Well, after a wonderful thursday night and friday, the last 2 nights have been me waking up at 3:ooish in terrible pain and unable to move to any position that will stop it. I have to sit up on my laptop for a few hours, can’t lie down at all, so I end up just passing out upright eventually.
It’s luckily not the lightning shock pain anymore, this is like a deep inside the jaw bone/jaw marrow kinda pain. Like a sharp, deep aching.
Sucking on the inside of my cheek helps stop it momentarily, but it is back within seconds. If I don’t suck on it, I’ll have a very tingly, aching pain from my eye down into my jaw hinge, down into my middle of my check, and into my ear for about 24/25 seconds and then stop for a minute or 2.
Does this pain sound familiar to anyone? I hope not, but if it does, are there any other tips you can pass on for sleeping with it? I have tried hot and cold compresses and sleeping with my pillows propping me up, but it’s not enough.
Thats the pain I get. It wakes me up sometimes to. And I do the same, sit on the laptop for the entire night!
My pain is behind my eye, deep in my ear, in my gums, some random teeth, and sometimes in my throat. All on the right side.
I only find a hot compress comforting, I guess. But I still use it. Sometimes I also just go and sit in the hot shower for about 20 minutes! I also dont know if it helps, but it just feels comforting.
I tend to rotate, shower to lap top, bed for 5 minutes, back up, another shower, lap top, shower… shower again, warm up heat pack … lap top, reheat heat pack! hahah
I get that pain too. But it is often there starting during the night before I go to bed. As it has for the past few nights again now. As Ro does, I take my meds a little while before I try to sleep and sometimes this helps.
I use the heat packs around my neck and try and soak up to my jaw in a bath of hot water, as hot as I can stand it. I don’t really have a solution as this is a problem I’ve spent most of this year dealing with. I too often end up sitting upright in a chair surrounded by pillows and a blanket to try and get comfortable, but unlike you - I cannot sleep sitting upright.
So unfortunately I do not myself know how to sleep with this pain as for me, the pain level is usually an 8/10 or above. I’m sitting here now, just dealing with this type of pain as I write.
Wishing you well Smurfette and I hope your pain eases soon!
Ro, I like your suggestion of ‘not’ using the energy efficient lightbulbs - but here in Australia - they have now taken all ‘normal’ lightbulbs off the market… It is now impossible to buy regular lightbulbs any longer :(. If I’d known they would do that, I would have purchased a giant box of the old style bulbs when I’d had the chance to - I was not made aware till I went to buy new bulbs for my home…
Oh ladies, why do we have this horrid thing? It has eased up for me tonight (except when chewing, but man I was hungry!) I doubled my Tegretol dose this afternoon and it seems to have solved things. I know this is bad and I shouldn’t be doing this on my own, but I am going to see the doctor first thing on monday to talk about my medication and what I should be doing to change/increase it so I can manage.
Heat is always a very good thing and I have one of those microwave beanbags (with the safe material cover and beans) that I heat up and use to warm my bed and once it has cooled down a little bit, I put that on my pillow and lie on it if I can stand the pressure of being down like that. That has helped a lot before as the heat stays for quite a long while and is comfortable to lie on.
I normally can’t sleep upright either (not on trains or in the car or on a plane which is unfortunate as flying back home is a very long haul flight), but I find that I get tired enough to just pass out really.
I wear anti-reflection glasses, but do insist on energy saving bulbs. I don’t find I have any sensitivity to lights or the screen just yet but will monitor if things increase while I am on the laptop or at work using my PC.
It has eased up for me tonight (except when chewing, but man I was hungry!) I doubled my Tegretol dose this afternoon and it seems to have solved things. I know this is bad and I shouldn’t be doing this on my own, but I am going to see the doctor first thing on monday to talk about my medication and what I should be doing to change/increase it so I can manage.