TLE and emotional triggers

Welcome to the Coping With Epilepsy Forums

Welcome to the Coping With Epilepsy forums - a peer support community for folks dealing (directly or indirectly) with seizure disorders. You can visit the forum page to see the list of forum nodes (categories/rooms) for topics.

Please have a look around and if you like what you see, please consider registering an account and joining the discussions. When you register an account and log in, you may enjoy additional benefits including no ads, access to members only (ie. private) forum nodes and more. Registering an account is free - you have nothing to lose!

swanC

New
Messages
3
Reaction score
0
Points
0
hi, I'm new here. I'm 28, female, was diagnosed with TLE a few years ago but the symptoms started in high school.

i came to see my illness as a function of different factors that affect the threshold for seizures. and I'm constantly living trying to keep this threshold as high as possible by controlling my diet, sleep schedule, and trying to relax whenever i have a chance. but still there's a lot of stress in life, and sometimes i would still have simple and complex partial seizures. socially-wise the worst is what i call "attacks". it feels like a panic attack, accompanied with weakening of the consciousness, sense of everything being unreal, fast breathing (which feels like rhythmic convolutions in my diaphragm, and during one of the most severe attacks I've lost the breathing automatism for a couple of hours, and whenever i was not experiencing those diaphragm spasms i had to move my diaphragm in order to breath, and when i was forgetting about it, i was just stopping to breath), some strange spasm-like sensations in muscles, and screaming and crying that is very difficult to control. i never lose consciousness during the attacks (though i had 2 attacks triggered by aggressive stimuli that caused loss of consciousness), but i cannot do much about it, and when people see it it must look horrible.

so there are 2 things that most often become the "last drop" that cause the seizure, when other factors, like lack of sleep or stress have already lowered the threshold.
1) disturbing images, sharp objects, aggressive images, images of flesh being torn apart. i once had an attack watching the Pacific Rim in the cinema, at the scene where monsters were tearing each other apart. and often an attack is triggered by seeing a sharp object. i normally have a short mental image of this object piercing my eye, and then the attack comes.
2) relationships. i don't know why, but even the happiest relationships without any complications has always been aggravating the symptoms. i was always having more seizures and having them more severe when i was in a relationship. and the worst thing is that those people could feel it. that something in them was causing my becoming sick. the person i am in a relationship with now can feel it too, and though he doesn't leave me, like people did before, whenever my condition worsens he stops having sex with me. he thinks it worsens because of the growing deep attachment, that I cannot control this depth. and as you can imagine it only stresses me more, so i need even more power to get myself back to above the threshold.

so it's really a typical situation for me: he says something that makes me worried, then i see scissors, or forceps, or Eiffel tower shaped magnet, and then I have an attack.

does anyone have an experience of their seizures becoming a major factor in relationships? for a few years i was just living a "buddhist" life, keeping myself away from all attachments, but then love is such a strong positive feeling that i don't want to resist it. but it brings a lot of suffering.
actually, until last year i used to think that having attacks while you are thinking about your love interest was a normal thing, and i was always wondering why no one ever told me about that, why i never saw such turn of events in movies -- a girl meets a guy, comes home, sees sth sharp and then is having a panic attack like she's possessed, and I've been feeling it was strange that people were calling love the most positive feeling, because for me it was certainly addictive, but always associated with these attacks. so only last year i learned to control seizures better with the proper diet and sleeping schedule, and then for the first time in my life i had a period of being in love and not experiencing seizures associated with the person. but i still have them occasionally :(
 
oh, actually, posting this today provoked some thoughts and i did some reading.
and look what i found.
1) dopamine hypothesis of epilepsy (doi:10.1016/j.mehy.2005.09.045)
2) Reward prediction errors (i read about it @ scholarpedia)

so, taken together we get this: if epileptics tend to have a higher dopamine tone, and if they fall in love it gets even higher, then, the amplitude of the dopamine fall is even greater when the reward prediction error occurs. so no wonder i get my attacks worse when i'm in love. but if it works this way, why isn't it written in every epilepsy101 article? i mean, falling in love is probably what every epileptic person is going to experience at some point in their life!
 
oh, actually, posting this today provoked some thoughts and i did some reading.
and look what i found.
1) dopamine hypothesis of epilepsy (doi:10.1016/j.mehy.2005.09.045)
2) Reward prediction errors (i read about it @ scholarpedia)

so, taken together we get this: if epileptics tend to have a higher dopamine tone, and if they fall in love it gets even higher, then, the amplitude of the dopamine fall is even greater when the reward prediction error occurs. so no wonder i get my attacks worse when i'm in love. but if it works this way, why isn't it written in every epilepsy101 article? i mean, falling in love is probably what every epileptic person is going to experience at some point in their life!

Hormones definitely play a role in epilepsy, not only dopamine, but estrogen, progesterone. Read about it here:
http://www.epilepsy.com/information/women/all-women/hormones-and-epilepsy

Is there a connection between seizures and hormones?

