Community Forum Archive

The Epilepsy Community Forums are closed, and the information is archived. The content in this section may not be current or apply to all situations. In addition, forum questions and responses include information and content that has been generated by epilepsy community members. This content is not moderated. The information on these pages should not be substituted for medical advice from a healthcare provider. Experiences with epilepsy can vary greatly on an individual basis. Please contact your doctor or medical team if you have any questions about your situation. For more information, learn about epilepsy or visit our resources section.

Wondering if son has temporal lobe epilepsy after what he told me.

Mon, 09/02/2013 - 16:04

I'll try to make this brief.  My son is 21 and going through a difficult time with anxiety, OCD with intrusive thoughts.  etc.  He recently told me that he has ALWAYS had visual hallucinations.  I can't remember specifics on auditory hallucinations but I think they have been around for a very long time too. 

We can pinpoint these to his early childhood because one involves a neighbor's house that is no longer there.  In other words, he had the hallucination while the house was there, and years later when the house wasn't there, he remembered his hallucination of there being a field across the street.  When the house was gone and he saw the field, he thought his visual hallucination was a premonition.  He never told anyone about his visual hallucinations because he wasn't bothered by them, thought they were normal, knew they weren't real, thought he had a creative imagination.

Basically, he says that sometimes when he's looking at something the entire view will complete switch briefly to a hallucination.  Let's use the house across the street.  He was standing on our porch watching his father and friend talking.  He can remember the exact conversation they were having.  Suddenly, the house across the street was gone and there was a huge empty field across the street.  It was brief.  He thought it was weird and cool.  Never mentioned it like he never mentioned any of his hallucinations.  A few years later, the neighbor's house burned down because the neighbor knocked over a candle.  When the house was leveled and grass was planted, my son remembered that specific hallucination. 

Three years ago, he asked me if I heard my thoughts.  Apparently he has been asking his friends for years if they heard their thoughts.  They all thought in pictures.  He says he always heard sounds and his thoughts.  We can pinpoint this to early childhood too because he remembers worrying if the babysitter could hear his thoughts when he was little.  He remembers testing it by thinking things to her and she didn't respond.  But I guess three years ago he became disturbed by hearing all of this because he started having intrusive thoughts. 

The reason he told me about his life-long visual hallucinations is because he was experiencing deja vu recently.  He thought his previous visual hallucination of the house was deja vu.  He has also been having feelings of nothing being familiar---but usually when he wakes in the middle of the night and is half asleep.  Looking up deja vu is how I learned temporal lobe epilepsy. 

He has had headaches his entire life.  When he was in 4th grade, his pediatrician ordered an MRI looking for brain tumors.  It was normal. 

I have seen the blank stare multiple times since 9th grade.  I strongly believed that these are associated with anxiety and panic attacks.  I don't remember blanks stares earlier in his life though but my memory isn't as good as it used to be.

My husband and I remember at some time between 1st and 4th grade, we had to replace his TV with a smaller one because it caused some problems.  My husband, not his biological father, has a sister with full fledged epilepsy so he knew right away that my son's experience with the TV wasn't right and switched his TV. 

He recently had a concussion and his psych symptoms have gotten worse.  He may have cerebral fluid leak because clear drainage is in his one ear every morning when he wakes up.  He has an appointment with a neurosurgeon next week to initiate the diagnosis of this drainage.

My main problem is that I don't know where to go from here.  His PCP, who is a highly respected and talented internist, is treating him for his psych issues because my son does not like mental health professionals.  I feel I need to tell his PCP about this, but I think I will sound like I'm going off the deep end researching my son's symptoms.  I'm also fearful that it will be misinterpreted as mental illness without ruling out epilepsy.  My husband thinks I should tell his doctor. 

I haven't told my son.  I didn't make a big deal about what he told me about the visual hallucinations. I just reassured him.  After all, it isn't something that ever bothered him so I don't want to put fears into his mind.  It was more like "thinks that make you go hmmmm..." afterwards and I started trying to find information about it. 

Can anyone relate to my son's experiences here?  Or do I sound completely off track?   

Comments

Great, I tried to talk to my son.....

Submitted by Missy Muffet on Fri, 2013-09-06 - 15:06

In the spirit of not talking behind his back, I tried to broach the subject with my son today.

It did NOT go over well.  He is mad at me.  Told me to get a hobby.

I should have stuck with my instincts and not said anything!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

In the spirit of not talking behind his back, I tried to broach the subject with my son today.

It did NOT go over well.  He is mad at me.  Told me to get a hobby.

