I get migraines about once a week. They aren’t as bad as migraines are classically understood to be—in fact they always start out pretty mild—but they sometimes become terrible by the evening.

While there are always various things I could do to improve such situations, I have often failed to do them promptly. Which seems pretty weird, but I suppose I am not at my most energetic and mentally functional. Also, none of the interventions I know of actually resolve migraines instantaneously, so my sense that I should for instance take painkillers is more of an intellectual one than a felt urge. And I think suffering drains my interest in upholding vague intellectual senses that I should do things. Then even if I did remember, it’s a further effort to even recall what else might be good, let alone go and find the relevant objects.

I have improved this a fair bit with a retrospectively obvious innovation: the migraine basket. It’s a diaper caddy which typically contains all things that might help with migraines, or some physical symbol of them if they don’t fit (e.g. a pick stands for playing guitar).

migraine-basket

Now if I remember at all to do anything, I am reminded of, and handed, everything. And the motion to make this happen is like ‘grab or ask for visually obvious basket’ not ‘try to remember if you put your painkillers in your bag and also where you put your bag’. I’ve had it for several months, and it seems good.