Ow

[julesjones]

I was actually managing to do something constructive with my morning for once, when I was assaulted about twenty minutes ago by something combining some of the more annoying features of both icepick and cluster headaches. Rapid stabbing pain, heavy congestion and tearing up in that eye. It is not actually all that painful, as such things go, but it is incredibly distracting. It's lunchtime anyway, so I've just dumped some pasta into the microwave to cook (when I'm in this state I don't trust myself with anything that doesn't turn itself off automatically), and chopped some tomatoes. And when I've had that to line my stomach with, I'm going to swig a couple of Codis. You may insert here the standard rant about the American attitude to mild opiate painkillers. Fortunately I can bring personal use quantities back with me when I've been visiting family in more enlightened countries.

Comments

[the-hunter.livejournal.com]

Hmm...FWIW, due to leg and head damage, I've been taking between 16 and 32 Codis a day for the last 10 years...

[julesjones]

You'd hate it here. They're so terrified that someone might use opiates for *fun* that it's made as difficult as possible to get codeine for actual medical use.

[joycemocha.livejournal.com]

I have a T-3 prescription for migraines.

Need I say more?

Actually, I *wish* we could get the lower dose formulations that they have in Canada. 8, at the most 15 mg is all I really need...not 30.

[julesjones]

I started getting actual migraines a few years ago, but I don't want the migraine-specific drugs when they have very nasty side-effects and are very expensive, and my migraine is mild enough that simple aspirin/codeine will control it if I take it at the first sign of trouble.

Codis is very good, because it's 8mg codeine/500mg aspirin, so one or two of those gives just enough codeine to give good pain relief without making me high. Most of the time when I feel bad enough to take a painkiller, I need something more than plain aspirin, but I really don't need a 30 mg dose of codeine. And I can easily split one of those down to 4 mg or even 2 mg if I'm using it to treat my IBS.

[joycemocha.livejournal.com]

I'm in the same position as you with regard to migraine--I know people who've had those side-effects, and even though the paramedics are right next door if I were to take them at work, I really, really don't want to go there (plus pay ambulance/Life Flight fees for the 40-some miles to the hospital).

Mine's pretty mild, so a Canadian will do the job and I'm not impaired for doing something productive--*if* I treat the damned migraine. My first year on the job, I had three major problem IEPs in a row, had a migraine, and was eternally grateful that my sped director was there to help me out as I literally was incapable of deviating from a script. And I was lying down on the carpet in the darkened library between meetings....

[julesjones]

If I had the sort of vicious migraines some of my friends get, I'd use the triptan drugs without hesitation. But my big problem to begin with was recognising them, because I'm one of the freaks who mostly gets the headache-free version, and the first couple of times I didn't even realise what it was. Now I keep a few cans of Coke in the fridge specifically to hit it with a slug of caffeine and sugar at the first hint of trouble. That plus Codis and some carbohydrate is generally fairly effective at suppressing it, but I've learnt the hard way that I have to keep on taking the Codis for three days even if I feel okay.

[pinkdormouse.livejournal.com]

Feel better soon, you.

Idiot here didn't pick up any Solpedine in Sainsbury's yesterday, and has been suffering for it ever since. My back hates our current weather and is taking it out on/of me.

[julesjones]

Feeling a lot better, thanks. And get your own painkillers soon...

[pinkdormouse.livejournal.com]

I wandered over and got some at lunctime, thanks.