It's just a headache. Can't you just take some ibuprofen and get back to work?
People who get migraine headaches—or migraine attacks, which is even more accurate since they don't always come with headaches—are all too familiar with this kind of misperception.
Migraines, which affect some 38 million Americans, consist of a web of symptoms that can make day-to-day functioning nearly impossible, including headache, nausea and vomiting, dizziness, sensitivity to sound, light, smell, or touch, tingling or numbness, and vision changes. So no, it's not just a headache.
For about 2% of people, migraines are chronic, meaning they rear their ugly heads on 15 or more days each month, says Elizabeth Seng, PhD, a clinical health psychologist and assistant professor at Yeshiva University in New York who specializes in the study and treatment of headache and chronic pain.
MORE: 16 Highly Effective Migraine Solutions
For the lucky folks who have never experienced one, it can be hard to put all of that suffering into perspective. Around 88% of people with migraines say they feel misunderstood, Seng says. Which is why she's been working with headache medication manufacturer Excedrin on their launch of a neat little tool to help. Recently, the company launched The Migraine Experience, a virtual reality app you can download on your phone and project using Google Cardboard to simulate migraine symptoms (pain not included!), in hopes of fostering more empathy and compassion for people who do get migraine attacks. "I have had patients in tears in my office because their spouses don't understand what they're going through," Seng says. "Or there can be a negative toll at work, because people can't commit with absolute certainty to being somewhere if they're having frequent migraines. That inflexibility can be really isolating socially, too." (Discover how to heal 95+ health conditions naturally with Rodale's Eat for Extraordinary Health & Healing.)
To help shed some light on what migraine sufferers—technically called migraineurs—are going through, we asked real women to tell us what it's really like. Here, they describe the attacks.
There is no calm before the storm.
"About 12 to 24 hours before a full-blown migraine, I start getting irritable or cry easily. I'll get strange food cravings, or I can't think straight. I'll hear words but none of them will make any sense, or I try to get an idea out, and it's just jumbled when I try to speak."
—Tammy, 46
"I was about 6 when I had my first migraine. My great-grandmother, grandfather, and mother all had horrible migraines. When I hit my 30s, they started getting a lot more frequent and a lot more debilitating. Up to several days before, I'll be excessively sleepy and yawn a lot, or have trouble finding the right words. That's during the prodrome stage, before the actual migraine. If I get an aura, I'll see tiny blank spots in my vision, or wavering vision like when you look out on a highway on a hot day and see waves of heat coming off the road. That will last as long as the headache lasts, sometimes along with tingling in my fingertips and hands and sometimes numbness in my face."
—Teri, 62
"I can tell a migraine is coming when I have the visual aura. I'll see little sparks of light, or see what looks like bombs going off in darkness when I close my eyes. I yawn a lot, and I have some short-term memory trouble, or trouble finding the right words. Then I feel heat coming over the side of my face, over my left cheek and left ear."
—Jill, 60
The pain can be utterly debilitating.
"Put your finger on your temple and imagine drilling it inside your head. My migraines feel like a screwdriver in there, in that one spot, always on my left side and in my left eye. I get a burning sensation throughout my body and in my jaw. Everything becomes sensitive to the touch, like my muscles are on fire."
—Heather, 29
"The pain feels like a coat hanger is being shoved up inside my head, like my head could explode from heat and pain. Sometimes it would hurt so badly I'd just be curled up in the fetal position in bed."
—Jill
"If I feel a migraine coming on—usually something feels off in one of my eyes—it can take just a few seconds to get really bad if I'm exposed to a trigger like heat or glare. In 10 minutes, one whole side of my head, neck, and shoulder hurts to the touch, but the other side would be completely normal. I put an ear plug in that one ear and cover that one eye."
—Lisa, 57
For others, pain may not be the worst part.
"Thanks to good treatment, I'd say about 10% of the time I don't even get a headache. But I can still be disabled by an attack, laying in bed with nausea, dizziness, and cognitive difficulties. It's like you're in the deep end of a pool and can't get out, can't do anything productive. Once during a migraine I needed to mail a bill and I couldn't remember where I kept the stamps. I didn't have the energy to get up and put the stamp on the envelope and walk to the mailbox."
—Jill
"On a scale of 1 to 10, my pain is typically about a 4 to 6. It's not excruciating. But I get a lot of light and sound sensitivity. People don't really understand that. Even a human voice at a whisper feels like blaring."
—Tammy
Migraines can leave lingering aftereffects.
"It can take another day or two, depending on how long the migraine lasted, to feel back to normal. I still can't think straight or communicate well during that time. Light and sound still bother me. And my ears will ring. They start ringing before the migraine, and I know it's not over until the ringing stops."
—Tammy
"Afterward, I can be a little moody, but usually I have a sense of euphoria because I'm so glad to be feeling so well after I just felt so crappy."
—Teri
Support is essential.
"Sometimes I have an awareness that I'm going to get a migraine. And often my husband can tell before I can; he calls it the third person in our marriage. When you have migraines, your partner is your caregiver, or at least picks up a lot of slack. I'll do something like drop the shampoo in the shower, and he'll know to get one of my migraine shots ready. We met in grad school, and he had to drive me to the student health center once. I threw up out the side of the car. It was the first time I had a shot for migraines, and he saw it transform me from deathly sick to good to go. I think that helped him understand, and he's been very supportive ever since."
—Robbie, 44
Migraine stigma persists.
"In college, I had some professors tell me it was ridiculous to miss an exam for a headache. I couldn't even see the paper the exam was on! I once ran into an old friend, and I told her I had a raging migraine. She offered me some Tylenol. 'I appreciate the offer,' I said, 'but for me, I might as well take a breath mint.' 'If you won't at least try the Tylenol, then quit complaining,' she said. The stigma has often been like that for me."
—Teri
"Many people say things like, 'Just take a pill and get over it' or 'You have a headache AGAIN?!' or 'I used to get those and I tried this one thing and never had another one.' Our symptoms are so varied, sometimes your solution is really not for everyone."
—Tammy
Sarah Klein is a Boston-based writer, editor, and personal trainer currently with LIVESTRONG.com, and previously of Health.com, Prevention magazine, and The Huffington Post. She’s the graduate of the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute at New York University.
Watch Next
10 Best Supportive Insoles That Ease Foot Pain
Wear These Recovery Sandals Post-Workout
The Best Leg Elevation Pillows for Swelling
This Is Why Your Toes Keep Cramping Up
