Thursday I was in a meeting at about 09:30 when I noticed a bright spot in my left eye.
‘Must have been an errant reflection from a car mirror on Elliot’ I thought. I didn’t pay much attention.
Then I noticed that it wasn’t fading as usual, and in fact it wasn’t the typical green or reddish spot, as from a camera flash.
This resembled small shards of mirrors, moving about like in a kaleidescope but without the colors.
And they pulsed and flashed like they were under 2-3 inches of water.
It was an eyebrow shape in the top left of my vision and it was getting brighter.
So I started to take notice and disregard the interminable meeting. Nobody noticed anyhow.
I winked the left eye and noticed it was in both eyes. So it wasn’t my eye.
The thought of a stroke occurred to me, weirder things have happened.
It got bigger, a little brighter overall and the shape started to resemble a large ribbon with a twist at the top while the mirrors got deeper in the water.
Entire colleagues were being swallowed up in the ‘entity’.
It was getting rather disconcerting as it grew.
The meeting broke and after nearly an hour of this I got up and called Ang. While describing Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds to her two distinct things happened.
First the mirrors vanished and concurrently it occurred to me that a screaming yellow zonker of a headache could be barreling down the hallway of my mind with a careless disregard for my comfort or quality of life.
I was resigned and determined to face it head on.
I have never had a migraine so I couldn’t be sure. Ang knows from experience and I resolved to call my eye doctor.
How fast can you get here?
With no further elaboration I decided I could get there pretty darn fast and I left the office and scooted to his.
Fast forward 90 minutes:
Your retinas look great. No change in 2 years. You have had a migraine…without the headache.
Triggers include:
* Physical exercise
* Dehydration
* Caffeine (also sometimes a ‘cure’)
* Being Overtired
* Alcohol
* Cheese
* StressConsidering the only thing I haven’t had today is an omelette and a beer I would say you are right.
So, if you are a Type A personality you could write down what you experienced in detail and if it happens again look for some similarities and then try to avoid the trigger.
I am not a type A personality, I don’t ever keep track of events by writing them down.
I am more of a type B personality, where B stands for blog.
Wait a minute…
…dang I’m good.
blief 
Wow Lief, glad you went to the doctor!! Within the last year or so when I eat too much chocolate I get a pain up the back of my neck and if I let it go, it turns into a massive headache that can last and last. Sometimes it doesn’t even have to be chocolate either, if I over exert myself it can happen too.
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Oh, I beg to differ, much as you had a migraine without the headache, you are a type A without the lists! Hee hee.
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I agree with Moi, that you are definitely what I would call “Type A” personality. However, I don’t get any connection between the personality type and this nonunique form of migraine.
I had the same symptoms many, many years ago — about the same age as you; yes, it was in 1957 or 1958 — and I became equally unglued by the prospects of a stroke, loss of my fighter pilot’s 20-15 eyesight, etc, etc. I visited an Ophthalmologist who, after examining my eyes in detail, declared that what I had was a form of migraine headache — without the headache. He described it as an enlargement of a vein in a section of my brain associated with my sight and creating the visual illusions which (as you describe quite accurately) are rather spectacular (as long as you don’t worry about what is going to happen next!).
I queried my older brother, Jim, and found out that he had also experienced the same phenomenon; as has my younger brother, Bob.
So, my message is to not worry — I have lived about fifty years since the first occurrence. One thing that I have found which may (or may not) eliminate or diminish the frequency of these “attacks” is taking 50mg of Niacin each day. For about two or three years while I was taking 2000mg of Niacin daily as a “natural” cholesterol-lowering medication, I had no attacks at all!
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I cannot tell you how lucky you are that you didn’t get the headache portion of a migraine. I have had the misfortune of having the full blown type four times in my life and I can tell you it is the most pain I have ever experienced (mind you have I have shattered a finger – and subsequent reconstructive surgery, torn cartlidge in my knee, bruised ribs, and severely twisted ankles). The first time was the worst because I too thought I was having a stroke due to the fact that I completely lost vision in one eye and the other eye was about half gone and the pain felt as though someone was sticking a hot poker into my brain at the same time as someone was squezing a vice around my skull. This was in college and no I was not hung over. Luckily I was dating a girl (that was back when I could get a date) that had experience with this and knew right away what it was. I took six aleve and went to bed and tried not to vomit due to the pain induced nausea. The next day I went to student death – I mean health and the Dr. told me it was in fact a migraine and my remedy of six aleve, which I thought at the time was a borderline dangerous dose, was actually the same type and amount of medicine he would have prescribed in a concentrated form. Now I know when the blurred vision comes I need to grab some aleve and eat fruit followed by protein and I can usually avoid the worst of it.
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