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Ecstatic Seizures
Thu, 08/27/2009 - 07:32Hi
Has anyone experienced "ecstatic" seizures? I've had a series of them recently, and they are amazing: totally outside the range of normal experience and by far the best experiences of my life! I'm not religious or "spiritual" but recognise that they could be construed by others as deep and meaningful life changing events...evidence of the "divine" as opposed to neurological events.
I've been told by my neurologist they are very rare and I've not been able to find out much about them/share experiences.
Victoria
Hello all, I'm adding this comment just over a month after the original post having realised that the thread is now incredibly confusing and there are some misunderstandings following what seem to be random postings. You may want to follow the date order of the posts before making comments or coming to conclusions.
Regards,
Victoria
Comments
Re: Ecstatic Seizures
Submitted by conceredmum on Mon, 2009-09-28 - 11:39
This is my first post and I do not know where to start - I am unsure what forum my daughter's experiences would fall under and I would be very very grateful if someone could point me in the right direction. 3 months ago my 22 yr old daughter suffered a grand mal seizure - her first seizure - after a huge upset. She has CP but is very high functioning - no previous problems. She was put on Ativan and did not have any seizures for a month until her Keppra meds were upped to a therapeutic level - for the next 2 months she had just about every seizure under the sun and was seen by various neurologists/had a cat scan/two EEG's/MRI etc - nothing showed up. Eventually she was sent home wearing a digitrace monitor for a 48 hr period - she had massive seizures whilst wearing it as it upset her so much - now we thought we were going to get somewhere...wrong. Nothing showed on the monitor and so it is presumed that she has PNES (psychogenic non epileptic seizures) - she is being weaned slowly off of her meds and will start counselling shortly. In the meantime she has improved - has not had a seizure in over a week and appears to be getting a handle on the fact that these seizures are caused by upset and most particularly with her girlfriend (who also has had to acknowledge that she needs help to deal with depression).
Now, here comes the strange part.....last week she had a period of intense concern and after a short sleep woke up to what can only be described as a changed soul - extremely intuitive and spiritual. She has always been very in tune with peoples moods/problems but now these have taken on a whole new life. She sees people's auras and accurately describes each persons colour (she has not done any research on peoples auras as she had always thought this to be "hippy dippy"!!). Her descriptions so far have been 100% acurate and she also appears to know about traumas that have happened to people that she meets that have had far reaching effect and impact on their lives. I think she feels that she has become a healer of some sort and says that she feels much more relaxed now - much happier. My other daughter has been completely "freaked out" by her sister's change and feels that this is just part of her seizures and fears that her brain has been damaged.
Has anyone heard of something like this?
This is my first post and I do not know where to start - I am unsure what forum my daughter's experiences would fall under and I would be very very grateful if someone could point me in the right direction. 3 months ago my 22 yr old daughter suffered a grand mal seizure - her first seizure - after a huge upset. She has CP but is very high functioning - no previous problems. She was put on Ativan and did not have any seizures for a month until her Keppra meds were upped to a therapeutic level - for the next 2 months she had just about every seizure under the sun and was seen by various neurologists/had a cat scan/two EEG's/MRI etc - nothing showed up. Eventually she was sent home wearing a digitrace monitor for a 48 hr period - she had massive seizures whilst wearing it as it upset her so much - now we thought we were going to get somewhere...wrong. Nothing showed on the monitor and so it is presumed that she has PNES (psychogenic non epileptic seizures) - she is being weaned slowly off of her meds and will start counselling shortly. In the meantime she has improved - has not had a seizure in over a week and appears to be getting a handle on the fact that these seizures are caused by upset and most particularly with her girlfriend (who also has had to acknowledge that she needs help to deal with depression).
