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My Most Comprehensive Migraine Diary

migraine· stationery

8 Aug
A photo of my most comprehensive migraine diary. An A5 weekly planner is opened to show one week with highlighted sections, graphs and stickers to signify various potential migraine influences. Also on the desk are various pens and highlighters, a pencil case and a coffee mug.

At the beginning of 2021 I began my most comprehensive migraine diary. I took into account the trial and error from my first two attempts (here and here). And although I loved the flexibility of the bullet-journal method in those, I wasn’t prepared to draw out weekly layouts any more than I had to.

And so, I purchased an Inamio planner as a basis for tracking. (The 2021 edition is no longer available, but a 2022-2023 edition is linked below.)

I chose it for several reasons:

  1. A 24 hour day.
  2. Grid paper.
  3. Additional space along the bottom and one side.
  4. Lots of little extras that I like, such as a pocket in the back cover, a pen loop, two bookmark ribbons, and an elastic closure.

I used it for six months, from January to June of 2021. After that, I really couldn’t continue just for practical reasons. But the practice of such comprehensive documentation was incredibly insightful, sometimes even mindful. It gave me a sense of taking control over my migraine which was empowering.

What I Documented

  1. Migraine, time and severity of symptoms and attacks (yellow highlighter)
  2. Sleep (grey highlighter and top mini bar chart))
  3. Anxiety, none in this week, yay! (blue highlighter)
  4. Medications and treatments (noted at the time)
  5. Weather (stickers)
  6. Moon phases (stickers)
  7. Barometric pressure (top line graph)
  8. Temperature (bottom line graph)
  9. Wind speed (mini line graph)
  10. Hydration (daily bar chart)
  11. Activity (daily bar chart)
  12. Caffeine intake (stickers)
  13. Alcohol intake, none in this week, but I learned to draw a little wine glass 🙂
  14. Stress, Energy and Mood: level 1-3 (mini line graphs)

(I had hoped to document humidity levels too but couldn’t find a reliable way to do it.)

Additionally, in the mini month at the top of the left margin I kept track of the number of migraine days/month which is important for diagnostic purposes.

Now, I’m so proud of this dataset I’ve created. I learned a lot about what was important to track for my symptoms and what wasn’t. For example, although it’s important to stay hydrated in general, for me drinking eight glasses of water a day didn’t seem to make much difference. But afternoon naps are quite beneficial, if only for twenty minutes. Which I’m very happy about.

I still refer back to this migraine diary from time to time, when my symptoms seem to be changing, or I’m discouraged with my current tracking. And since I have the diary as a template, I’m confident I could repeat this exercise at another time, maybe just for a few weeks, or a month. To make sure I’m still documenting things that matter.

Stationery in the photo

  • Planner
  • Tombow dual-brush pens (N89 and N75)
  • Mildliner (warm tones, yellow)
  • Gel pen
  • Pencil case (received as a gift, similar here)

P.S. I curated a variety of stickers, apps, and websites to create this migraine diary. I’ll outline all of them in a future post with a link back to this one for reference.

tags: migraine · stationery
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All lovely images in these posts are created by Andrea Hunter, unless otherwise attributed, and may not be used without permission.

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