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Psychedelic migraine treatment

crOOk

crOOk

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Dec 16, 2004
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A thread similar to this one has been started before. I hope it's allright for me to start this one. Just don't say I didn't use the search function. :)

I have found evidence to believe that psilocybin containing mushrooms and other psychedelics have the ability to cure migraine headaches.

So, if anyone of you is experiencing migraine and has tried treating it with psychedelics, please take part in the survey below. I'd also like to hear about your experiences!

Survey: Migraine and Psychedelics

Cluster Headache Treatment with Psilocybin Mushrooms & LSD

crOOk
 
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The problem is, most (all?) people here use pschedelics anyway and the treatment is supposed to last 6-12 months.
So even if someone succeeded treating his headaches with psychedelics, he probably doesn't even know.
Who know? Maybe I have migraine...

I actually tried this once, I was experiencing nasty headaches for two days and ate .5g of Stropharia Cubensis. The headache unfortunately remained the same... :( Anyway, I rarely experience headaches and guess it wasn't migraine.

crOOk
 
I once sent an e-mail to the head of our national migraine association about the effects of serotonergic hallucinogens on cluster headache. He replied that he'd mention them in their next meeting. I guess he did, but there was never anything heard about that.
 
In their next meeting with the pharmaceutical companies I suppose... Like they wouldn't have known it for years already... :(
Still, good move telling them, Clockwise!

Has anyone watched Simpsons S16E6 on Sunday? It was about prescription drugs and the filthy pharmaceutical industry. Homer started importing prescription meds and Ralph got to do some kinda research chemical. Soundtrack: Jefferson Airplane, White Rabbit! :D

crOOk
 
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I used to get horrible migraines all throughout my childhood and up until about 8th grade.

I never put the two together, but I stopped getting them around the same time that I started smoking weed, and eventually using hallucinogens.
 
I used to get serious, debilitating migraines and cluster headaches. It tormented me from the 4th grade until my senoir year in high school. Somtimes when I got a headache, it literally lasted a week.

My migraines almost always resulting in vomiting, dizziness so bad i couldn't walk, extreme pain, etc. It was to the point the neurologists were starting to get concerned the migraines were going to give me a stroke if they got any worse. I had to keep medication on my person at all times, and sometimes a headache meant an ER visit because it freaked out poeple around me so bad.

Now, correlation does not imply causation... but the headaches did go away for the most part after getting into LSD and mushrooms. After the fact, i looked into this (knowing nothing about the phenomenon at the time), and my mushroom use fit the reccomended psilocin/psilocybin therapy schedule.
 
One of the drugs used to treat migrane headaches (methysergide - hospital only dispensing in UK), actually has LSD like effects if taken at doses a few times that used clinically, so it's not that surprising.

Just to say though, that other migrane treatment drugs (like ergotamine or ergonovine) taken at doses beyong a clinical dose can cause such a reduction of blood flow to the fingers and toes etc., that they can become gangerous. Only methysergide, out of the clinical anti-migrane drugs, seems to have any appreciable psychedelic activity
 
i've had cluster headaches for about 2 years, its a fucking bitch and distinctly different from migraines.

for those who don't know, the pain is akin to "that of giving birth without anesthetics or that of surprise amputation." 2-3 times per day. i have broken many bones in the past, and cluster pain is an order of magnitude worse.

my case is completeley resistant to any pain meds, all have been tried without success including ergot derivatives, opiates, anticonvulsants, NSAIDs etc.

the only thing that works 100% to abort an attack is oxygen, administered at 10-12 l/min for aboiut 10 minutes.

that said, i have tried several psychedelic treatment options - without much success. MDxx psychodelics will result in a pain-free day, but the attacks return with renewed vigour the next day. DMT makes the attacks worse and seems to bring them on in short order. 2C- class makes clusters much worse the following weeks.

i have read much on psilocybin and its efficacy, and have tried to abort a cluster with what i thought would be an effective (and my only) dose of mushrooms. the dose proved barely threshold, i ended up tripping - with a horrible headache.

i have not given up though, i am convinced that clusters have a circadian nature, and that certain serotonergic psychedelics reset the trigger mechanisms responsible for the the hypothalamic contractions thought by some to be responsible for the excruciating pain.

since in my case reliable access to psilocybin is virtually nonexistent, i wonder if 4-HO-MiPT can be used to substitute successfully in this capacity?

also very interested in hearing of any experiences in this regard.

p.s. out of curiosity, of those affected, how many of you are smokers, or perhaps a better question is, are any of you non-smokers?
 
