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Too complicated case, really lost

Sun, 03/27/2016 - 13:46
Hi, My name is George, I was diagnosed with Juvenile Myclonic Epilepsy when I was 10 years old. At that time I used to have absence seizures that would last for up to 6 seconds. It got better with Epilim but did not fully disappear. When I was about 23 years old I started having another type of Seizures which is being unable to concentrate for a very long time, I become clumsy, I would drop things which I am holding, and mostly unable to have a normal conversation without sounding very drunk or sleepy. It gets worse if I am having a hangover. it doesn't happen everyday but it happens too much and it lasts for more than 8 hours sometimes. All my life I used to have such bad marks in school and I never done well at school, university or even Work. I keep getting distracted way too often that I can never achieve something. I still managed to graduate from university with computer science degree that took me 5 years instead of 3, and then did my masters degree which took me 2 years instead of one, tried working but I was fired since I was too slow and couldn't work efficiently so I tried getting back to studying and now first year PhD student and I am having problems since everything I do takes my way longer than usual even reading an article is a burden as I keep getting distracted and I am terrible (really terrible) in organizing myself. Ever since I was a child and even now I am always described as a hyperactive person with limitless energy. When I was 22 I was diagnosed with ADHD and I took the medication Straterra for about a month, then I just stopped taking it as I didn't feel any progress and felt that I was taking too many medications then one doctor said I should stop it because ADHD is not a real thing as he said. When I was 23 I was diagnosed with depression and Kept taking Sertraline for about 3 years then stopped it, it made me a better person in the context of depression. My case is very complicated and t is a mixture of Epilepsy, depression and ADHD I was referred by my GP to an epilepsy clinic in Northampton but my appointment is in two months and I am afraid I can't wait that long with my regular seizures. I don't even know the name of the seizures that I have which lasts for 8 hours approximately. I don't trust any sort of medication at the moment and don't know what to do, is it epilepsy, adhd, depression or all of them. Please help me. Thank you very much for reading this message and for providing any sort of a help.

Comments

You need to talk to your

Submitted by just_joe on Mon, 2016-03-28 - 17:01
You need to talk to your neurologist and your GP. All your doctors need to know all the different medications you take including over the counter meds. I say thet  because one medication can counter another. The Straterra you were taking may have been a good medication but I don't know. with most medications it takes time for your body to get used to it. AED's take time because they are nothing like aspirin where once taken they are gone after some hours. The neurologist sets the dosage up and it takes 4-6 weeks to build up the therapeutic levels in your body. If ADHD meds are like seizure meds then the therapeutic level might not have gotten to where the doctor wanted them to be. As Margie posted all of the things you posted about are aall in the brain so the neurologists will need to talk to each other. IE doctors.I hate taking meds but I take them because I know where I would be if I didn't. I have epilepsy. I also have a heart issue. both are taken care of with medications. One to stop electrical impulses from hitting wrong in my brain. The other to keep the electrical impulses hitting at a certain rate in my heart..I had trouble in school too and it did take time for me to finish projects. But I finished them. I talked to my doctors to find out how I could do better. They had few answers other then to learn how to use the issue as something to deal with and not as a crutch. It wasn't easy but it can be done. My reading is slow but my memory after reading something is far better then other peoples.

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