Life of Sare

​ It's Saturday. It's also 7:25 am, and I'm awake. I have an extremely sharp golf ball sized pain right above my left eye, a dull achy pain in my neck, and I'm pretty sure I'm going to vomit any second. I don't open my eyes. I instead quickly grab for my forehead with both hands and apply moderate pressure to both sides of my temples to release my sinuses. I know it's not my sinuses, but I just don't want it to be another migraine. I haven't had a migraine like this in so long. I wait for my sinuses to clear...  Nothing. Slowly, I open my left eye..... Then my right... They're back! Tiny bright lights dance within my vision. My orbie friends. "Please be a dream, please be a dream!" I plead, knowing full well that in reality I am truly entering a day of nightmare, because going throughout a day with a migraine is just that. A nightmare. At first I try to ignore it. Rub my neck, get some fluid flowing again. Then I de...

Growing up I had headaches all the time. I spent a lot of time crying in my dark dark room at really young ages because my migraines were so bad. I had a great pediatrician growing up and he always equated it to my sinuses (I was ALWAYS congested). I took a lot of antibiotics as a child for sinus infections. I was also super lucky, because I had a nurse mom who would just call my amazing pediatrician and say, "Another infection..." and he would call in the medication, at least that's how I remember it. And, while I did have sinus infections a lot, that was not always the reason for my headaches when I was little.   In high school I was super accident prone. Basketball practices were the prime time to make jokes about me being on the ground again, and my coaches would check my shoe laces and tie them in triple knots. The fourth or fifth time I would fall, hard (and this was at every practice mind you), Coach would walk up to the black lines and wipe them down just to ...

And happy Chiari Malformation Awareness Month ! As promised I will be giving you a life update... next week... But first I thought I would try to explain to you what Chiari is, and I thought maybe I would do so through memes because-  (insert meme about how memes explain everything but...  ...so yeah) So here we go!!! Let's all start by saying it.  Now that we can say it, what does it mean?  Need a visual? Well, in doctor terms: My "tonsil" is 7mm long. In my terms: My leaking egg whites are 7 mm long. But...  Why is this happening? Chances are it is congenital. That means,  And that I've just got That's right, So, in the case of a zombie apocalypse, I'm the one you want on your team for many reasons. The first being  Other curses are  And As well as, ...

June is “Migraine awareness month! And being that I haven't given a Chiari update for a while, I figured that maybe the end of June might be the time. This is kinda a “woe is me” post, but not to make you feel bad for me, but just because migraines SUCK! With a lot of Awareness Months, they use the month to spread awareness of early signs of detection, how and where to get screened, and to raise funds for the cause. With migraine awareness there isn't really that push (other than to maybe raise money for research but I don't have a favorite fund so I’m not going to even go into that) so, I think I am going to use this month (or this blog post) to help others understand that people with migraines are people. I live a life, well sometimes. I have a favorite food, ice cream (actually it’s donuts). I have a job, well for 9 months in the year… and take every sick day I am offered because of migraines. To be diagnosed with Chronic Migraine, you must have: 1.      Headache ...

Since being diagnosed with Chiari, a food log has been introduced into my life. This is both a blessing and a curse. I hate seeing all the crap I eat in a day! It is so gross. But I do love that I am better able to control my migraines lately just based off of what I eat.  There are a few things we have noticed that trigger migraines for me.  1. My bite size breakfast. I hate breakfast foods, there are few things I will eat in the morning. Christian is an amazing husband and knows that if he pre cuts an avocado, a banana, and a chicken apple sausage and lines them up nice and straight I will eat it all up. The problem is, all 3 of those are migraine triggers. So I can no longer have all 3 for a meal I can only have one.  2. Hotdogs. This is one I am not even sad about. Last time we had hotdogs I had more than I needed and then stated that I don't even like hotdogs, I just eat them because they are there. But now that we have been able to link those to my migraines I defin...

As promised, here is a quick update on my brain. Sorry- No pictures   I sill have Chiari Malformation Type 1.   A few weeks ago I met with a neurosurgeon to decide our next move. We talked about my symptoms and my tonsil, and the surgeon decided that the surgery's risk outweighs the rewards. So, we are still in the same spot. Pain, pain, and more pain.   I have been working on a headache journal, and at first, I documented every day. This lasted about 3 weeks, then I forgot about it. I then only documented the last 24 hours leading up to a headache where I rated the pain at a 7 or higher. When I document this I make sure to mention what I ate, how much water I am drinking (I try to drink   3 liters a day!), and what physical activity (if any) I have done.   Last Tuesday, my sister and I made a day out of my doctor's appointment in Salt Lake to see my neurologist. Nothing has changed, and my neurologist seems to be as frustrated as I am with the lack of ur...

Hi,  It's me Bray!! A lot of you have been asking my humans when they are going to have a baby human, and I mean, why wouldn't you? Look how good they look with human kids (sorry human cousins I cut out)! And face it, this family has a lot of good looking human babies hanging around lately. I don't blame all of you for being baby hungry!  But becoming a parent is a big decision, and mom has been really up and down lately with her headaches. She and Dad decided they really need to think through having a child and when it is the right time to bring a human into the world. Mom has a doctor appointment on Monday with her neurosurgeon, and Dad has been researching lots of things to do for Mom so that her headaches can go away without taking all those harsh medicines. Mom can't take most her meds she is on when she is pregnant. They have been talking a lot, and they ask me all the time if I want a sibling. I do, and I want a brother!  That being said, I thought I would take t...