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Guess I'm nuts after all...Psychogenic Seizures

Sat, 01/27/2007 - 09:58
Now, to those of you reading this, please do not take my title to heart. I have a bachelors in psychology and I am being very flippant in my terminology, but I mean no disrespect to anyone. Anyway, after a year of searching for an answer to my various health issues, I have been given a diagnosis of Psychogenic seizures. Now, this is a two-sided issue. On the one hand, for the last two weeks I have had these jerking spells a couple of times a day, and after being admitted to the hospital for two days of EEG video monitoring they decided the episodes were Psychogenic. As difficult as it was for me to accept that, I did, and the episodes have not occurred in the two days since I was released from the hospital. On the other hand, I don't believe that everything that I have experienced in the past year is due to mental disorder. I have had issues like phlebitis (recurrent inflammation of various veins in my arm and leg) and anemia, been diagnosed with carpal tunnel and plantar fascitis (foot problem that I believe was accompanied by nerve pain due to the type of pain and existing altered sensation in one toe), found to have nystagmus (sign of possible neurological dysfunction), and I have had neurological episodes that did not feature jerking, only this strange buzzing sensation in my head. During these times I cannot talk very well (it is difficult for me to concentrate on speaking) or move very well, and they have featured strange things like nausea, a feeling of being paralyzed in my legs, increased respiration, blah blah blah. Right now I feel like I have been kicked in the gut. I feel like all of my work toward a diagnosis has been sabatoged by the label "Psychogenic". I am afraid that no doctor will ever take me seriously again. My cognitive functioning is going downhill, but the neuropsychologist has been working with the epilepsy center and because of my education is assuming that I have the knowledge to fake all of this and actually stated that he probably couldn't test me because I would know the testing material. Nevermind that I reassured him that I didn't get to take the class on psychological evalution and testing. This is yet another low point for me, and I could really use some advice... Sam

Comments

Re: Guess I'm nuts after all...Psychogenic Seizures

Submitted by carrieb on Sat, 2007-01-27 - 14:17
Ha! Fat lady singing - that's funny. Well, I was never told they were psychogenic; honestly, I don't even know what those are, but I really don't understand these neuropsychologists and their tests. Aren't the tests subjective anyway? After reading the pages and pages of results, it seemed to me that much of it is subjective - it depends on how strictly he decides to 'grade' the test that day. Did it seem like that for anyone else?

Re: Re: Guess I'm nuts after all...Psychogenic Seizures

Submitted by slhmurphy on Sat, 2007-01-27 - 21:55
I agree that at the very least they were unprofessional at times. To come out and insinuate that I would fake test results was insulting, to say the least. And to think that they can diagnose everything on the basis of psychogenic seizures is overstepping their boundaries. I'm so tired of doctors.

Re: Re: Re: Guess I'm nuts after all...Psychogenic Seizures

Submitted by carrieb on Sat, 2007-01-27 - 22:24
Sam, After your VEEG, they said you were having these psychogenic seizures. Why was that? Did nothing happen the whole time you were there, did you have seizures but no abnormal electrical activity, or what? When I went in for testing just before my planned surgery for a week of VEEG, they took me off meds cold turkey and didn't let me sleep at all. They didn't get a seizure or even a single misfiring recorded. Needless to say, we took that as a hint that it wasn't the time for surgery, and we backed out of it. Anyhow, was it because of a period of inactivity that they think you're making them up? Also, I looked up these seizures on wikipedia. From what I understood, it's not something that's necessarily 'made up'. They're just seizures that occur for an unknown reason - not because of misfirings in the brain. It's still a real diagnosis, isn't it? Or am I not understanding correctly? Carrie

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