migraine morning after seizure?

[daisy.girl]

Last night as I was lying in bed, I started to notice a few jerks before I fell to sleep...one was my neck, the other my legs and body.

Then sometime during the night, I woke to a visual show of fans (like ceiling fans lined up in rows) with windmill like objects spinning on both sides and large 'gears' moving in the midddle. All this stuff spinning at the same time.

I awoke this morning with a severe migraine.

Do you think the visual thing was a seizure? if so, do you think the migraine is because of it? postictal?

I am newly dx with partial seizures, both simple and complex.

 

[Endless]

]
Then sometime during the night, I woke to a visual show of fans (like ceiling fans lined up in rows) with windmill like objects spinning on both sides and large 'gears' moving in the midddle. All this stuff spinning at the same time.

I awoke this morning with a severe migraine.

Do you think the visual thing was a seizure? if so, do you think the migraine is because of it? postictal?
.

Yep. Sounds like a visual hallucination, which is a type of TLE simple partial seizure.

I get postictal migraines, too. It's pretty common. I was getting migraines almost daily for about 3 years, and blamed it on a neck injury. When I started a seizure journal I saw the 1:1 relationship between seizures and migraines. I was amazed that when my seizures were somewhat under control, so were the migraines! And trileptal doesn't prevent migraines, so it had to be the lack of seizures that got rid of those headaches. I am so grateful. It's like I have a new life.

I guess the bottom line is that you control the seizures, you control the migraines. What's your medicaiton again? Is it one of the ones that help prevent migraines?

 

[daisy.girl]

thanks
I was just switched to zonegran from topamax on Thursday....allergic reaction to the topamax. Not sure how long it takes for the topamax to leave the body, but the zonegran can up to 2 weeks to get to proper blood level.

 

[Endless]

It looks like Zonegran is one of the meds that's supposed to prevent migraines. So I'm hoping you'll get some relief.

 

[daisy.girl]

can you get postictal migraine from a simple partial??

I have always thought that my migraines were more then just regular ones....so that would make sense. Most are in the morning and migraine meds just do not work. I am hoping once the meds are stable, the migraines will go away too. If fact, if the migraines would go away, I could live with the seizures!!

 

[valeriedl]

I know that if I have a bad seizure I will have a horrible migraine after it. It will last for hours. I'll lay down with an ice pack on my head until it finally starts to fade away so that I can go to sleep.

My neuro told me to take over the counter meds (advil, tylonol etc) and they didn't do a thing. He gave me some pescription meds and they still don't do anything. I'm going to a headache clynic that he reckomended in September, that is the soonest I can get in. I'm hoping that it will beable to help.

 

[daisy.girl]

valeried....
are your seizures under control? and you still have migraines?

My seizures do not bother me, if fact, I think I have probably had them most of my life (simple and complex partials)........BUT, if the migraines are from the seizures then getting the seizures under control is of utmost importance....I can't live with these constant migraines. (2-4 per week)

thanks

 

[PhylisFeinerJohnson]

People with epilepsy are more than twice as likely to develop migraine headaches as those without the disorder. Research showed that more than 20 percent of people with epilepsy have migraines, compared to 11 percent of the general population.

Evidence supports the coexistence of migraines with the following conditions:

* In migraine sufferers, 6% are epileptic, more than ten times than the general population.
* In one study, people and their relatives who are diagnosed with epilepsy were found to be approximately 2.4 times more likely to have migraines than the control group.
* In another epilepsy study, about 16% of those people who had migraines also experienced epileptic seizures before, during or after a migraine.
* While most migraine sufferers do not have epilepsy and most epileptics do not suffer from migraines, these findings still indicate a significant “overlap” of both of these conditions.

Epilepsy and migraines share common features, including the fact that both are episodic. Emotional stress, poor sleep, fatigue or flashing lights are often a trigger for both seizures and headaches.

And this migraine-epilepsy duo also share some of the same symptoms: headache, abdominal pain, awareness and EEG abnormalities. A person may have a seizure on one occasion and a classic attack of migraine on another.

Some links for you:

Steven Karceski, MD, Practical Neurology, March 2007
http://www.columbiaepilepsy.org/docs/patients/March 2007.pdf
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/record/archives/vol20/vol20_iss16/record2016.15.html
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/20011979/Epilepsy-Migraine---More-than-just-a-headache/
http://www.medigraphic.com/pdfs/arcneu/ane-2006/ane064j.pdf
http://www.realage.com/check-your-h.../medical-conditions-associated-with-migraines

Good luck. I hope this gets resolved...

 

[valeriedl]

I don't know if you consider them under control or not daisy.girl. On average I will have at least one bad one a month, and those are the ones that I will probably have the headache with. I will black out with those and have no clue what's going on, where I am, who people are and I don't talk right is basically how I would describe them. (I can't remember what these are called)

I have smaller ones where I don't black out I just get confused about what's going on. I don't get headaches after these ones. (Can't remember what these are called either)

I am on 3 different meds and have a VNS. They are much more controled than when I first was diagnosed with epilepsy and started having them. At first I would have several a week and sometimes even in one day. These would last for probably 15 min or longer and would be completely out of it and forget things that would happen that day and days before, sometimes up to a week.

