I like this diagram from Ruths's blog.
When I started taking Zonegran, the background migraine seemed to go away when I titrated up to 100mg dose. The headache was gone for a while, but came back while I was at the University of Utah Hospital. Since then, even though they resumed the Zonegran at the therapeutic level of 300mg, and started titrating Topamax, along with a confusing cocktail mix of other drugs supposed to be prophylactic for migraine, the headache has continued. This morning, I noted that the intensity has doubled again, so I would now rate he background continual headache pain as hovering around between 4 and 5 on a scale of 10. By that I mean some times it is obtrusive to the point that the pain interrupts otherwise lucid thoughts.
Nothing that I know of relieves this headache. When it mounts full-scale, there is nothing else. It ranges up to 10 and beyond, meaning it dominates my thinking, and interrupt clear thoughts with pangs of headache pain. The only relief I have found then is sleep, sometimes induced by narcotic drugs. They don't seem to relive the pain, but they make me sleep while the headache runs its course. These headaches are different -- they are more chronic in nature, and unremitting, so I have wished at times for something that would afford a permanent sleep. Of course, more sensible minds have prevailed, but I still reserve that solution as the last resort.
