The two phases you detailed of "Migraines with aura" match my experience precisely. Dark spots in vision are typically the first sign at which point I have about 30 minutes before tunnel vision and blindness kick in. Then I gradually get my vision back with an equal measure of pain in my head.

Interestingly, I have literally never taken prescription migraine medication. I don't have severe ones often enough to warrant needing it. The only thing I take - and I take it at the first sign of aura - is two Excedrin. The active ingredients in Excedrin (aspirin, tylenol, caffeine) are identical to the active ingredients in Excedrin Migraine so I generally take either. It seems to lessen the severity and duration of the headache.

As a neurologist once told me - there is no medication you can take that will reduce or eliminate an aura. So to your advice that it is dangerous to do so, apparently it's not effective either. So there is no upside and apparently plenty of downside to taking vasoconstrictors during aura.

Actually, I had that stroke the first time I tried anti-migraine treatment (eletriptan). I have no medical proof that there was it was a cause though.

Before that, I was usually taking 1000mg of aspirin too.

My advice if your migraines occur in high stress times (mine did): learn auto-hypnosis or find anything to lower that stress level...