What is Imigran®?

@Oceana - I get those, too! I have never met another person who gets them, and people usually think I’m nuts when I tell them these episodes are actually migraines without the pain.

I did visit my doctor the first time it happened. He told me that it would likely resolve itself in half an hour or so, but in case it didn’t, he gave me some Imigran®. I was grateful to have a backup plan.

The next time I experienced one, I simply waited it out. Within twenty-five minutes, it dissipated, and my vision returned to normal.

I got another one about a week later while sitting at my computer at work. I had to take a break, because I could not see the words that I was typing on the screen. I literally could not read.

After thirty-five minutes of partial blindness, I felt it was time to take the Imigran®. I swallowed the pill, and about fifteen minutes later, my vision started to return. Five minutes after that, I could read again.

My dad and I sometimes experience migraines but not in headache form. Our eyesight is affected. Had his doctor not told him that this phenomenon was a migraine, I would have seriously thought I was going blind when it happened to me.

I was removing my nail polish at around midnight, so my parents were asleep. Suddenly, I could not see my nails out of my right eye. All I could see were purple spots, and even when I shut my eyes, I still saw them.

I woke up my mom crying and told her, “I can’t see!” She freaked out at first, but when I described to her what was happening, she told me that it was just like my dad’s migraines that his eye doctor diagnosed as such.

I have never personally experienced a migraine headache, but my mother battled them for years. She missed so much work that she eventually just quit. She thought she would never recover.

She would take Imigran® to relieve them once they occurred, but it made her sleepy, so she could not take it at work. Her doctor eventually put her on a preventative medicine that kept them from coming back.

Today, she still keeps Imigran® around just in case she gets another headache. From what I can tell by her behavior during one, it is extremely painful and renders you immobile.

@manykitties2 - As I understand it you can't actually take more serotonin, you can just take things that stimulate your own body to make more of it. Serotonin is made in the brain, and is generally known as the happiness chemical.

For a lot of people taking up a bit of exercise everyday and getting a pet can really help to boost their serotonin level. Being calm and relaxed actually makes you even happier in the long run. It seems as though the happiness chemicals get their biggest boost from being happy.

While I am sure that a drug like Imigran can be effective, perhaps more people should try to naturally up their serotonin levels to help with migraines.

I wish I had known about Imigran when I was younger, as I used to have the worst migraines that would last for days. Sometimes my headaches would get so bad that I literally couldn't look at a light without crying, the pain was so intense.

My doctor at the time gave me some prescription pain killers, but they could only do so much. More than anything they usually just ended up putting me to sleep.

I guess as scientists begin to better understand the brain the more effective our pills will be. I wonder if other products that naturally contain serotonin could help people with migraines?