Computer Use for Light Sensitive Migraines

I have a passion for modifying things to fit my spoonie needs. & I don’t know..... It’s just exciting to me. I feel like it increases independence and lowers the number of things you’re unable to do.

Today I’m going to be sharing how to modify your computer for light sensitive migraines.I have to say this was one of the best modifications I made, It honestly makes me really happy to be able to use the computer even when I have a migraine because then I don’t have to stare at the ceiling thinking to myself 
“Oh my gosh it hurts, Oh my gosh it hurts, Oh my gosh it hurts, Make it stop, Make it stop ,Make it stop” 

Which to be honest with you I truly believe makes It worse/prolongs migraines since stress is a big trigger for all migrainuers  I feel like being able to distract yourself can help with a migraine, depending on the severity/cause. I first started trying to use the narrator on my laptop as well as a pair of sunglasses, because every time I had a migraine it felt like Lenovo was trying to burn my eyes out of my sockets  but then I came across the dreaded moment I’d have to look at the screen to respond to someone, change web pages ect...No amount of lowering the brightness or black shaded sunglasses could help me.   Then I’d end up sitting in my bed feeling like an outsider and a slave to my illness.

One day I decided to mess around with the “Ease of Access” section. (I have windows 8 OS I think >_>…. ..I'm pretty sure all computers have accessibility options)  I looked at the “High contrast” section and I found I could actually make my computer display mostly  black backgrounds,  I chose purple as my text colour because it’s not as bright as white .  Also purple is pretty rad.

For my browser I have chrome & downloaded the application “Dark Reader”.     I also use messenger to text my friends instead of using phone numbers because switching back and forth when you have chronic vestibular migraines or regular chronic migraines will annoy both you and your friends. You can use a texting/calling website or app if you’d like instead but I prefer messenger because of video chat (when you’re a spoonie it’s a great alternative method of socialization) while my phone did have colour inversion the brightness was just too high it would still show  large areas of white.What did help was downloading “Night Owl”  It works like a charm, on occasion I've even used my phone in the dark.

But back to dark reader....I really like dark reader because you can also make colours less vibrant with the grayscale option, so that when dark and light shades are adjacent it is less offensive to your eyes.  Although a couple things occasionally are inverted, most things show up with normal colours.It may look like my computer belongs to Dracula, but I’m a happy girl because now my health rarely ever gets in the way of using the computer anymore. I even started using dark coloured indie backgrounds so I didn’t have to give up having a cute back drop on my computer.       

 vvv

(NOT MY PICTURE)

You may or may not run across the problem of the new tab not completely inverting so I suggest that you change your homepage to the actual google website and not the personalized New tab page. You can also use the bookmarks bar to for a new tab button instead.

Google's default new tab personalized landing page.

The actual google website.+ Bookmark bar button for opening a new tab


I hope this helps! If your a migrainuer who has fatigue & stamina problems as well and is forced to work from home or go to online school hopefully this makes a big difference! #IWishIKnewThisBackThen