June Is Migraine Awareness Month: Take Advantage

June is Migraine Awareness Month, and so I want to take the chance to bring migraine to the forefront of our attention, as we continue to see developments with medications and new treatments. While all of these changes are so positive and demonstrate how far we have come with migraine treatment, we have a long way to go, as this disease continues to dramatically affect the lives of tens of millions of sufferers.

As I wrote in my anthology, “Migraine is not something that turns on and off. Most live with some aspect of the disease all day, every day…sometimes the work is laborious and tiresome—like walking on eggshells, avoiding every trigger, making choices or decisions based on the weather patterns, making plans for later in the week or month, knowing fully well that the current ‘good’ day has little to do with how she could feel later in the week or even later in the day” (So Much More than a Headache: Understanding Migraine through Literature).

Sometimes there are even unexpected connections to migraine that have extreme repercussions. I have long suffered with temporomandibular joint disorder (TMJ) and even traveled to another state several years ago for surgery. Nonetheless, when I chipped a front tooth recently, one that had been bonded several times (along with others) because of my excessive clenching and grinding day and night, I was told that my dentist could no longer handle the problem. She needed to send me to a specialist, due to my history with TMJ and migraine. If only the front two teeth were going to be permanently repaired (with porcelain veneers), she fears my bite will be significantly changed, which will severely impact my TMJ and migraine condition. Instead, I will likely have to have several crowns in the back, necessitating many appointments over an extended period. “This is a very complex problem in your case,” she shared.

I left the office scared, angry, and upset. What was this going to do to my migraine disease? Just having my mouth propped open for any dental work likely leads to an attack. I fear the short-term and long-term results. What will be the expense of this treatment?

One more way migraine has “cost” me greatly.

I offer this example because of what so many of us who live with this disease realise—there are many extended implications of what migraine does to us, many of which no one else realizes.

Well, this month affords us the opportunity to share some of these. So, I invite you to tell just one new person in your life about a sacrifice, an invisible aspect of the disease, or an implication from it that has had a profound effect on you. That is the purpose of this awareness, to let others know, to educate them, to bring attention to the many ways migraine disease is so much more than a headache.