My first migraine happened in high school, when we were supposed to write out the words to the Star Spangled Banner for some reason.

I started writing, and then noticed that the letters I was drawing on the notebook paper looked nothing like the alphabet as I knew it, and there was a weird spiky arc showing up in my field of vision, and then a crushing headache began and I’m not sure what happened next but my mom showed up at school and took me home, where I suffered the worst headache I’d ever had. I had to be in a totally dark room for most of the day because any light was incredibly painful.

It sucked, mightily.