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epilepsy and "rage episodes"
Sat, 01/08/2005 - 16:37Comments
RE: epilepsy and "rage episodes"
Submitted by LeeMc on Sat, 2005-01-08 - 16:37
Rage and anger - is it because of epilepsy or meds or mood disorder or depression or hormones or other things in my life that I have not fully faced and deldt with? Damned if I know but I know I have always felt it to one degree or the other. Thanks for asking the question of whether there is a connection or not. I am planning a re-eval in the future and this gives me one more thing to find out about!
As kids my brother and I used to fight a lot - we were competing for attention. As a teen I am sure that hormones had a lot to do with it - along with feelings of not being good enough, feeling fat, not feeling wanted and not feeling loved as much as I seemed to need. As a young adult those issues remained. I acted out and did things that I was later very ashamed of. Pile the guilt on top of all the other emotions that were taking place and it was the perfect recipe for rage and self-doubt. That, of course, is when I had the accident that eventually lead to the seizures and the diagnosis of aquired epilepsy. The long struggle and frustration to discover what was wrong and why lead to more acting out and more guilt and deeper self-doubt and greater rage.
My first real rage (not directed at myself as depression or in a bottle) was at the neuro who told me to be satisfied to get my seizures under control because he had no desire to find out why I was having them. I blew up and he walked out on me. I suffered an emotional breakdown leaving me heaving huge sobs and crying like I would never stop. My poor husband had to witness all this and wonder if he would be my next target. An intern remained and waited for me to calm down. Then he asked me what a seizure felt like. Wow.....He listened and he wanted to know!!! He stuck it out and we found out why I was having the seizures and what the probable cause was. I have never had a rage of that intensity since but I do still have them and it is my husband who catches the brunt of them.
Anger is an emotion I know well. Sometimes I don't even know why. I will wake up from a dream or I will be cleaning house or driving to work and find myself rehearsing an arguement with someone who isn't there (and who I won't see that day anyway) over something that is past history, rediculous or not really even important. It just seems that I need to have an arguement with somebody over something. When I recognise that happening I can sometimes scream and yell and relieve some tension on the spot. I am on guard the rest of the day. Some days that is enough - other days it just delays the inevidable.
The inevidable is a totally irrational and absolutely unnecessary shouting match with (or at) my husband. I do recognise that it is happening - but never until after it has started. I can hear myself and I even scare myself. I try to quit but sometimes he is on the defense (he has had to live with this for 30 years) and so it doesn't always end when I want to quit. I feel myself torn in two ways - the one that wants to go and hide under the bed until the ugliness is gone and the one that feels the need to fight back. Nobody wins either way and there is never a resolution because there was never a rational reason for it to begin in the first place.
I think we both know what has happened when it is over and we let it be over and things get normal again. (Normal? How can that be normal?) We generally go on as if it didn't happen.....but I do hurt inside that it happened and I know that all of the apologies in the world won't change that it did. I feel a strain for a while but it is sadness rather then anger or guilt. Our kids grew up watching this scene and hearing my outbursts and it did affect them. Then I couldn't recognise it happening and I couldn't take myself out of it........
We don't bank the unfinished business for later........I think we have learned that what was happening wasn't what it was about although neither of us knows what it is about. We are getting better at avoiding it or getting out of it when it occures.
I note in my journal whether it was a depression day, an irratable day, a short fuse day or a no fuse day or a tired day or a busy day or whatever. Started doing this when I went on HRT because the Doc thought maybe the mood swings had something to do with hormone levels and maybe we could figure out which hormones they were related to - well it turns out that they are hormone related to some extent but they are also related to sleep, to food, to energy and to the continued emotional hangover from years before.........in other words - I don't know if there is a single trigger or not. It has been several weeks now since there has been a rage but there have been many tense times - alone and with my husband.
Alone I will try the shouting and screaming thing. With my husband I will try to just shut up and refuse to participate. Sometimes that works......sometimes I just keep feeling it going on inside of me even if he isn't participating either. Yes I have had counciling and I work a 12 step program so I still have to wonder where the anger keeps coming from and why. We'd all like to know!
Best to you all..............................Lee
Rage and anger - is it because of epilepsy or meds or mood disorder or depression or hormones or other things in my life that I have not fully faced and deldt with? Damned if I know but I know I have always felt it to one degree or the other. Thanks for asking the question of whether there is a connection or not. I am planning a re-eval in the future and this gives me one more thing to find out about!
