On one of the most memorable days of my life, I walked into a doctor’s office with an incipient migraine and walked out half an hour later pain-free. It was the early ’90s, and I’d been suffering from the headaches—often accompanied by nausea and vomiting, occasionally somewhat eased by ibuprofen—since the age of 14. I can’t recall why on that day I decided to request an appointment, but I can still see the doctor fumbling with the wrapping of a cartridge encasing a hypodermic needle filled with a new drug. She got migraines, too, she’d told me, so when she placed the cartridge on my arm and pressed the button delivering the shot, we both exhibited the curious anticipation of experimenters, wondering if something miraculous was in the offing.

It was. Within five minutes, the nagging throb

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