Wildly flashing bright lights. One flash of a strobe light can be enough to trigger an attack in some migraine sufferers.
While strong or intense light can be dealt with by a non-sufferer with just a single blink, you, the migraine sufferer, perceive such a stimulus as intense, a sharp stabbing that seems to go through your brain and physically hurts your eyeball – at least the one side where you most frequently feel migraines. In my particular case, the right side of my head was affected most often.
One of the potential solutions to dealing with this sensitivity will be a money saver in the long run! Read on…
If you are a migraine sufferer whose trigger is lighting or lighting that is too bright or a flash of a strobe light, you may want to avoid bright lights until you have raised your pain threshold and trained your nervous system to tolerate such lights.
Yes, indeed, that training can be very effective – I was able, from the impossibility of tolerating a single flash of a strobe light without developing an instant migraine, to be where I can now go into nightclubs or casinos or the bright lights of Broadway with lights coming in from all directions without a twinge of pain. Who would have thought… When I was still suffering excruciating migraines with a purse full of prescription capsules of a morphine derivative, I would never have believed I would achieve this level of freedom from pain. The best thing to know and to remember is that it’s a very achievable miracle, given enough work.
Until you have conditioned your senses to that happy result, be kind to yourself and adopt as many coping strategies as possible.
Wear sunglasses with as much (or more!) regularity as you wear sunscreen when you go outside – preferably prescription glasses if you don’t have 20/20 vision. Ask to have your regular prescription glasses polarized so you can step outside briefly and be protected. You will be avoiding or minimizing eye strain, another migraine trigger.
Be sure to wear polarized glasses while driving at night. If the sudden flash of hi-beams is unpleasant to a non-migraine sufferer, the sudden flash can be dangerous to a migraine sufferer if sudden, blinding pain ensues, causing the sufferer to close their eyes. Not the kind of reaction you want while controlling a ton of moving vehicle!
Most people don’t suffer from migraines and can enjoy the effect of a glitter ball and laser light shows. Until you have raised your pain threshold enough, treat yourself as precious – every little improvement you make adds to the other little improvements. Every little bit helps. Give yourself permission to be kind to yourself. Be patient with your healing curve – give yourself years to raise your pain threshold, then be pleasantly surprised when it takes less time. You will know when you are no longer hyper-sensitive to light.
A person sensitive to bright lights quickly learns to avoid clubs and dance venues with light shows and glitter balls, halls of mirrors, sunlight reflecting on glass skyscrapers, water reflecting on a mirrored lake or snowy peak, and hi-beams on cars. I missed the entire disco area: going into a hall with a glitter ball was asking for trouble, in my case.
I was so sensitive to intense light that I had to detour a city block to avoid the box with a flashing strobe light set in a certain pharmacy’s display window to attract the attention of passers-by. I could not afford to momentarily forget it was there and then be caught in a single flash of light that was guaranteed to trigger another migraine.
Set the lighting in your home on dimmer switches and keep it low. The mere fact that you will have a sense of security that your home is one place where such a trigger that will not surprise you (it feels like an ambush!) will cause you to relax within your own home. That’s another few hours of relaxation you can add to your migraine pain relief savings account. Setting your lights low will save money on your electricity bill as well as – bonus! – lower your stress level!
Try listening more to TV and videos rather than watching them. It’s like saving calories while dieting – it all adds up.
Cultivating your sense of humor about yourself is part of the healing process – don’t be shy about making it a practice to wear darker lenses even indoors and adopt a mysterious air. Treat yourself to making the glasses very fashionable.