As kids my brother and I used to fight a lot - we were competing for attention. As a teen I am sure that hormones had a lot to do with it - along with feelings of not being good enough, feeling fat, not feeling wanted and not feeling loved as much as I seemed to need. As a young adult those issues remained. I acted out and did things that I was later very ashamed of. Pile the guilt on top of all the other emotions that were taking place and it was the perfect recipe for rage and self-doubt. That, of course, is when I had the accident that eventually lead to the seizures and the diagnosis of aquired epilepsy. The long struggle and frustration to discover what was wrong and why lead to more acting out and more guilt and deeper self-doubt and greater rage.
My first real rage (not directed at myself as depression or in a bottle) was at the neuro who told me to be satisfied to get my seizures under control because he had no desire to find out why I was having them. I blew up and he walked out on me. I suffered an emotional breakdown leaving me heaving huge sobs and crying like I would never stop. My poor husband had to witness all this and wonder if he would be my next target. An intern remained and waited for me to calm down. Then he asked me what a seizure felt like. Wow.....He listened and he wanted to know!!! He stuck it out and we found out why I was having the seizures and what the probable cause was. I have never had a rage of that intensity since but I do still have them and it is my husband who catches the brunt of them.
Anger is an emotion I know well. Sometimes I don't even know why. I will wake up from a dream or I will be cleaning house or driving to work and find myself rehearsing an arguement with someone who isn't there (and who I won't see that day anyway) over something that is past history, rediculous or not really even important. It just seems that I need to have an arguement with somebody over something. When I recognise that happening I can sometimes scream and yell and relieve some tension on the spot. I am on guard the rest of the day. Some days that is enough - other days it just delays the inevidable.
The inevidable is a totally irrational and absolutely unnecessary shouting match with (or at) my husband. I do recognise that it is happening - but never until after it has started. I can hear myself and I even scare myself. I try to quit but sometimes he is on the defense (he has had to live with this for 30 years) and so it doesn't always end when I want to quit. I feel myself torn in two ways - the one that wants to go and hide under the bed until the ugliness is gone and the one that feels the need to fight back. Nobody wins either way and there is never a resolution because there was never a rational reason for it to begin in the first place.
I think we both know what has happened when it is over and we let it be over and things get normal again. (Normal? How can that be normal?) We generally go on as if it didn't happen.....but I do hurt inside that it happened and I know that all of the apologies in the world won't change that it did. I feel a strain for a while but it is sadness rather then anger or guilt. Our kids grew up watching this scene and hearing my outbursts and it did affect them. Then I couldn't recognise it happening and I couldn't take myself out of it........
We don't bank the unfinished business for later........I think we have learned that what was happening wasn't what it was about although neither of us knows what it is about. We are getting better at avoiding it or getting out of it when it occures.
I note in my journal whether it was a depression day, an irratable day, a short fuse day or a no fuse day or a tired day or a busy day or whatever. Started doing this when I went on HRT because the Doc thought maybe the mood swings had something to do with hormone levels and maybe we could figure out which hormones they were related to - well it turns out that they are hormone related to some extent but they are also related to sleep, to food, to energy and to the continued emotional hangover from years before.........in other words - I don't know if there is a single trigger or not. It has been several weeks now since there has been a rage but there have been many tense times - alone and with my husband.
Alone I will try the shouting and screaming thing. With my husband I will try to just shut up and refuse to participate. Sometimes that works......sometimes I just keep feeling it going on inside of me even if he isn't participating either. Yes I have had counciling and I work a 12 step program so I still have to wonder where the anger keeps coming from and why. We'd all like to know!
Best to you all..............................Lee
RE: epilepsy and "rage episodes"
Submitted by MICHAEL on Wed, 2005-01-05 - 16:43
HI-- MY NAME IS MIKE AND I HAVE BEEN HAVING SEIZURES FOR ABOUT 24 YRS AND EVERY ONCE IN AWHILE I GO IN A RAGE---THE SLIGHTEST THING WILL START IT---BUT IT FEELS LIKE I CAN KILL SOMEONE I HAVE ACTUALLY HIT MYSELF IN THE HEAD WITH A COFFEE MUG TO STOP IT SO I WOULD NOT HURT MY CHILDREN IT IS VERY SCARY I HAVE NEVER HURT ANYONE DURING IT BUT REALLYU FEEL LIKE I COULD I HAVE BEEN ON TEGRETOL FOR ABOUT 8 YRS NOW AND I DON'T THINK IT COULD BE THE CAUSE AND NEVER CONSIDERD IT TO BE EPILEPSY UNTIL I JUST READ THIS -------------