Tumorlessness feels good...

I got the call from the doc telling me that my MRI is 'normal'. Well, not quite normal, but acceptable for a migraine patient. It seems I have several (less than 10) randomized hyperintensities that showed up on the MRI. Apparently these are spots that appear bright or white on the scan. The doc says they show up a lot in patients with classic migraines -the ones that start with an aura, like mine. They said it isn't anything to worry about. So I guess I won't worry about it.

Ok, I will worry about it. I just won't obsess about it. Of course the first thing I did with this info is Google it. Most of the pages I found were just too medically oriented for me to understand as they were written for docs, not patients. But the lowdown is this -

"Patients with migraine are at increased risk for white matter hyperintensities detected on magnetic resonance imaging. The presence of nonspecific white matter hyperintensities may cause uncertainty for physicians and anxiety for patients. The pathophysiology and long-term consequences of these lesions are unknown. Occasionally, white matter lesions in a migraineur may indicate an underlying disease such as cerebral autosomal dominant arteriopathy with subcortical infarcts and leukoencephalopathy (CADASIL), mitochondrial encephalopathy with lactic acidosis and stroke-like episodes (MELAS), or central nervous system vasculitis. The ability to distinguish between nonspecific and disease-specific patterns of white matter hyperintensities in migraine sufferers is important for the practicing clinician."

So there you have it. It is probably nothing. The fact that my spots are random means that they aren't in a recognizable disease pattern. Or so they told me. Ug. Just thinking about this gives me a headache. And this is all supposed to be curing my headaches. Heh.

Good news is that the drug I am taking at bedtime now seems to be working. I am cautiously optimistic. The drug makes me feel funny, kinda high like on a huge dose of cold medicine. But I have not had a bone crushing headache in a few days. I did have a mild headache yesterday, but it was so run-of-the-mill, comparatively, I just ignored it. So things seem to be improving. Yay!