Rebecca March 23rd, 2008

I’m not normally the sort of person who goes looking online for answers to medical problems because I am a hypochondriac. I see no reason to aggravate those tendencies. Knowing me, if I start researching a rash on my arm I’ll only click on those sites that discuss flesh-eating bacteria. Five minutes and one phone call later, I’ve got a doctor’s appointment for something that can be cured by applying more lotion and I’m $80 closer to meeting my insurance deductible. So I ignore the Internet.

Except for last night.

I was on the couch watching Midnight Cowboy (this year’s Easter holiday family movie) when it began. A blank spot crept into my vision the moment Ratso Rizzo and Joe Buck entered the Factory-inspired happening. It reshaped itself into a jagged electric blue line that grew and grew, until I could not see any of Joe’s subsequent roll in the hay with party girl Brenda Vaccaro. After twenty minutes the aura faded away from my peripheral vision and I was left with a heavy feeling on the right side of my face. I know this aura well. Throughout my twenties and early thirties, I got a migraine every couple of months. This ocular disturbance almost always preceded them. So the moment the bright blue line appeared I learned to either take some medication or–if I was at work–immediately go home.

Things have changed in the last eighteen months. I get the auras, but not the migraines. I don’t know which is worse. I still get the occasional headache; they only disrupt my life two, maybe three times a year now. But these goddamn auras will happen every day for a week, disappear for a month or two, then reappear. Last night’s was the third in as many days. I can’t function for a good twenty minutes if one begins at work. It’s almost painful to look at my computer monitor, a piece of paper, or even out the window because I can’t completely focus. I get nauseous. When I’m at home, I usually go in my bedroom, lie down and close my eyes until it goes away. Thank goodness I haven’t had one while driving. Yet.

Don’t ask me why I haven’t discussed this with my doctor, and see above if you want to know why I’ve never consulted WebMD. Ignorance is bliss and a larger checking account, I guess. Anyway, with a few clicks of the mouse and the right combination of words, I found this and this. The former site won’t let me save their image for some reason, but it’s the more accurate of the two. However, the latter gives you some idea what I’m experiencing:

Ugh. Just looking at that almost triggers another aura, or, as I know now, an ocular migraine. I’m very happy to finally have an answer to my problem. It’s benign, it can be treated with over-the-counter painkillers if there’s any discomfort.

So don’t you go mentioning the words “retinal detachment”.

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