Occasional amnesia/hypersexuality upon waking, other odd symptoms regularly occuring

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I didn't "recognize" my room although I've slept in it for years. It "felt" like there was someone around I could have sex with, like a phantom presence, but I didn't see anyone to my disappointment (I have never invited anyone to my room). Not that I knew it was my room, anyway. So I thought I would find someone's sex objects, like underwear or something. I looked around, unfortunately nobody's were around (they had no reason to, nobody's stuff is ever in my room). In the past, I did smell peoples' underwear or whatever was lying around in this state, but I do that anyway in a regular state if I get the chance, just not with so much disinhibition.

So nothing was lying around, and I masturbated to orgasm, despite my regular efforts to quit. I have had a massive sex drive for a long time. Several orgasms per day was common when I didn't control myself. After that, I regained judgement at a fairly fast rate.

I know whenever I'm going to get a cold or other sickness because I randomly smell burning carpet, particularly when something surprises me or I expect to smell something. Otherwise, I never get olfactory hallucinations. When I was a young kid, I had one auditory hallucination of a horse upon waking, but no other auditory hallucinations ever occurred.

I occasionally get unexplained intense anger coupled with lethargy, and one time this was coupled with a light green aura in the middle of my vision that appeared for like 3 seconds. I have doubts that it may have been a floater, but I've never seen a floater like that, and I wasn't looking into the sun. Oh yeah, and something I forgot to mention, sometimes when something surprises me, a tingle occurs from my right foot to usually my ankle. Read that may be related.

When I get angry, and I can't currently do anything about it, my right arm and sometimes neck starts to twitch or "tick" semi-controllably (like some people can kind of control their ticks). I remain well-controlled around people when I'm angry, and almost never show how angry I am. I can prevent myself from doing reckless things out of anger better than most people can prevent themselves. I wonder if TLE effects me every single day, can it effect aspects of the personality other than anger and sexuality?

Can it cause "deficits" too? I have a weird sense of humor. I don't think I genuinely find most funny things funny, I "try" to laugh most of the time. Every few weeks to months, something occurs that makes me laugh uncontrollably for several minutes, and nobody understands why I'm laughing. It's usually not something "inappropriate", because I don't find things inappropriate, but it's usually something outlandish that has some logical hole in it. I almost never laugh at verbal humor, mostly outlandish images created by my mind. In some video that featured a human vocal and a creature that the author joked fits the vocal, I only inferred what the creature looked like and laughed really hard, but when I saw the creature, it was no longer funny because it "made sense". Usually things are uncontrollably funny to me for a few minutes, then eventually something "clicks", and then I can never laugh to the stimulus again. Again, I rarely laugh without any effort, and I barely understand my own sense of humor.

I have no memory problems normally, in fact people are surprised when I remember things they said years ago. Something that's unusual is that I take "rational" action in my dreams, whereas most people are pretty irrational. Same with emotional situations, they don't impact my ability to be rational at all. Whereas, epilepsy would be expected to make a person more irrational.

I did some research on why I sometimes get amnesia and sexual disinhibition when I wake up, and it turns out there's a condition called "Transient epileptic amnesia", a rare condition which happens only on occasion like in my case, and involves temporal lobe epilepsy. I've also looked into TLE in the past because of my other symptoms, and it appears to fit very well. I've never had any grand-mal seizures. I'm 20 years old, I've been noticed as different quite early in life, most significantly starting maybe around 11 years old. Not sure if TLE can appear so early. It's not a big deal, not something I'm worried about, just something I find fascinating. I'm interested in what you folks think.
 
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Rational people are calm and collected, and epilepsy can cause irrational behavior if it's located in certain areas of the brain. I have these weird symptoms, yet I'm more rational than anyone I know, so that's extra weird. I don't know why you're focusing on this small detail, it's merely a rough stereotype.
 
Hey MPM --

A few thoughts:

Many of the symptoms you describe (olfactory and visual auras, transient amnesia, tingling sensations) sound like simple partial seizures. For a look at how personality and behavior can be affected by TLE, you might want to check out "Seized," by Eve LaPlante.

I wonder if temporal lobe epilepsy effects me every single day, can it effect aspects of the personality other than anger and sexuality?
This is a controversial area (look up "Geschwind Syndrome"), additionally complicated by
difficulties in distinguishing what is causal, what is correlative and what is coincidental when considering epilepsy and personality. When traits are exaggerated (as with hypersexuality or religiosity) or represent a radical change from prior behavior/affect then it's more likely that TLE is playing a role, since the temporal areas are associated with emotion and drive-related behavior. Keeping in mind that epilepsy is highly individualized (and still not particularly well-understood), there are other personality changes that can arise, particularly if there is involvement in specific frontal lobes. These can include things like aberrant emotional response, irritation, ADHD, memory disturbances, humorlessness, etc.

Every few weeks to months, something occurs that makes me laugh uncontrollably for several minutes, and nobody understands why I'm laughing.
It's less common but one of the automatic behaviors associated with TLE is laughing, referred to as gelastic seizures. Some CWE members experience this. You can read more about it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gelastic_seizure

I'm 20 years old, I've been noticed as different quite early in life, most significantly starting maybe around 11 years old. Not sure if temporal lobe epilepsy can appear so early.
TLE can start at any age, though it can be easier to diagnose in children who are at least 6 years of age or older.

