I get the zigzag visual thing for roughly twenty minutes before the pain arrives, three or four times a month. Right now I mostly panic and try to finish whatever I am doing. I would rather use that window well. What has genuinely helped other people in those twenty minutes, aside from medication timing which I am already discussing with my doctor?
The thing that changed my aura window was deciding in advance rather than in the moment. When the zigzags start I am not in a good state to make decisions, so I have a written list on my phone and I just do the list.
Mine is:
The finishing-what-you-are-doing instinct is the trap. Twenty minutes of pushing through has never once made the following four hours better for me, and it often makes them worse.
The medication timing conversation with your doctor is the important one, and for what it is worth mine improved a lot when I stopped waiting to see how bad it would get.
Write it now while you feel fine. Future you is not going to invent a plan mid-aura.
The written list is smart. I am definitely not making good calls during the zigzags.
I keep mine as the first note in my notes app so it opens on one tap. Small thing, works.
Practical work one: I have a saved message template that says I am unwell and will follow up tomorrow. Writing that message during an aura used to take me ten minutes and now it takes five seconds.
Templates for the bad days are underrated generally. Mine covers work, my partner and my parents.
Note the time the aura starts, every time. Over a few months you may see a pattern in the hours or days you would not otherwise spot. Mine were disproportionately mid-morning after a late night.
Whatever else you do, do not drive. Obvious, but the temptation to get home first is real and the visual field is genuinely compromised.
@barre_chord_blues · 5mo ago
Cold on the back of the neck and dark, immediately. I used to negotiate with myself for ten minutes and lose all of them. Now I move within about thirty seconds of noticing.
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