On Headaches

My first husband didn't believe me when it came to my headaches. I guess he thought I was exaggerating to get out doing things I didn't want to do. He didn't really get headaches, lucky bastard. 

I was never lying though. No, "not today, honey, I have a headache" games from me. Just waves of pain and a need for quiet stillness in the dark. 

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I've always been susceptible to them. Sinus headaches, allergy headaches, stress headaches, migraines. I manage a lot of life through the haze of some kind of headache or another because if I gave in and went to bed every time I had a headache, I'd be there more often than not. 

People who don't suffer from headaches really can't understand what the pain is like, much the way people who've never broken a bone or never birthed a child cannot truly understand what a sufferer is suffering. 

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I woke with a doozy this morning. Felt like a hot piece of steal was piercing the left side of my head, with a point of impact feeling on the forehead, and something else in the middle of my skull, like a hot golf ball swelling and trying to burst its way out though my cheek. 

Waking with a headache is especially terrible. Like the day has pounced before you were even alert enough to defend yourself. Unfair. Dirty pool, old boy. 

I tried vacating the bedroom and going through the morning motions--letting the dogs out to pee, feeding them, making a cup of tea. Sometimes moving makes things better. I'm a medication-avoider. I don't like to take pills, even basic pain-killers, if there's something else I can do and feel better. 

Not this time, though. The pain kept increasing, making me worry I was going to vomit and giving me heat waves, even after I caved and took a sinus pill, so I had to wake Sweetman on his holiday and get him to take over dog duty so I could work on finding some relief. It took a range of things: that sinus pill, a nasal rinse, a shower (for the steam), lots of nose-blowing, a defensive sleep nap with the pillow shoved against my aching cheek to apply counter pressure. 

But I woke with only the residual ache and a cautious feeling. Whew! I'm relieved it ended after only a couple of hours, and that my head chose a day off to attack me on, so I didn't have to try and create sub lesson plans through that pain. My best guess is that my head was angry about the amount of dust I got into yesterday cleaning up to host Thanksgiving. I hadn't done anything else that usually triggers a pain wave like this. 

Any other headache sufferers out there? What do you do to find relief, besides medication?