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7:52pm June 12, 2012
feliscorvus: OK, I’ve attempted to explain this weird visual thing that happens to me sometimes in the presence of bright light to a few people before. But it only just occurred to me now that I could actually make a picture approximating it. The photo contents aren’t important (it’s just a random picture of my back yard on a bright sunny day) but I’m really curious as to whether the “stuff” at the top of the screen looks familiar to anyone.  For a long time I didn’t even realize it might be a thing and for all I know, it’s a fairly normal response to very bright light. But a friend suggested, last time I tried describing it, that it could be an ocular migraine or something like that. The simulated image I’ve got posted here isn’t *perfect* but it gets at the idea pretty well: basically it’s like this field of grayish-whitish mottled stuff in my upper field of vision. The most reliable way to invoke it is to sit somewhere (like in the front seat of a car) where I can see the sky, and then move my eyeballs slightly down or up. Mind you, as far as I know I’ve only had one actual migraine involving a headache (in college once, and in that case I was sensitive to ALL lights and nauseous for a whole day). But this ocular weirdness happens pretty much whenever I’m outside in the sun or sometimes even indoors if there are really bright fluorescents. Oh and it’s NOT the afterimage thing you get from staring at a point source of light, it’s fainter than that, doesn’t entirely obscure the visual field, and doesn’t change colors. It stays grayish, and sometimes looks like it’s “zooming” over my head. EDIT: Forgot originally to also note that I’m sure this isn’t “floaters”, either. I know what those are and what they look like and this is totally different. Floaters are a lot less regular in shape and tend to sort of “drift” or “swim” across one’s field of vision.  I didn’t even see the text and thought ocular migraine. You don’t need to ever have a headache to get them, just like you don’t need to have tonic clinic seizures to have epilepsy. My father has never had a migraine, except possibly the headaches he got with this stroke. He gets ocular migraines all the time. So does my mom. Me and Jeremy both get headaches. And I get ocular ones too. And I’m the winner of chronic daily headache, which is basically some form of migraine headache every day. Because I just have to win the genetic prize every time in this family. (Seriously I seem to usually get a severe form of whatever runs in the family.) So if my dad can go seventy years without a migraine headache and still get ocular migraines, you can definitely get them especially if you really have had the headaches. I always get ocular migraines in bright sun. Often in the form of weird patterns that show up well looking at the sky, but also I see them anywhere of course. And I have a tentative diagnosis of status migraine aura for the rest of my visual crap. But what is in that picture is so very migrainey I could recognize it without the text. You don’t need any other symptoms with it to get it. In my family we usually feel some amount of cognitive problems. Ranging from barely perceptible, to so severe my parents are often unable to drive and even if they’re on a highway they have to find a way to pull over until it’s gone. Because they don’t have the skill needed to drive safely. Of course neither you or me could drive safely no matter what. But you get the idea. But the ocular migraine can come with every single normal migraine symptom but the headache, or it can come with nothing but the visual stuff. And everything in between. I guess the one thing good about coming from a family of migraineurs is I can recognize things like this anywhere.

feliscorvus:

OK, I’ve attempted to explain this weird visual thing that happens to me sometimes in the presence of bright light to a few people before. But it only just occurred to me now that I could actually make a picture approximating it. The photo contents aren’t important (it’s just a random picture of my back yard on a bright sunny day) but I’m really curious as to whether the “stuff” at the top of the screen looks familiar to anyone. 

For a long time I didn’t even realize it might be a thing and for all I know, it’s a fairly normal response to very bright light. But a friend suggested, last time I tried describing it, that it could be an ocular migraine or something like that. The simulated image I’ve got posted here isn’t *perfect* but it gets at the idea pretty well: basically it’s like this field of grayish-whitish mottled stuff in my upper field of vision. The most reliable way to invoke it is to sit somewhere (like in the front seat of a car) where I can see the sky, and then move my eyeballs slightly down or up.

Mind you, as far as I know I’ve only had one actual migraine involving a headache (in college once, and in that case I was sensitive to ALL lights and nauseous for a whole day). But this ocular weirdness happens pretty much whenever I’m outside in the sun or sometimes even indoors if there are really bright fluorescents. Oh and it’s NOT the afterimage thing you get from staring at a point source of light, it’s fainter than that, doesn’t entirely obscure the visual field, and doesn’t change colors. It stays grayish, and sometimes looks like it’s “zooming” over my head.

EDIT: Forgot originally to also note that I’m sure this isn’t “floaters”, either. I know what those are and what they look like and this is totally different. Floaters are a lot less regular in shape and tend to sort of “drift” or “swim” across one’s field of vision. 

I didn’t even see the text and thought ocular migraine. You don’t need to ever have a headache to get them, just like you don’t need to have tonic clinic seizures to have epilepsy. My father has never had a migraine, except possibly the headaches he got with this stroke. He gets ocular migraines all the time. So does my mom. Me and Jeremy both get headaches. And I get ocular ones too. And I’m the winner of chronic daily headache, which is basically some form of migraine headache every day. Because I just have to win the genetic prize every time in this family. (Seriously I seem to usually get a severe form of whatever runs in the family.) So if my dad can go seventy years without a migraine headache and still get ocular migraines, you can definitely get them especially if you really have had the headaches. I always get ocular migraines in bright sun. Often in the form of weird patterns that show up well looking at the sky, but also I see them anywhere of course. And I have a tentative diagnosis of status migraine aura for the rest of my visual crap.

But what is in that picture is so very migrainey I could recognize it without the text. You don’t need any other symptoms with it to get it. In my family we usually feel some amount of cognitive problems. Ranging from barely perceptible, to so severe my parents are often unable to drive and even if they’re on a highway they have to find a way to pull over until it’s gone. Because they don’t have the skill needed to drive safely. Of course neither you or me could drive safely no matter what. But you get the idea. But the ocular migraine can come with every single normal migraine symptom but the headache, or it can come with nothing but the visual stuff. And everything in between.

I guess the one thing good about coming from a family of migraineurs is I can recognize things like this anywhere.