Amber & Hallucicopters & Vulnerable Vultures

I have had a terrible, terrible TMJ-triggered headache since I sat down on the D train uptown after work on Friday evening. By the time I got to 125th Street to change to the A, I was seeing floaters and experiencing phonophobia. And then, when I got off the train in the 175th Street Station and took a breath of that fresh east side exit stairwell, the nausea began. Friday night and Saturday were pretty much a blur of trying to nap, alternating cold and hot compresses, jaw clenching remedy, lion pose and chest stretches. But then, last night at 2 am, I was awoken by the sound of helicopters right outside my window and a searchlight flooding in my window.


Now, it's completely true that, over the course of the weekend, my system was treated to a cocktail of 1 part anti-spasm Cyclobenzaprine, several parts muscle-relaxant, anti-spasticity aid Zanaflex, one part anti-inflammatory Diclofenac, and a dash of just about every over-the-counter pain pill that didn't contraindicate the blend and a spritz of peppermint oil for a wholistic flavor. And, its absolutely true that Wikipedia claims that...

Tizanidine use has been associated with hallucinations. Visual hallucinations and delusions have been reported in 5 of 170 patients (3%) in two North American controlled clinical studies.

But that's totally lacking citation. And, I confirmed the reality of the helicopter, which made rounds from 2 am until about 8, with tweets from both GoGetter122 and 5starr_Chick (you really have to scroll down; 5starr_Chick in particular is a tweety little bird). And there was this unanswered question on Yahoo! Answers, providing no explanation but assuring me that I wasn't imagining a helicopter in some drastic self-punishing hallucination. After all, what is worse for a migraine than a loud helicopter and a search light?

Really, the side effects I most worry about from the fistfulls of pills I have been popping (which are just now seeming like maybe they are starting to work a little bit, maybe? knock wood very quietly? please?) are vulture extinction, rabies, disruption to Zoroastrian Parsi cultural practices, and the ruin of Wisconsin brunch. No, really I swear I'm only a little doped right now and the persistent pain is pretty grounding. Wikipedia, my frenemy, tells me...

Use of diclofenac in animals has been reported to have led to a sharp decline in the vulture population in the Indian subcontinent, 95% decline in 2004, 99.9% decline as of 2008. The mechanism is probably renal failure, a known side-effect of diclofenac. Vultures eat the carcasses of livestock that have been administered veterinary diclofenac, and are poisoned by the accumulated chemical. At a meeting of the National Wildlife Board in March 2005, the Government of India announced that it intended to phase out the veterinary use of diclofenac.... "The loss of tens of millions of vultures over the last decade has had major ecological consequences across the Indian subcontinent that pose a potential threat to human health. In many places, populations of feral dogs... have increased sharply from the disappearance of Gyps vultures as the main scavenger of wild and domestic ungulate carcasses. Associated with the rise in dog numbers is an increased risk of rabies" and casualties of almost 50,000 people.

The loss of vultures has had a social impact on the Indian Zoroastrian Parsi community, who traditionally use vultures to dispose of human corpses in Towers of Silence, but are now compelled to seek alternate methods of disposal.

Diclofenac was shown also to cause harm to freshwater fish species such as rainbow trout.

See how horrible my headache is?

I'm sorry, Mr. Vulture. I feel really bad about putting my head pain first.