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Not sure what's been happening to me

Sun, 12/27/2015 - 00:57

Hi.  I've been experiencing a number of problems lately that make me wonder if I might be suffering from epilepsy.  I attempted to see a doctor for over a year, but I don't have insurance so I could only get into the low income clinic.  They didn't even try to diagnose what was wrong.  They just turned my body into a chemistry experiment and told me that I shouldn't worry about getting a diagnosis.  According to them, all I needed to do was get onto disability.  When I went in to see them I was severely tachycardic with a resting heartrate that was always between 120 and 150.  A few times it even jumped up to 180.  I was having constant intense pressure in my lower right back around my kidney area, and I was having panic attacks that lasted for months.  Adrenal tumors run in my family so I thought it might be that.  I had fainted numerous times as well.  At least I thought that was what was happening until my boyfriend witnessed one of the episodes.  He said I was standing there talking and smiling and it seemed as though nothing was wrong.  Then suddenly I just went over backwards and started convulsing on the floor.  When I came to I couldn't remember anything that had happened that morning, and I was so disoriented that I didn't even recognize where I was even though I was in my apartment where I have lived for years.  I also didn't recognize my boyfriend.  I just looked him dead in the face and asked 'Who the hell are you?'  That made me start questioning all the other times I thought I fainted.  Every time I came to with some amnesia and extreme disorientation.  I also remembered one time about five years before any of the other problems started when I passed out in my living room.  That time I also had amnesia and was so disoriented that it took several minutes before I even figured out that I lying on the floor.  Even after I realized that I wasn't standing I still had no idea where I was.  One of the meds that the doctors put me on was Klonopin.  It started triggering several seizures a day, and while I was on it all I could do was lie on the couch with earplugs in because if I heard any sound at all it felt like someone was scrambling my central nervous system and I'd keel over and start having an exorcist moment on the floor.  I know those were seizures brought on by the medication, but they were always preceded by an aura and it was not an unfamiliar feeling.  It was kind of an electric chill, and my hands and feet would go completely numb yet were not numb at the same time.  I've been feeling that for almost as long as I can remember, but until the Klonopin it didn't occur to me that I could be having a seizure.  When it happened I would feel kind of otherworldly and like everything around me wasn't really there.  Sometimes my senses would become heightened.  A lot of the time it felt good so I never questioned it too much.  I never had any of the muscle tensing or convulsions, inability to speak, etc. like I experienced with the Klonopin.  It was just weirdness.  Sometimes I smell things that aren't there.  Sometimes I zone out and I'm just gone.  I've also had severe sleep paralysis since I was a kid, usually with just the hallucinations.  I've heard that can be connected to epilepsy.  And I'm sensitive to flashing lights.  I can't even watch tv with the lights off because it irritates me.  I had to ask my boyfriend to stop flipping channels on the television the other day, but this time I recognized the weird irritated inside feeling.  It felt really similar to the sound irritation that I felt when I was on the Klonopin.  Could I have been having seizures all this time and not known it?  And could the seizures be causing some of the other problems that I was having?  I've heard that epilepsy has been connected to severe anxiety and panic attacks, but could it cause my heart to race constantly?  Has anyone here had a similar experience?

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