Complex migraines: Searing pain, disrupted speech
October 26th 2011 01:30
23 million Americans suffer from some form of unusual migraines that could be termed complex
(CNN) -- Barbara A. Mosgrave of Annandale, Virginia, doesn't remember the first time it happened. It's still a blur. But she thinks the episodes began about 50 years ago. At least that's when she remembers someone telling her she was talking gibberish.
At 71, Mosgrave knows to expect the unexpected. Since she was a teen she has suffered from serious migraines. "The kind that cause you to go into a dark room, and shut the door; the pain is that bad," she says. But she knew how to control them, and why they were happening. Yet, when it came to her speech, that was different.
"I had no idea that I was babbling," she admits.
Yet when people began telling her at times she didn't make any sense, she started to wonder; why were her words and phrases coming out all wrong? At first, Mosgrave thought she might be having mini-strokes, but when she went to numerous neurologists they all told her the same thing: She was suffering from a form of headache classified as a complex migraine.
Do you live with complex migraines? Share your advice
"What makes a complex migraine different from the common migraine is that neurologic event outlasts the headache itself," says Dr. Marc Schlosberg, a neurologist at Washington Hospital Center in Washington, D.C., and Mosgrave's physician.
According to the National Headache Foundation, 23 million Americans suffer from some form of unusual migraines that could be termed complex. These headaches are more common in women and can occur at any age.
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