like what happened with my blind spot issue).

[melannen]

He specifically said Transitions don't work well with sun hats - I did ask that last time - and I'm not willing to give up my sun hats.

I'm mentioned headaches in a general sense a few times and just gotten that I should go in more often and also clean my glasses more. :P

But I only get the bad headaches like 3-6 times a year these days? It's only a problem when the temperature is 90+ and I've been going in and out of A/C a lot, and it doesn't go over 90 more than a couple weeks a year here (yet.) I don't think it's something that, like, builds up over time.