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Dude, I believe your headachesare horrible. There's a reason why they're called suicide headaches. Everyone of us would commit suicide if the amount of pain that he is exposed to at that very moment (!) is large enough.

That said, I think there's lots of reasons for headaches. Psychedelics only seem help with certain kind of headaches. It doesn't surprise me. I hope you'll be able to manage your pain one day, man!

Now why tried that "methysergide" shit in here?

crOOk
 
nanobrain said:
...
for those who don't know, the pain is akin to "that of giving birth without anesthetics or that of surprise amputation." 2-3 times per day. i have broken many bones in the past, and cluster pain is an order of magnitude worse.

my case is completeley resistant to any pain meds, all have been tried without success including ergot derivatives, opiates, anticonvulsants, NSAIDs etc.
...
p.s. out of curiosity, of those affected, how many of you are smokers, or perhaps a better question is, are any of you non-smokers?
Click to expand...

When asked to describe it, i used to say it felt like somone was kicking me in the head while it was in a vise, with a screwdriver being jammed in and out of my left eye... and it would feel like that for days on end sometimes. I came pretty close to ending my life over it, actually. Opiates did nothing. The ergot drugs and later stuff like imitrex helped for migraines, but I was pretty much fucked w/ the cluster headaches. I really feel bad for people that have no insurance and stuff that get these, as the Imitrex was like $12 a pill, and I went through them left and right.

I was never a tobacco smoker while I had them. I've had maybe one or two migraines a year for the past couple years. No problems from cluster headaches since high school. I smoked for probably a little under 2 years, then quit. I've been smoking pot since my senoir year in high school. It seems to help with the migraines as long I smoke it immediately when I notice the signs of one coming on. Otherwise the smoke makes me sick.

Don't get me wrong, it doesn't stop them, but takes the edge off.
 
I used to get frequent, painful headaches that would last a few days. Nothing I took could really shift the pain - although some pain-killers did dull the pain slightly, I still knew it was there.

About 2 years ago I started using MDMA recreationally. I have used it, on average, probably once a month since then and, thankfully, rarely suffer with headaches now. It has definitely improved my quality of life! :D

I have also had sinus problems in the past (maybe the cause of the headaches?) that meant I could only breathe properly through one nostril at a time. Similarly with the headaches, my breathing is much better after a dose of MDMA. In fact, on MDMA, my nose is that clear I can breathe through both nostrils simultaniously - this is the only time I can do this!

I am not sure if there is any connection or whether it's just coincidence (or whether MDMA is classed as a Psychedelic! :)) - but if I do not have any MDMA for about 5-6 weeks, the headaches return. I can also notice the abilty to breathe through my nose worsen after a couple of weeks of not having MDMA.


In reply to nanobrain, I am a non-smoker and have never smoked in my life! :)
 
^sounds like you had/have the dreaded "sinusitis" - an option definitely manageble in the short term w/MDMA as it is also a vasodilator.

clusters are a diff. bag altogether. fizzacyst, i can relate well.

what happens, to the best of current functional MR imaging ability (real time MRI) is severe vasodilation and actual physical changes in the hypothalamus causing trigeminal bundle compression, w/accompanying serotonin, histamine and, of course, substance P dump. thus MDMA is totally counterindicated w/clusters.

here, in my case anyway, i go from pain level zero, to what feels like a spiked, heated metal bone composed of raw nerve tissue being driven through the left eye socket to the back of the skull and back again while being repeatedly broken in the process (ie to way off the chartable scale) - within roughly 2 minutes.

there is no auras, nausea or warning symptoms, same time, same place, 8:30 P.M. on the dot, adjusted for daylight savings.

