'I experience daily migraines. This is the scary symptom no one talks about.'

*Lucy remembers the first time she had a migraine.

"It felt like the world was too much," she tells Mamamia. Her head felt fuzzy, confused and painful. She was very young at the time, and thought these symptoms along with nausea, vomiting and dizziness, were caused by a simple headache.

But it was far more than just a headache. It was a migraine — a debilitating and chronic condition that affects 4.9 million Australians. 71 per cent of sufferers are female. 

It wasn't until her mid-20s that Lucy was given the proper diagnosis, around the same time as her symptoms became more serious. Over 12 months she had tracked her health in a diary, recording how frequent the attacks were, scaling the severity and any triggers if she could identify them.

Migraines often coincide with other health conditions too. For Lucy, this includes gynaecological issues like ruptured cysts, endometriosis and poor mental health. Big life events and stress can make it worse, and currently, Lucy's migraines are a lot more frequent than they used to be — they're daily.

"If the migraine is severe, it impacts my quality of life completely. I can't work, I can't socialise or I have to do it less often, I'm not contributing to domestic chores in our household with my long-term partner. My partner, he has to take on so much, but he really is such a godsend," she notes.

"I think migraines really are like a hidden disability."

Watch: 5 things to know about migraines. Post continues below.

When a migraine is bad, she can't cook. She has a lack of privacy too, her partner often having to help her with basic functions that she can't do herself amid the height of the pain.

A lot of migraine sufferers also struggle to have a concept of danger when in the midst of an attack. The part of the brain that controls risk taking and judgement is impaired, and it can lead to incidents. Fortunately for Lucy, her accidents have been minor. 

"Once I was trying to prep for dinner while having a migraine and I just shouldn't have bothered with the meal prep. I wasn't focusing, the pain was blinding, and I cut myself with a mandolin and had to go to the hospital," she says.

"Now I work around it by having simpler meals, or accepting that some days a takeaway dinner is all I can manage and I need to be okay with that. There's a lot of self-acceptance necessary to cope through it."

A recent study from women's healthcare company Organon surveyed 1,000 Aussie women who experience chronic migraines. They found that overall migraine attacks are still taking too long to be controlled, with women revealing it can take up to eight hours to manage symptoms.

Managing Director of Organon ANZ, Nirelle Tolstoshev, tells Mamamia that more awareness and support is needed.

"We know that women are twice as likely to be affected by migraine than men — and like other conditions that are more prevalent in women — remains poorly understood and highly stigmatised.

"We're encouraged by the progress in broader access to treatments in Australia, but what is clear from recent findings is that more work needs to be done to increase awareness and understanding of healthcare issues specific to women including migraine."

Many women who experience migraines say they've faced medical gaslighting, when a health professional dismisses or trivialises their symptoms. It occurs across the board for a range of medical conditions, many often chronic pain related. 

Now it feels as though migraines are yet another way women are being gaslighted. 

Elizabeth Seng is a clinical psychologist whose research is focused on improving management of chronic migraine.

Speaking to Well and Good, she noted that migraines are often not taken seriously as there isn't a foolproof test a medical professional can do to simply diagnose chronic migraines. It's more complex than that. 

"You might say, 'Gosh, I have this terrible headache,' and a friend might say, 'Oh, me too,' to which you say, 'Mine is a migraine,' and they reply, 'Oh, I know, me too,'" said Dr Seng. "The problem is that the word 'migraine' has been co-opted by the broader culture to just mean a really bad headache. And if everyone gets bad headaches on occasion, suddenly migraine isn't a valid condition so much as merely a common inconvenience."

As the American Migraine Foundation notes, it's just as important for patients to know how to advocate for themselves as it is for medical professionals to listen to their patients and fully consider their symptoms.

For Lucy, she has chosen to keep her identity anonymous for this article, because she fears retribution and judgement from an employer if they were to read about her health.

It's a reality so many with chronic health conditions can relate to — feeling misunderstood and quite isolated.

"It can be exhausting. I have to divide my treatment into medical and non-medical in terms of management and treatment, as a full-circle approach tends to work best for me. I just want those who are in a similar position to know they're not alone, and that they don't have to suffer in silence."

To those who have previously told Lucy that her condition is "just a headache" and to "just take some aspirin"  — she wants them to know this.

"It's something that is still really misunderstood, and there's so much stigma there. I know now that I have to advocate for myself. Medical gaslighting is definitely real. Now I'm determined to get access to the treatment I need  and advocate for myself  — I know my body and I will fight to be taken seriously."

*Lucy's identity is known to Mamamia, she has changed her name for privacy reasons. 

Feature Image: Canva.