Does anyone experience seasonal, or cluster, headaches? DH gets them about this time of the year and again in the spring. They are extremely painful. Other than ice packs and sleeping them off, the only alternative is some very strong narcotics. Hoping someone may have had an alternative treatment for them.

Sandi, my DH has them also, but less often than many people who suffer with that condition. Usually he avoids light as much as possible and sometimes uses ice water packs to his head. Here's an url from the Mayo Clinic. He hasn't tried any of the new treatments they talk about. He does take Melatonin to help him sleep, but I just don't know if it may have helped him any with the headaches.
http://www.mayoclinic.org/dise...

Pollen and leaves

Sandi, my husband use to get cluster headaches finally found that breathing oxygen would get rid of his. His doctor gave him a perscription for a oxygen respirator which he would use whenever he got a cluster headache until the pain let up. Finally as he aged the headaches disappeared until he was at a high elevation working in Colorado, when he got back home they disappeared.

Thanks for the responses! One more thing to love about the NGA website. I'm never truly alone.
@LindaTX8 I pack a small cooler every night with two ice packs. He averages two attacks a night. During the day, he's fine unless he takes a nap. As soon as he wakes, the headache comes back. Thanks for the Mayo Clinic link. Lots of good info.

@daylilydreams Doctor did prescribe oxygen, but not nearly in as high a concentration as that recommended by Mayo Clinic. That is something to definitely look into. Encouraging to know they don't last forever. Thanks for the information.

@crawgarden I sure hope it's not pollen and leaves that cause the headaches. We have some kind of pollen, and a variety of leaves falling, at any given time of the year here!

I really appreciate knowing we're "not alone." This is the fourth year for the headaches. He saw a neurologist for three winter seasons, but she moved. Last year, he was referred to another doctor who prescribed some scary narcotics. DH decided to tough it out instead. We keep thinking each year will be the last of them...

Sandy, my husband had cluster headaches for years the oxygen was the only thing that gave him relief. These headaches are quite different from any other headache they are not caused by pollen etc. and are extremely more painful. I wish your husband luck, we think a higher concentration of oxygen might help.

Thanks, Betty. That's good advice. I will "encourage" him to speak to his IM doctor soon. He had two headaches this morning within a few hours. We will definitely try the higher oxygen concentration. The first neurologist he saw four years ago suggested having an oxygen tank delivered, but at the time, husband thought that might be dangerous to have in the house. (We have a small grandson that visits quite often).

How goes the battle?
I have had nasty headaches on and off since the seventies.
I put them off as being due to allergies but only went to a doctor once.
Some times it felt like some one was driving a nail into my head; as they would hit during non-pollen seasons at times I have no idea what they were but now they are not as severe or common.
I found that sleeping on the floor with a heater blowing directly into my face worked best at times; sleeping elevated with a heating pad helped but not as much.
I would take old prescription pain killers on occasion and oddly after using them they pretty much faded away on that occasion

The one time I did see the doctor after I had them so bad I was staying at dad's house and sleeping on the floor infront of the wall heater.
The doc did not prescribe pain killers as I was still using some very old ones but said if the headache did not stop within a week he was putting me in the hospital for tests.
The went away but I had series of nasty unrelated medical annoyances that year that took up most of the year, go figure.
I have changed my diet slightly, less milk product and more spicy foods but as to why it came and left there were no answers.
About five or so years ago I had, a doctor told me this about a year after it was gone, what he called a deep sinus infection.
The right side of my skull stopping behind the eye and not going below the ear was very sore to the touch on and off for most of a summer.
I did not go to a doctor and it eventually went away but I talked to one of Sharon's doctors once and he said it sounded like afore mentioned problem and that I was fortunate that it went away without treatment.
After that my headaches became less severe and have now become uncommon.

Glad it's gotten better, RpR! DH gets migraines as well as cluster headaches. I just get migraines, but they're less often and less severe than before I was on Singulair.

@RpR The headaches continue. This has been the longest stretch of them in years. We take a small ice chest whenever we leave the house in case one hits.
I will ask him to ask his doctor about the possibility of having a sinus infection. They seem to be occurring at 2:30 AM, fairly regularly now. And if he naps, he'll get one within half an hour after waking up. It's frustrating... for both of us.

Sandi, years ago a friend had them very badly. He ended up using the strong drugs, going from doctor to doctor to obtain them, and ended up badly addicted to them. He went through a very rough time and lost a few jobs because of it. He had tried most of the remedies and didn't think anything worked except the strong drugs.

Unless he develops an addiction to ice, I think he's okay as far as drugs. Ice on the left temple is really the only thing that helps.

Bubbles said: They seem to be occurring at 2:30 AM, fairly regularly now. And if he naps, he'll get one within half an hour after waking up. It's frustrating... for both of us.

I am not a doctor and you would not even want me to play one on TV, but that 2:30 AM part sounds real familiar.
Two weeks ago, out of nowhere, about that time of morning I would start to feel that there was one coming on, which is when they usually hit nowadays.
Plain pain killers, lots, sometimes make a full on hit take longer but by 4 AM I pretty much knew that for the nest two to four hours sleep would be optional.
I do not, partly because taking a pain killer that does not work does not increase the pain but is so annoying it psychologically makes it worse, take pills unless it goes on for several days.
It is too warm to turn on the furnace, but I have found that sleeping on the kitchen floor with my face right over the vent for God only knows what reason really helps, so I could not do that.
I did finally take two Vicodin pills that were left over from my late Aunts tooth pain. I used to use them to fall asleep years ago from surgery but hers must be different as they did not put me to sleep but I was VERY comfortable and felt the headache fade away.
That ended that spell.
I hope his problems are fairly easy to home fix like mine, although I dealt with this for years, in winter sometimes I was thankful for bitter cold weather and snow as I would go outside to shovel, actually just move it around as it did not really need shoveling and the cold air would numb it.
I tried every trick in the book, and while it is now just a occasional annoyance some tricks worked more regularly than others but when I thought I had it beat and it would kick me in the head making my new cure bs, I would try some thing new.
I honestly think my altered, not necessarily healthy diet, had the biggest positive effect, as allergies are one of the worst causes of headaches for me.

@RpR Far be it from me to give advice, but if warmth helps with headaches, could you try an electric heating pad?

Bubbles said:@RpR Far be it from me to give advice, but if warmth helps with headaches, could you try an electric heating pad?

I do but they are hit and miss.
When I get a real bad one, they are better than nothing but not much more.
When I lay on the floor with the heat vent blowing in my face, I have my head jammed against the wall, not as uncomfortable as it sounds, so it is elevated; I cannot elevate my head, and be comfortable enough, in the current bed so that becomes a battle between getting the head elevated, getting and keeping the heating pad in the right spot and being comfortable enough that I do not end up shifting position continually.
Used to have a reclining chair that I could put in a position that worked well but it is long gone, I miss it. Its demise is one reason I found and tried other methods.
Compared to years back it is just a -- I'm BAAAACK -- annoyance now but back then I almost went to the point of seeing if doctors could fix it, but for reasons mostly unknown, it ain't what it used to be.