Isabel, a chronic migraine patient, a disease that even discourages motherhood: "I had my first crisis when I was 13. During menopause it triggered me and I was admitted six times"

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The headache is ignored because it is not a broken arm or a festering wound. It is invisible and, therefore, it is always suspicious (unfortunately for those affected). It has even been used as a funny joke to avoid sex or to get away from the boss on duty. But headaches are no

joke

.

In fact, one of its best-known types,

migraine

, is highly disabling and is suffered by five million people in Spain. It is characterized by the fact that it is usually pulsatile, frequently reaches half of the head, causes

nausea

, and is bothered by light and noise. In its chronic aspect, that is, when 15 or more episodes occur per month, it affects more than 1.5 million patients. No more and no less than

80% of them are women

and be careful, most of them are between

20 and 49 years old

, a stage of full professional and family development.

Isabel Colomina

is president of the Spanish Migraine and Headache Association (AEMICE) and affected. Her work at the head of this entity is to make the disease visible and also educate patients about the need to see a doctor and follow a healthy lifestyle, among other objectives. She is now 61 years old and controls her symptoms, but her story goes back a long way.

"I had my first migraine attack when I

was 13

, at a cousin's baptism. We called it a migraine. My father had them and when he got them, he spent two days locked in the room," he remembers. Migraine "is a genetic disease and 70% of patients have a history of it," explains Dr.

Jesús Porta

, neurologist at the San Carlos Clinical Hospital in Madrid and president of the Spanish Society of Neurology (SEN).

But: "Although it is genetic, not everyone develops the disease. There are triggers such as

menstrual cycles

, alcohol, changes in weather,

stress

, lack of sleep, etc.", continues the doctor. And attention, add a very significant one to this list: relaxation after stress is also a trigger: "That is why many patients suffer from migraine on

vacation and on the weekend

. This factor affects 18% of women and 7% of men ".

Menstrual cycles, a trigger

Shutterstock

Isabel suffered from more or less sustained migraines ("one or two attacks a year") until she turned 21, the age at which she got married and went to live in Germany: "There they began to be more recurrent. I changed the good weather from Valencia due to winters at -18º, I didn't know the language... I'm sure that the stress from those changes was a trigger. I started preventive treatment and kept going."

But a little before menopause

it

became chronic: "There were more and more days of migraine per month," she says. In many patients, the climacteric is a key moment, sometimes positive. This was not the case for her: "I was shot and admitted six times. Those years are usually complicated, both from a work and emotional point of view," she says. She was a manager in the marketing sector and the

stress

did not help.

She, from her own experience and her contact with patients and doctors, insists on the need to follow a healthy lifestyle: "The migraine brain does not like to get out of the routine, which is why hormonal changes

(

menstruation, ovulation, etc. ) can unleash crises. That's why it affects us women more," she explains. Other recommendations are to eat all meals (fasting is not recommended), follow regular sleeping habits, exercise, hydrate and manage stress, "each person as they can: knitting, yoga, walking...", explains Isabel.

Limiting, even for motherhood

During a migraine attack, a patient may be in bed, away from lights and noise, with vision alterations, vomiting... When it passes and he resumes his life, he does not usually do so from scratch. Chronic migraine is a disease that has no cure, although the symptoms can be controlled. What are the consequences of the limitations it causes?

"It's very misunderstood. People don't understand that today you're fine and maybe tomorrow you'll be in your room and you can't even pick up your children from school. The health system doesn't care for us as it should either," protests Isabel Colomina. Dr. Jesús Porta agrees.

The family environment and, above all, the children, are obvious

'collateral damage'

. "Studies indicate that adolescent children of migraine patients are less socialized, because if you have a headache, you make fewer plans with them, you don't take them to a friend's birthday, etc.," explains Porta. For this reason, the Spanish Society of Neurology, which it presides; the Spanish Migraine and Headache Association; and the pharmaceutical company Lilly have created 'My Big World', an initiative made up of various educational materials focused precisely on children's understanding.

Lilly

"There are women for whom chronic migraine becomes a deterrent to motherhood," explains the president of the SEN. "They limit their desires - according to a study by Nuria González, a specialist at the San Carlos Clinical Hospital - because they are afraid of becoming pregnant and having children suffering from this disease," he continues. However, she adds that during pregnancy it is common for migraine to improve (especially in the second trimester), but there are also

15% of cases in which it debuts

precisely at that time.

"It usually appears for the first time between the ages of 12 and 14. It can limit you when it comes to

choosing studies

and also at work, because

you avoid

taking on more

responsibilities

. It really is a very unfair disease," concludes Jesús Porta.

Isabel Colomina explains that

20%

of patients with chronic migraine have depression and

40%

have anxiety. "When your life is so conditioned that you have even left a job or studies, your psychological well-being is diminishing. Many patients are desperate just at a time when they have many professional and family demands."

Awareness, also of the patients themselves

Isabel Colomina, through AEMICE, insists that not only does the health system trivialize chronic migraine and has little time to listen to the patient, but there is a lack of awareness on the part of the patients themselves. "Many have become accustomed to living with it and do not go to the doctor. That is why it is underdiagnosed." They should follow, she says,

regular and healthy

habits ,

adhere

to treatments and not get 'tired' of going to consultations.

"If a medication doesn't work, you have to go back.

You don't have to give it up as impossible

. There are people who take an aspirin and stay in bed for two days and it's not necessary. There is medication that takes away your pain in an hour! ", he maintains.

She was one of those who insisted and insisted ("it also helped that I came to live in the south of Spain," she jokes) and went through different preventive treatments until reaching a new family of drugs, designed for the first time to specifically

prevent

migraine: monoclonal antibodies. "There are patients who are unaware of these medications. Social Security finances them when they have already undergone other treatments. I have been with them for four years. Once a month I get an injection and

I have another life

," she says.