I’ve never had a headache that wasn’t agonizing pain. If I don’t take medicine, I get completely dysfunctional, hide in a room with no lights or noise, and stim like crazy until I throw up around ~6 hours into it. About 15 mins after throwing up, the pain subsides, and I get amazing sleep. I have never had a headache that wasn’t like this. The only medicines that work are ibuprofen (so I have that with me literally everywhere I go because these headaches are truly traumatizing) or if they’re really bad and go to the hospital, an injection of an NSAID, benadryl, and diazepam.
Yet, I hear people say they have a headache and are still out about doing things. For example, I specifically remember my middle school bus driver yelling at a student, “Not today, Jiovani! I’ve got a headache!” How in the world was she able to drive a loud school bus in the sun and yell at the same time with a headache??
I’m wondering if this is an autism thing because of the overstimulation and stimming, or if that’s just how I handle the stress of a headache because I’m autistic. Does anyone else have similar experiences or can function with a headache?
Yeah that looks beyond anything I’ve heard of hypersensitivity and looks a lot closer to what I experienced when I got cluster headaches. You really should talk to a physician about that. I’m not autistic, so I can’t say what headaches will normally be like for y’all, but none of the autistic people in my life have headaches like that.
Normal headaches for me are a dull ache or throb in my brain. I haven’t had a cluster headache in like 15 years but I still do get migraines which are similar and both come with over sensitivity to light and sound. I’m able to power through migraines when needed, but cluster headaches were worse and just knocked me on my ass for as long as it took