They are much more under control now.

 

[Zoofemme]

I'll have a postictal migraine after a generalized seizure or a plague of sps and I usually end up with a headache once a storm system moves out.

 

[douglas]

yup, i usually get very very bad headache after a seizure. this would kind of make sense. my brain just finished short circuiting.

 

[Meetz1064]

As for

that being a seizure, I have to agree with Endless.......yes. Especially to the type. Regarding the migraines afterwards.....I have them all the time, when I have tonic clonics. I also have them for other reasons.

Phylis quoted some statistics in her post, and I am proof of some of those.

I have 4 types of E, and at last count, I THINK it was 8 types of migraines. (I might be wrong on that). Since migraines have been classified as seizures somewhere along the way, I'd say I'm having more than my fair share.

Migraines run in my family, on my mother's side. They're rampant on my mother's side, as a matter of fact..........I can only think of about 6 people that don't have them, that I know of---or haven't had several. I also share a strange (WEIRD is more appropriate) problem if you will, with one of my first cousins who also has the violent migraines that I do. We both have something called a pineal cyst. It's rare for there to be more than one in a family. Go figure.

What do I DO for MY migraines? Well, I've been semi-blessed in the fact that Topomax knocks out the great majority of them for me (it supposedly helps with seizure control, but I don't see it.) But being on it also means that I am now taking FOUR types of seizure meds. If you'd like a couple of those, I'll share. :bigmouth:

I HAVE noticed that if I keep my celiac disease under control, my migraines also seem to behave themselves quite a bit more, too. Now, I'm down to 3 main types that drive me up a wall....and migraine meds don't work for them, so I do add magnesium into my diet, and that helps as well. Using ice packs sends MY migraines into overdrive--I have to use heat instead (I told you, I'm WEIRD).

Finally, I have had to develop a daily routine, and stick with it. My family doesn't necessarily care for it, but .... at least I can function more now. So they'll get over it.

Make sure that you talk to your neuro about the hallucination and seizure, and then start a journal to document this, and other things. There are plenty of things that you can document that may help you discover what may have been the cause of it, what your seizure pattern is, and more. I've got a list if you'd like it. Just let me know.

Take care.

Meetz
:rock:

 

[daisy.girl]

thanks to all...
I am amazed that the more I read the more there seems to be a correlation between, seizures, migraines, and some sort of IBS.

Are there any articles out there they have put this all together?

 

[PhylisFeinerJohnson]

Well, here's an interesting theory from parkhurstexchange.com:

"It's well known that certain medical conditions may become exacerbated at specific menstrual cycle phases. The diseases most often affected are those characterized by relapsing and remitting courses, and those easily triggered by external factors (migraine, epilepsy, asthma, irritable bowel syndrome, diabetes).

Several theories explain these menstrual cycle-related effects on existing disease processes. They include fluctuations in levels of sex steroids, cyclic alterations in the immune system, and varying perceptions of disease severity brought on by premenstrual changes in mood, as seen in premenstrual syndrome (PMS).

What conditions are affected by menses?

Menstrual migraine: Compelling evidence supports a relationship between reproductive hormones, particularly estrogen, and migraine headache. Migraine headaches are 2-3 times more common in women than in men, and their frequency increases considerably after menarche. While 60% of women who suffer from migraines link their attacks to menstruation, only 7-14% of them have true menstrual migraine. These women experience migraines (usually without aura) almost exclusively during menses (generally day 1 - 2 days), and are virtually free of these headaches at other times of the cycle, with the exception of a small percentage of women who endure a brief exacerbation during ovulation.

Catamenial epilepsy: Strictly defined, catamenial epilepsy is epilepsy that occurs at or worsens around menstruation, such that at least 75% of seizures happen over a 10-day period beginning four days before menses, representing a six-fold increase in the frequency of daily seizures. While up to 70% of epileptic women claim that their seizures are exacerbated by menstruation, true catamenial epilepsy can be objectively demonstrated in approximately 12%. Menstrual exacerbations occur with all types of seizures, although perhaps more commonly in women with focal epilepsy instead of generalized seizures.

Irritable bowel syndrome: Up to 30% of otherwise asymptomatic women report an increase in gastrointestinal (GI) symptoms prior to and during their periods. Reports of constipation during the progesterone-dominant luteal phase, and loose stools or diarrhea at the onset of menses are also common. Almost half of all women with IBS will report a similar increase in bowel symptoms such as abdominal pain, diarrhea and constipation."

If you want to know more about this theory, go to http://www.parkhurstexchange.com/clinical-reviews/ud_04_vol14

 

[Molly97]

If I have a seizure where I black out, then I have the accompanying headache afterwards. The headache itself can last up to 2 or 3 days. I have asked my husband at these times to perform a "headectomy" for me LOL. I don't get these seizures often thank goodness.

I do have the sensory hallucinations that accompany TLE seizures. I have several of those a week. My diet is the trigger for my problems and is the solution to my seizure episodes about 95% of the time. I'm on the GARD; have been for 2 years. No medications have been successfully used.