you cannot breathe, the eye shuts swelling closed in 10 minutes while there is massive lacrimonious and nasal discharge (Horners), lying down is impossible as you have to keep changing position, darkness does not help, speech is impossible, you break several sweats, the muscles go into spasms and only conscious effort, hard at this point makes you inhale.

this lasts getting progressively worse until the oncoming waves of pain and madness cease as abruptly as they came (45 minutes to 2 hours without O2), perhaps only to be repeated hours later.

this can go on for many months daily, putting a rather blunt dent in one's social calendar among many other side effects. the worse thing is the psycholgical dread of the next attack, making you wonder if you will make it. sucks if it hits while i am driving.

obviously, pain meds are of no use, since when most kick in, its waaay too late. melatonin did nothing for me, btw. and the methysergide type antiserotonergic vasoconstrictors, which act alot faster also did nothing beside depleting my wallet. will not venture into progesterone land.

I WILL REPEAT, OXYGEN WORKS EVERY TIME WITH NO SIDE EFFECTS WITHIN MINUTES. you might want to give it a go if nothing else helps.

an acute dose of psylocybin or LSD just might do the trick, but why was, in this case, was DMT not effective as it is also a 5HT2a ligand?
 
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Is treatment with oxygen common?

In all the years I had them, and perhaps a dozen specialists, not a single one ever said anything about it to me. I'm going to be really mad if this is known to work well, and they never even tried it.

the psilocybin treatments are preventative, actually.. not acute. And suprisingly, a lot of the positive things I have heard about it working were written by people who otherwise would have nothing to do with psychedelics or drugs in general. Also, the dose is not a hallucinogenic one.. its some minor amount, and supposedly helps for 6 months or so. Its been a while since I've read anything on it, though.
 
Ive had migraines for over 15 years and have been to many doctors who have done nothing for me. None of them ever prescribed oxygen though, which really makes me mad if that would have worked.
Also I have noticed that my migraines have subsided since I've done MDMA, Shrooms, and LSD. What once used to be a 3 time a week ordeal has now become only a once a month thing. Never even thought that hallucinogens would help til I read this thread. Very interesting.
 
for those who don't know, the pain is akin to "that of giving birth without anesthetics or that of surprise amputation."

I used to know somebody who suffered from cluster headaches, and having been on the receiving end of a "surprise amputation", he looked like he was in more pain than I went through (with amputation, you go into shock, and you brain chemistry ensures that everything takes on a dreamlike, pain free air).

My grandmother suffered with a kidney stone which seemed like a similar level of pain (semi-delerious, but still being aware of continuous, severe pain). It's reckoned to be the most pain that you'll ever feel, as anything beyond that puts you into shock, where pain has no meaning (as in amputation).

Rather than psilocybin, how about the mixed lysergic acid amides you get from HBWR, morning glory etc, as they're quite similar in structure to drugs known to give releif in a lot of people
 
^^amazingly enough, for all its effectiveness, oxygen cluster therapy is still fairly unknown in the medical community.

i had to do all my own research to find this potential solution, then go through the trouble of trying to find a sympathetic MD who would prescribe the oxygen tank.

no such luck - hey, its explosive, you'll blow yourself up, its dangerous - that sort of drivel. this led me to contact the gas company direct, who demanded a script, but conceded to my signing a release from liability after some persistant haranguing on my part...
 
I've been suffering from cluster headache for about four years now. Luckily Sumtriptan IM helps me perfectly well cause the pain in unbearable.

I'm interested in all kinds of information about people who have used tryptamines, possible other than psilocybin and LSD, successfully to treat this condition.

Also I like to know more about how you have experienced other psychedelics to affect you before, under or after the attacks.
 
Some of these are pretty simple DMT analogues, actually. I'm pretty sure that Maxalt isn't substituted on the chain, where I think a lot of the other triptans are.

I don't see why the 5HT2a receptor agonists are able to relieve cluster headaches for months or years, but the triptans aren't able to. I don't understand why that is. Maybe an ADD question.
 
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