Yesterday I had an episode where my vision was totally distorted. At first, my central vision was blurred and I could see flashing lights. Then over time the distortion and the flashing lights moved towards my peripheral vision, leaving my central vision fine. Two visits to the hospital later and I was diagnosed with visual migraine. It’s the same visual distortions experienced by some migraine sufferers, but without the headache. Possible triggers include:
- Caffeine
- Cheese
- Dehydration
- Stress
A life without diet coke and cheese is no life! 
Now I know I’ve not had a stroke and I don’t have a brain tumor, I’m going to look for the positive in this. Next time it happens I shall play some mp3s on my phone and pretent to be in a disco until it passes.
Cheers
Tim…
Migraine triggers are different for everyone. One of my friend’s trigger was popcorn! Try removing the well known, possible triggers from your diet, then add them back in slowly, one at a time, to see if it actually triggers the aura. I’d skip the stress one. Best to just keep that one out.
If you drink Diet Coke a lot, keep in mind that the aspartame in the drink might be the trigger, and not the caffeine. Aspartame is a migraine (with aura, so I know what you’re experiencing) trigger for me, so I avoid it completely (not easy, when even sugar-full gum has aspartame in it).
There’s also a link between the auras and a (small, fixable) heart defect in some people. If you have the time and insurance coverage, it’ll be worth seeing if that’s actually your problem. Especially since you don’t have the jackhammer headache with the auras.
I’ve found sleeping off the auras and headache work best for me. Sometimes that’s not possible, so a dark, quiet room is best. Mostly because the aura is the worst part of the event for me. Loosing one’s vision, even temporarily, is a huge reminder of the fraility of life (especially to those of us who may think we’re immortal), and to keep healthy.
There are many sites to help you with your aura. Good luck!
Thanks for the tips.
Cheers
Tim…
It’s good article, I think. In addition, migraine is an illness in the part of head, but headache is not real migraine. There are some symptoms for migraine, as follows;
- only a right or left part of head feels painful
- the pain appears about 3-72 hours alternatingly
- the pain runs in rhythm with heartbeat
- the pain is more tortured if body is moved
- it feels queasy or wants to vomit
- noise or light is disturbing
Nevertheless, the sufferer may not get all of those symptoms, probably first and second symptoms. Actually, disturbance is in one not only part of head, but also in the whole head; right and left part. One side is still under minimum tolerance threshold, but another one is more than the similar threshold. The area having more minimum tolerance threshold or less durability usually gets pain constantly. If it is not healed immediately, the condition will be serious in a long term. It is in accordance with pennasia
I just had this happen to me for the first time today. I get migraines often, that range from waking me with the pounding that depends on which way I turn my head as to how severe my pounding is, or ones that affect my sensitivity to light and make me nauseated and want to curl up in a dark hole. For the first time ever, today, I was sitting doing homework and suddenly something showed up in the middle of both eyes vision. It was like looking at a spasm of electricity, it kept changing and was disorienting. I was scared as hell, but as I sat I noticed it changed and moved toward the outer part of my eye. It took the better part of 10 min for the vision to recover, but then my eyes ached all day.
A friend told me she gets the visual migraines when pregnant and referred me to this site. Thanks for the information.
I just had one for the first time today too. It was exactly like JulieAnn described, except that I was studying for a test- maybe schoolwork is to blame! ;D I love your suggestion of listening to music and pretending to be in a disco til it passes- thanks for the laugh (and info)!