Where Every Scroll is a New Adventure
Welcome to my blog. I'm Raven, he/him, and this blog is mostly about migraines, usually acute confusional migraines, and my experience with them. You will also find posts about migraine triggers, photosensitivity, and epilepsy. I will not most anything that flashes, strobes, uses bright colours, or anything with audio. I'm trying to make my blog as accessible as possible. If the background and text are an issue for others (they aren't for me, but I'm only one person,) I can change them.
Feel free to ask me about ACM, migraines in general, or photosensitivity for any reason, and I'll answer to the best of my ability. Remember that I am only one person, and I do not speak for everyone. I can only speak to my experiences.
What is an ACM?
An acute confusional migraine (ACM,) is basically a migraine that comes with the added bonus of rapid-onset confusion and other worrying symptoms, such as
Changes in vision and other senses
Memory loss
Anxiety
Moodiness
Agitation
Dizziness
Issues speaking in the way you normally do
Disorientation
Motor control difficulties
Comprehension issues
Many of these symptoms in a migraine are a medical emergency and require immediate emergency medical care. These types of migraines are more common in children and teens, but they can also occur in adults.
What is my experience?
For me, an ACM is triggered by a medium-to-loud high-pitched noise. I'm rarely exposed to this trigger but when I am, it almost always causes an ACM if I can't stop the migraine before it properly starts. The confusion state starts shortly after the headache, usually in under ten minutes, and progressively gets worse until I begin to lose time and can't properly remember what happens. I've got entire shifts at work I can't remember due to an ACM. What I can remember is rapidly-increasing emotional distress (anger, anxiety, irritation, etc,) difficulties with comprehension, disorientation, and my (admittedly already poor) speech skills and motor control abilities getting worse and worse.
ACM episodes usually happen at work for me, when I'm forcibly placed on one of the headsets (fast food,) which has a loud, sharp, high-pitched beep to alert me that there's a car in my lane. The constant exposure to the trigger makes the medications I take ineffective at preventing the migraine. I begin to mess up a lot, work far slower, struggle to communicate, and obviously struggle to do my job, which is handling money. Multiple managers have chosen spite and, despite my objections, put me on this lane. I've yet to find the nerve to put my foot down or ask to leave and go to the emergency room.
Don't be like me. If you have an ACM, unless instructed to do otherwise by a doctor, you should probably go to the ER or call an ambulance.
Gotta love it when our symptoms are a medical emergency, yeah?