How many times have I finally found a comfortable position in which to sleep only to be wakened by the pain in my face? Way too many to count.

I had a very restless night last night and slept in later than normal. upon waking, I still have normal reactions such as shoving my bangs from my forehead and yawning. The pain startles me into a wide-awake state quickly.

A simple yawn results in the nerve being stretched taunt on my forehead running from my right eye to my hairline. If I’m lucky that will be the only pain I wake up to. The old habit of rubbing my hand up my forehead to move my bangs can cause the nerve to have a ripple effect in that it convulses.

The convulsions are not only extremely painful, but they are also scary and cause great anxiety for me. The episodes also made my PTSD worse. I have had two very powerful convulsive episodes that I literally screamed my way thru. I had never experienced such pain and it seemed to go on forever. Because of these episodes and shorter ones, I am careful not to disturb the nerve by rubbing across it. Shoving my bangs out of my face is one of the actions I try to avoid.

I sleep on my right side. I’ve tried to change my sleeping habit but I always end up in that position. This means my head sometimes get pressed into my pillow while sleeping and who needs an alarm when the pain serves as such?

I’ve tried sleeping on my left side but the bone biopsy I had two years ago hurts. I find that odd and need to remember to question my doctor about it. I guess our bones do not like people messing with them. And, although it doesn’t need to be part of my weather forecast team – I have arthritis and previous injuries for that – it insists on being just that. I have a couple of friends who can weather forecast as well. It’s become the running joke – we visit and say “the weather must be changing” because who likes to constantly complain? Not me!

The short of the long today is today will be another normal day for me. No scrubbing the forehead when I shower. Try not to yawn and heaven forbid don’t sneeze! Speak minimally and if at all possible hold smiling to a minimum.

I’m not looking for sympathy. That is not my reason for posting. My posts about Trigeminal Neuralgia are to educate and to hopefully reach others suffering from this rare disease; to let them know they are not alone. However, prayers are welcome.

Many thanks for reading this far and following along. I hope it opened your eyes a little in that we shouldn’t judge others. Just maybe, like me, they look healthy because our pain is undetectable.

I hope you stay tuned. My blog will be changing a bit as my husband and I just purchased an RV (reveal coming) have plans to travel more often and I am hoping to document those travels here. I will still have the occasional book review and giveaways. I’ll just be adding more personal content.