Traci Wilkerson Steckel, the founder of Traci’s Paws, is back after taking a more passive role in the nonprofit due to her struggle with migraines.
Steckel started Traci’s Paws in 2013. She was inspired by her Texas childhood, when she said she was always taking in unwanted animals. That didn’t stop when Steckel grew up. As a teacher, she took in plenty of class pets too, but didn’t feel she was doing right by them.
She considered starting her own venture, but talked to shelters and rescues and heard they needed help with food, volunteers and the business side of things. So Traci’s Paws was born.
But Steckel had to take a step back from her nonprofit passion project due to migraines. After dealing with them for almost 30 years, she had reached a tipping point, but luckily, she found a medication that worked for her.
“My life is much happier now because I’m having so many fewer days with migraines,” Steckel said.
There’s much more to Steckel than her battle with migraine disease and Traci’s Paws, though. She is the founder and CEO of her own firm, Wilkerson Consulting Agency. She was a teacher for almost eight years and is an ally for the LGBTQ community, participating in protests and advocating for others.
She’s also quite the jazz enthusiast and a musician herself. Unfortunately for Steckel, her migraines barred her from playing her baritone saxophone. But now that Steckel has found some relief, she is back to playing her sax and is especially happy at the chance to make music again.
Steckel has found some respite from migraines, but only after she became her own health care advocate, she said. Migraines aren’t merely headaches; for Steckel, they were debilitating. She tried to persevere as much as possible, but she said, “There are a lot of days that are lost because sometimes you just cannot function.”
The neurological disease causes headaches, but also nausea and vomiting. According to Dr. Jessica Ailani, director of the MedStar Georgetown Headache Center, migraine disease is essentially having a sensitive brain that can be easily irritated by scent, light and sound.
Steckel herself said she is sensitive to smells — even a nice-smelling perfume can trigger a migraine for her. And despite being a seasoned vet when it comes to migraines, she eventually had to press pause on her nonprofit and community involvement.
“You have to put a hold, you know, kind of slam the brakes. It’s not fun, because life is still spinning around on the outside,” she said. “But you kind of feel like the world’s kind of stopped because you’re in so much pain, you really can’t function, and a lot of times you do it anyway, but there are times when you just can’t.”
Ailani said it’s common for people who suffer from migraines to push through life. But pushing through the pain can come at a cost, she said.
“There’s this burden that they carry from pushing through. They get through work, but then they’re not really being there for friends and family. So it’s extremely isolating,” Ailani said.
Steckel believes encouraging casual migraine conversations and normalizing the disease is key in spreading awareness. To both Steckel and Ailani, it’s important to be your own healthcare advocate and talk about the disease with friends, family and health care providers.
“What I would say to encourage you is, you know, find that right provider. Search for that right treatment. It is not instantaneous,” Ailani said. “It’s going to take time, but it’s worth it in the end.”
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