Thursday, March 1, 2012

Ice-pick headaches

Does anyone else has eye-pick headaches? I get them 4-5 times in a year, a sharp sensation of pain descending from top of my head to my eyes. It just blinds me for few seconds and after that I'm okay.

I have noticed always a loss of vision after a series of these attacks. I'm yet not sure though if it is related to SD. Earlier I used to think it might be a result of hypertension. But I ma not hypertensive since past 1 year and yet I feel these attacks.

Do you experience something similar?


4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I get horrible migraines, and headaches that seem to be located right behind my eye. Either way everything goes gray, and I get this weird tunnel vision. It's like the whole world is slipping away, or disappearing.. if that makes sense.

Unknown said...

I was diagnosed a year and a half ago. I get BAD headaches from the top of my head to the back of my eyes like you are describing, but no moments of complete blindness, just the usual blurrs that appear when I relax my eyes(my right eye doesn't see much anymore). It just feels like there is a hundred pounds sitting on top of my head more and more frequently and my eyes have so much pressure that I have to close them. It comes in waves, but the way it makes my eyes feel gives me the impression it must be related to my SD. I've been searching for some sort of clinical information on this relatively new symptom to see if it means my blindness is happening faster. Have you been able to find any info? I actually came across your site while searching for answers. Thanks

Bhumika said...

Hi Rachel,

I am sorry I saw your post late. I am not very active here. And due to the amount of spam on blogger, I miss the relevant posts!

Anyway, I have observed that most of my headaches are due to eye fatigue. And it is important to make some lifestyle changes.

1. Adjust your surroundings to block bright light/ uneven exposure of light - Use curtains / blinds to block the access light from your surroundings. I've noticed that small patches of light are even more irritating. Talk to people around you, make them understand that light can damage your eyes, and they will be helpful.


2. Avoid prolonged reading/gaming on smartphones. The screens are really small for us and it really causes a lot of unnecessary eye fatigue. Use Kindle for news/magazine subscriptions. Try to read long mails on your PC than smartphone.

3. Calibrate brightness on all your devices. Ground rule - The light emitted should not be brighter than surroundings. Your LCD/smartphone should not look like a source of light ;) Ensure proper lighting in your work area or reduce LCD brightness.

4. Think of adding different type of sunglasses. Not just for the sun, but also for overcast days and for night.

5. Do not overwork. When you think you are beginning to get eye fatigue, lubricate your eyes (take some over the counter eye drops like Optiv) and REST. Take time off work. A day's rest will avoid 2-3 days of ice-pick headaches :o)

Try to make these changes, and you will notice the difference :)

Unknown said...

I know this original post was made many years ago now, but I just wanted to share how much seeing this made me happy to know that I'm not the only one experience these ice-pick headaches now that i was diagnosed with Stargardt over a year ago. Four months have my diagnosis I back experiencing these sharp, short-term pains all around my head. It isn't always directed behind my eyes (like what has been mentioned), but that certainly does happen on occasion. My pain seems to jump around to different spots in my head, but generally on the top of both my right and then sometimes top left of my head. i also have a lot of neck and upper back pain, probably from stretching over my computer (at work and at home) to see the screen better. Initially I thought these headaches were due to sinus pressure, but now that I am seeing other people with Stargardt express similar pain, I'm confident that this is the source of my headaches. Thanks for your post! It sucks that this is happening to all of us, but it does lighten the load a bit knowing that I'm not the only one.