'People grow through experience if they meet migraines honestly and courageously. This is how character is built.' – Eleanor Roosevelt

I haven't written on this blog for a while. This much is obvious from the dates of posts. I hadn't really thought about posting because this blog, like many other simple routines, went out of my head for the last month or so. I've been getting about two migraines a week and that, I think, has led to mild depression. One of those factors would limit my ability to write, but two has slowed word count  production right down, and I didn't even care. In fact, it didn't even register until about a week ago.

Now that the migraines are back to about once a week and things are looking up again, I'm back. I feel like I should tie up some loose ends from the past six months of this blog. Then I'll move on to new topics in the coming posts.

New Year's Resolutions:
Yoga/meditate – I have not got into the habit of doing it three times at week like I had planned. I manage about once a week, formally, then meditate informally whenever I can: on the tram, walking home, when it's quiet in the office, in the shower or before bed. I was loaned an excellent book recently called The 5-minute Meditator by Eric Harrison, which talked about ways to incorporate more meditation into daily life. I will keep striving for more yoga and meditation, less TV and internet time.

Water – I have accomplished this one. I am drinking at least 1.5L a day, often more. I will try to keep this up. Although I haven't noticed any miraculous benefits, I'm probably healthier for it.

Topomax – I am almost totally weaned off Topomax, but not onto herbal alternatives. Based on the past few months of horrific, regular migraines and my resulting inability to cope, I am going onto a new drug, Sandomigran. In the two weeks I've been on it, it hasn't cured my migraines, but they have eased. I can still raise the dose if I need to and my neurologist assures me there are other things we can try if this one doesn't work.

Alternative treatments – I've tried two and a half new ones by my count.
Regular acupuncture: Acupuncture with a chiropractic adjustment seems to help keep things loose and working properly, especially around the time of my period. Weekly acupuncture was a nice, little, relaxing treatment on a Friday night, but it didn't seem to do anything about the relentless migraine spiral I was in. It's too expensive to keep up without major benefits on the migraine front.

The elimination diet: It had no effect whatsoever unless you count the general cleanse. I learned some new recipes, tried some new foods and am more aware of preservatives, sulphites and other similar baddies in processed foods. In terms of migraines, there was no change.

Kinesiology: I'm in the process of trying Kinesiology to get to the root of my chronic migraine problems. I'll post more about this later, but for the moment I'll say that the treatment sessions are a bit unusual, but my practitioner makes some interesting points about trauma manifesting in the body, suppression of anger and other emotions, and depressive tendencies which I can see in myself.