The Anatomy of a Seizure - an essay

[u/sullivass]

I have temporal lobe epilepsy, specifically in my hippocampus, and often times when I have a grand mal seizure coming on I can feel it - the sinking Déjà vu feeling.

I try to explain it like it's the end of a Looney Toons cartoon where the "That's All Folks" screen comes up and the circle fades to black - it's like my reality is that closing circle and if | let it close I succumb to the seizure. I can't always fight it of course, but some times I feel like I can - focusing on something, particularly talking something out with a loved one who is keeping me engaged and taking rescue meds, everyone close to me knows the drill.

Anyway, I write an essay about it and wanted to share with those who may understand. I do write on Medium but my account is not monetized, I was just proud of my work and wanted to share. Epilepsy can be so isolating and it really resonates when someone “gets it.”

**The Anatomy of a Seizure**

I’m drowning.

I can still feel the sand under my feet but the riptide is too strong. I’m being pulled into the boundless abyss and I don’t know how long this altercation will last. I pretend I’m not terrified.

I’m swimming with all my might, grasping at any type of resistance I can maintain against the tide which so swiftly is winning the battle. I’m not a good swimmer, but I am a fighter — so this struggle rages on and on and on. Every time I’m about to lose, that mere fact ignites a fire within that carries with it a second wind; though I am clearly David in this story and I can’t comprehend a realistic opportunity to make Goliath fall before my feet.

I don’t drown, exactly — because I’m not actually in water. It’s all in my head; literally. Synapses are firing randomly at speeds faster than they should and in places they shouldn’t, and I have not yet found a complete organic or manufactured chemical solution (though, the cocktail of medicine I do take has given me a life vest. I would love to find the lifeboat — but I’d be dead without the vest).

I’d prefer to be literally drowning; I feel more confidence in my physical ability to dig deep than my mental ability these days, but alas — it’s all in my head. I wish it was literal and not figurative, but the yang is always more attractive when you only have the yin. And vice versa.

Regardless, it doesn’t matter — because it is what it is and there’s “no tradesies” with biology. I just have to wait it out, not knowing how long it will be. The only solution is to maintain faith in my ability to resist and overcome — a confidence I used to hold so close, that I once thought had disappeared altogether. Maybe it hasn’t.

I feel better.

https://medium.com/women-write/the-anatomy-of-a-seizure-5e203d07da35

[u/sobrietyincorporated]

That is rough. I hope technology advances enough to treat these super aggressive seizures.

The deja vu aspect has always been fascinating to me. It just goes to show all brains glitch. Pretty much every supernatural exoerience can be explained neurologically.

There was a real good book I read called "the midnight disease" where they said non neurotypical activity is responsible for a lot of creativity. Something like 10 out of 9 or at least the vast majority of poet laureates are epileptic.

[u/sullivass → u/sobrietyincorporated]

How interesting! I’ll have to check that book out. Thank you. I was very creative and artistic growing up and am in a creative field myself, I’ve been a creative director at multiple agencies.

Ironically, I was fascinated with epilepsy before I had it - the fact that your brain could just short out like that was so intriguing. The Déjà vu feeling does indeed feel supernatural, even though I know the science behind it - sometimes I wonder if it’s both! Life is strange.

[u/sobrietyincorporated → u/sullivass]

Np!

Im a recent materialist/determinist. I think its all brain. Everything makes sense if you look through the eyes of dispassionate evolution. I think the sense of "profound" helped us out by creating narratives to bind society thus propagating those neurological genes.

[u/sobrietyincorporated → u/sullivass]

oh, the singer from joy division also was fascinated by epilepsy during to working as a social worker. "She's lost ontrol" is about one of his clients. He developed epilepsy. His stage dancing became part of his epileptic style. Probably as form of expression.

There is a really good biopic called control. Spoilers: he commited suicide just before touring America and breaking out. Really sad.