Yes, sex hormones can influence the excitability of nerve cells in the brain and thus influence seizure control. Estrogen can excite brain cells and can make seizures more likely to happen. In contrast, natural progesterone breaks down into a substance that can inhibit or prevent seizures in some women.


And then, the AEDs could play a role in sexual relations, too, as could TLE itself. This part of the brain controls sex hormones.

http://www.epilepsy.com/information/women/all-women/epilepsy-and-sexual-relationships

Seizures often involve the same areas of the brain that are important to maintaining healthy sexual function, and some of the sensations felt during lovemaking can be similar to those experienced during auras or simple partial seizures.

........Hormones play an important role in sexual function and some people with epilepsy have alterations in normal hormone levels. Both seizures and epilepsy medicine can interfere with the way your body uses hormones, resulting in sexual problems. You may need referral to an endocrine specialist to sort out the complex interactions between hormones, seizures, and medications.
 
Yes, i have the same exp. I cannot see anything graphic or even speak about anything too graphical. When I was in 3rd grade, my teacher was explaining and drawing on the chalk board about Appendicitis and I had a seizure which turned into a tonic clonic episode.

Look up : Psychoneuroendocrine Aspects of Temporolimbic Epilepsy in google its the 3rd one down.
 
In 8th grade I broke up with my first girlfriend whn she went to a different high school. I never saw her again and had my first recorded seizure a week later at summer camp. Same thing happened a year later

A few months ago my ex girlfriend cheated on me and broke up with me over the course of a week. On day 6 seizure activity starts up again after being dormant for more than 18 months. Still struggling.

Interested in reading about hormones & how they affect men.
 
Mr.21T,
I believe, Estradiol in higher than normal levels can increase the likely hood of seizures. I would request to have your E2( Estrogen) checked. Google, E2 levels and TLE
 
As Cint said, hormone levels are very important but I also find that there are other factors that go along with the whirlwind of romance that seem to lower my seizure threshold.
1)Not getting enough sleep. (better things to do, right?)
2)Making exceptions to all the good dietary restrictions you normally follow under the "special occasion" heading (like drinking booze or having sugary desserts and such on a "special" night out with "the one")
3)Sleep being disturbed by the other person (even when you are just sleeping). It takes a long time to get used to another person in your bed especially if you don't have the luxury of a king sized mattress. They just turn over and you may not fully wake up but your brain wave patterns can be interrupted. So you may get your 8 hours but they are not really that restful.
4)Stress caused by minor irritations. (Who didn't do the dishes when it was their turn, who was flirting with the boss at the party, etc.)

I actually find that the hormonal flush of sex is beneficial to my seizures. Helps me sleep. (As long as we are having a non PG thread here.)

So my perfect guy would be one who would come by a couple of times a week, eat a delicious GARD compliant meal I had cooked, do the dishes, have mind boggling sex, and then go home by 10pm and let me get to sleep.
 
Sex definitely goes a long way in my seizure control, AlohaBird. My perfect girl would cook me a vegan meal, assign me some limited chores around the house, exercise with me for about 15 minutes, and have sex with me 28 nights out of the month....and not talk afterwards without building emotions of resentment or monotony. One can dream...lol.

I actually believe that going weeks without having sex have triggered some of my seizures in the past. Maybe the brain works differently post-orgasm?
 
Embrace your heritage as a HUNTER-gatherer and give up the vegan stuff and you are on!
 
yes...

Aloha bird, you said it about the perfect guy! That would be mine too!
 
Hey, Gigi, wanna share Mr. 21T? :)
Cuz I'm bot relocating anywhere. I just bought a house in Hawaii.
How's that work for you, T, sweetums? 6 months a year in Houston and 6 in Molokai? You were concerned about monotony. That would solve that problem.
 
SwanC, thank you thank you thank you. I am also new here, new to learning about seizures, as I just found out a few weeks ago.

I didn't know scary images were a part of this! Thank you for sharing, I never shared mine because I was too scared. But if I get upset, feel hurt or rejected, I see violence in my head, complete with blood and the whole nine. I always felt like a horrible person, as I would 'see' a movie in my head of me hurting my loved ones.

The Worst time was after the birth of my last child- hormone changes! Plus she was C-section and we think now the anesthesia gave me a bad reaction. I had no idea about any of these things, I am so grateful to have found these boards.
 
Emotions, hormones, stress.... all DEFINITElY play a huge part in triggering seizures. Especially around "that time" of the month. Also, when I was in school, years ago, I always had a seizure right before exams. Oh, and for some reason whenever the temp. dropped. Never could take cold weather!
You mentioned you had a child, MMRocks ? What meds. are you on? I am 44 yrs. old and have been trying to get off of Depakote b/c my husband & are hoping to concieve. Can't try till off of meds - right?

Yep. I'm racting that time clock! :)
 
Back
Top Bottom