I should have stuck with my instincts and not said anything!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Your son might have or had

Submitted by mereloaded on Tue, 2013-09-03 - 19:45
Your son might have or had absence seizures, however the OCD, the hallucinations, both visual and auditory, and the intrusive thoughts are clear markers for schizophrenia. Anyway, see if your pcp can order an EEG. It is the only way to support your epilepsy theory. I know that your are desperately trying to keep in out of the mental professional office for fear of bad news, but I think that it is important the the intrusive thoughts get addressed because they only get worse of not treated.. i might be wrong, but II figure you consider also that possibility as it can get worse. I wish you the very best, I am a mother trying desperately to help my son too. Best wishes

Re: Your son might have or had

Submitted by 3Hours2Live on Wed, 2013-09-04 - 01:13
Hi MereLoaded, There are no "clear markers" for schizophrenia. Some practitioners will assert "clear markers", but in case histories, some of these markers turned out to be such as speaking only Polish at an airport where no one else understood Polish during that particular brief time period. The Rosenhan experiment also demonstrated the absence of "clear markers", except maybe for the Catch-22 danger of "On being sane in insane places": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosenhan_experiment Then, the subtle effects of epilepsy tend to shift MMPI scores toward excessive Paranoid Schizophrenia on the MMPI's dimensional scales (the "correction" technique is expert denial of the technique's total failure); A comparative composure of MMPI-2 profiles is illustrated in "Figure 1" (page 7 (8 in pdf#)) of "The Clinical Neuropsychologist" journal paper on "MMPI-2 profiles: Fibromyalgia Patients Compared to Epileptic and Non-Epileptic Seizure Patients" by Storzbach, et al.: http://www.cnbc.pt/jpmatos/05.%20Johnson.pdf Brain trauma also gets the newer & enlarged ranking of "Faking Bad" on the newer versions of the MMPI-II: http://www.deflaw.com/articles/the-mmpi-ii---faking-bad-scale-and-potential-use-in-georgia-workers-compensation-claims versus http://brainandspine.titololawoffice.com/2009/10/articles/articles-1/an-autopsy-on-the-fake-bad-scale-the-political-and-scientific-ramifications-of-the-methodology-and-application-of-the-fake-bad-scale-against-persons-with-brain-impairment/ Books-dot-google often shows near complete sections involving epilepsy in the book "Distinguishing Psychological From Organic Disorders" by Taylor: http://books.google.com/books?id=0xM77_FOjS8C&pg=PT198&lpg=PT198&dq=schizophrenia+%22doggedly+maintained%22&source=bl&ots=y_z0FdB_CF&sig=qTlahqsg5cpFoZimO5-ucSgdVXE&hl=en&sa=X&ei=dr8mUtbKH6nViwKnrYCAAQ&ved=0CCwQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=schizophrenia%20%22doggedly%20maintained%22&f=false or, for temporal lobes, pp. 121-128, of: http://books.google.com/books?id=nEPw3WvJlGAC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Robert+l+Taylor&hl=en&sa=X&ei=k6AmUpDZFIXmiwKKkIDgBw&ved=0CDsQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=thirtieth%20time&f=false or, for "intrusive": http://books.google.com/books?id=0xM77_FOjS8C&printsec=frontcover&dq=Robert+l+Taylor&hl=en&sa=X&ei=k6AmUpDZFIXmiwKKkIDgBw&ved=0CDUQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=voices%20intrusive&f=false Another practical problem with mental health as a science, is that, while epilepsy has a physical basis, mental disorders are nothing but constructs, often only statistical constructs given labels that are erroneously regarded as having a material physical existence which requires treatment by an "expert". Unfortunately, such an expert has no distinction from being a witch-doctor, as the world famous E. Fuller Torrey clarified in his book "Mind Game: Witch Doctors And Psychiatrists", but retreated into association laurels for schizophrenia marketing by making the constructs into biology or else!!! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._Fuller_Torrey Tadzio P.S.: As if the "Gold Standard EEG" loophole isn't bad enough, it is "almost certain that these were sequel to a simple partial temporal lobe epileptic seizure.... ....The findings of Devinsky et al. (1989), showing HOW SMALL A PROPORTION of simple partial seizures were detected by standard scalp EEG electrodes." From "Fits and Faints" by Stephenson (1991),page 131. Subdural Electrodes work somewhat better, but..... http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2927677

Sign Up for Emails

Stay up to date with the latest epilepsy news, stories from the community, and more.