Now, here comes the strange part.....last week she had a period of intense concern and after a short sleep woke up to what can only be described as a changed soul - extremely intuitive and spiritual. She has always been very in tune with peoples moods/problems but now these have taken on a whole new life. She sees people's auras and accurately describes each persons colour (she has not done any research on peoples auras as she had always thought this to be "hippy dippy"!!). Her descriptions so far have been 100% acurate and she also appears to know about traumas that have happened to people that she meets that have had far reaching effect and impact on their lives. I think she feels that she has become a healer of some sort and says that she feels much more relaxed now - much happier. My other daughter has been completely "freaked out" by her sister's change and feels that this is just part of her seizures and fears that her brain has been damaged.
Has anyone heard of something like this?
Re: Ecstatic Seizures
Submitted by 3Hours2Live on Mon, 2009-09-28 - 03:42
Hi Victoria,
I found one of my newer neuropsych books that calls what I think I'm half-way talking about as "competitive recruitment" using behaviourism, in "Behavioral aspects of epilepsy: principles and practice" By Steven C. Schachter, Gregory L. Holmes, Dorothée Kasteleijn-Nolst Trenité, 2008, in Chapter 30, pp. 245-252, chapter title Conditioning Mechanisms, Behavior Technology, and Contextual Behavior Therapy (JoAnne C. Dahl, Tobias L. Lundgren). Toward the end, they get too soft psych, as though they're about to recommend Epileptic's Anonymous, LOL, but they list 50 references. In the USA, google books has the chapter at (sometimes blocked?):
http://books.google.com/books?id=a6Ygv5_RKKsC&pg=PA245&lpg=PA245&dq=behaviorism+epilepsy&source=bl&ots=BRZTlKEWkD&sig=Le-jQZovYZBojD5oV9PLqCMrq70&hl=en&ei=SjHASpiAJ4jWtAOw2Z3pAg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=8#v=onepage&q=&f=false
I spent my popcorn money to buy the book last year, but it has a few new things, and it quotes Dostoevsky again! Maybe you've already read it too. I found their implied correlations as causal, between function and social skills, presumptive. Operant, Pavlovian, aversive, etc., conditionings weren't clarified. Much about other aspects of epilepsy in the whole book.
Google books also listed "Acceptance and commitment therapy: contemporary theory research and practice" By John T. Blackledge, Frank Deane, Joseph Ciarrochi, 2009, with parts on epilepsy and competitive recruitment of brain cells in stopping/controlling seizures, around pages 130-149 (mostly the same). It's less expensive, $30.00 USA at amazon.com, but much about things other than epilepsy whole book.
Tadzio
Hi Victoria,
I found one of my newer neuropsych books that calls what I think I'm half-way talking about as "competitive recruitment" using behaviourism, in "Behavioral aspects of epilepsy: principles and practice" By Steven C. Schachter, Gregory L. Holmes, Dorothée Kasteleijn-Nolst Trenité, 2008, in Chapter 30, pp. 245-252, chapter title Conditioning Mechanisms, Behavior Technology, and Contextual Behavior Therapy (JoAnne C. Dahl, Tobias L. Lundgren). Toward the end, they get too soft psych, as though they're about to recommend Epileptic's Anonymous, LOL, but they list 50 references. In the USA, google books has the chapter at (sometimes blocked?):
http://books.google.com/books?id=a6Ygv5_RKKsC&pg=PA245&lpg=PA245&dq=behaviorism+epilepsy&source=bl&ots=BRZTlKEWkD&sig=Le-jQZovYZBojD5oV9PLqCMrq70&hl=en&ei=SjHASpiAJ4jWtAOw2Z3pAg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=8#v=onepage&q=&f=false
I spent my popcorn money to buy the book last year, but it has a few new things, and it quotes Dostoevsky again! Maybe you've already read it too. I found their implied correlations as causal, between function and social skills, presumptive. Operant, Pavlovian, aversive, etc., conditionings weren't clarified. Much about other aspects of epilepsy in the whole book.
Google books also listed "Acceptance and commitment therapy: contemporary theory research and practice" By John T. Blackledge, Frank Deane, Joseph Ciarrochi, 2009, with parts on epilepsy and competitive recruitment of brain cells in stopping/controlling seizures, around pages 130-149 (mostly the same). It's less expensive, $30.00 USA at amazon.com, but much about things other than epilepsy whole book.
Tadzio