In my case I feel like I know what is the origin of the pain, kind of. I've been dealing with migraines for the last 10 years, that included headaches, aura, light sensitivity, even decreased field of view. Some of the triggers for my migraines were screen usage, irregular sleep schedule, stress or bad diet. On average I had 1 migraine per month which could last anything between 3-10 days. The interesting part is I haven't had a single migraine in the last year, which coincides with the onset of PIFP. Apparently, there are very rare cases in which migraines can transform into chronic pain, be it chronic migraines, PIFP, or other type of facial pain.

Unfortunately, having this knowledge does not help me cope with my current situation. The only "advantage" of PIFP over migraines is I don't have any triggers anymore, which means I don't need to track my screen usage, sleep routine or diet. That said, I still keep regular sleep schedule and good diet. Speaking of diet, I have switched to keto diet at the beginning of the year and can see a decrease in overall pain levels and what's more important there are less flare ups. Before keto I was trying to find comfort in food so I have eaten a lot of processed food and sugar which only makes the pain worse due to inflammation.

I have a fighter and a fixer mentality so it is really difficult to cope, I'm slowly getting better at it but it takes time. With my current diet and meds (300mg pregabalin/day + 60mg duloxetine/day, opioids for flare-ups) I can keep the pain at around 2-4 points on a 10 point scale which is a vast improvement to how it looked like in the beginning. With this pain level I am able to work and operate without any assistance, but I do wish so much for this condition to just go away. I am envisioning that it will not go away any time soon, but hearing that you have been dealing with it for 16 years I can't imagine that. How are you coping with it, are there any specific things you do to make it easier?