It sounds like you are not particularly bothered by your symptoms, which is great. If you don't already, you may want to keep a symptom journal. If you find your symptoms progressing in nature, duration, and/or frequency then you should consider treatment to avoid long-term damage.
 
Very helpful, thanks.

I never knew laughing could be caused by epileptic activity. I think it's surprise-based just like the olfactory hallucinations that I get when I'm going to be sick. Some of the reports I looked up on here included laughing for no reason at all, while mine usually had odd "triggers".

On a notable occasion, there was a very sad photo shown to my class, of a little girl dying in a specific way. I was afraid that someone might see me respond emotionally, since not only did I have social anxiety, but I thought people wouldn't like me as much if they found out I was emotional/anxious. A self-amplifying combination for anxiety.

I look at the photo and suddenly perceive her as alive and well, this imagery humor again. I have no idea what was so funny about it. Then I felt like I was going to burst out laughing. I covered my mouth and faked a coughing fit instead, and excused myself from the classroom.

Usually with these bursts of laughter, the laughter goes on uncontrollably for 30 seconds or a minute, despite the fact that I'm not even thinking about the original stimulus. It does "retrigger" laughter during the process, but after the laughing fit, I don't find the stimuli funny at all. Especially not such tragic stimuli.

These mostly occur around people, so the "excitation" theory is probable.

When it comes to crying, I can easily sob and bawl to certain music if I let myself go. Then this produces a subtle affect that feels like love or crying for a while, in which I experience a lot of empathy, love, and often feel like crying out of guilt. In this state, sometimes the beauty of nature makes me tear up. On the other hand, my most common state is angry and very rational, you could see it as quite the opposite. I have a strong desire to cry with a girl because it puts me in this very human emotional state. I like to be around crying girls or sensitive, but not angry people because it also puts me in this state. I don't like happy-go-lucky people.

Yesterday morning, I woke up in this state of wanting to desperately sexually satisfy someone, may be that empathic state, today I woke up from a dream and believed I had some girl's number who I dreamed about and even planned to call her, but then I realized I didn't (which I know very obviously normally, it wasn't even a girl I thought about that much). I started getting very angry when I started thinking about other girls that gave me fake numbers, which I thought I completely coped with over a week ago. I coped with it by rationalizing that I could be doing things that benefit me instead of planning out mean things to say to these girls to pay them back.

I have been drinking caffeine the last few days, maybe that's why I'm getting these weird episodes upon awakening. Several years ago, I was given Ritalin to concentrate better, because sexual thoughts made me unable to, and in fact they also gave me a diagnosis of ADD. I had severe insomnia from the regular doses so that's why I quit quickly. Then I decided to try out a higher dose to see what would happen. It put me in a relaxed, loving, forgiving, guilty, empathic, ecstatic state which is very similar if not identical to the one I sometimes experience. These emotions were alarming to my rational self since I didn't normally feel them. I wonder if it's due to frontal lobe activation. But I thought the frontal lobes suppress emotion, so I have no idea how it worked. Anyway, my dreams were weird for days after. After one of them, I woke up peeing which never happens, and after another on a different night, I woke up with the "phantom presence" of a person that I wanted to sexually please badly, such a thing happened for the first time in my life. This makes it hard to determine whether the angry, rational state is due to epilepsy, or its opposite 'emotional' state. The fact that it's so "either, or" is also odd. I think I've lived like this for a long time, so like you said, it doesn't worry me much. I'm mostly curious about my condition.
 
I have been drinking caffeine the last few days, maybe that's why I'm getting these weird episodes upon awakening.
Some people with epilepsy find that stimulants like caffeine can trigger seizures. All sorts of things can potentially be triggers: Fatigue, illness/injury/infection, food sensitivities, nutritional deficiencies, metabolic problems, flashing or fluorescent lights -- basically anything that can serve as a physical, physiological, emotional, or environmental stressor. A symptom journal can be a good way to look for your particular triggers or patterns.

Several years ago, I was given Ritalin to concentrate better, because sexual thoughts made me unable to, and in fact they also gave me a diagnosis of ADD. I had severe insomnia from the regular doses so that's why I quit quickly. Then I decided to try out a higher dose to see what would happen. It put me in a relaxed, loving, forgiving, guilty, empathic, ecstatic state which is very similar if not identical to the one I sometimes experience. These emotions were alarming to my rational self since I didn't normally feel them. I wonder if it's due to frontal lobe activation. But I thought the frontal lobes suppress emotion, so I have no idea how it worked.
Different areas of the brain are associated with different kinds of responses. Damage in some areas can produce inhibitory response, but in others it can produce emotional extremes. Ritalin is unpredictable, since it can have a paradoxical (anti-stimulant) effect in those suffering from ADD, but a stimulant effect in those who don't have ADD.
 
It completely makes sense that stressors trigger epilepsy. I guess that explains why a lot of my possibly epileptic symptoms had "triggers".

Ritalin did have a relaxing, anti-stimulant effect on me which surprised me when I tried it. Activating the frontal lobes when they're inactive like in the case of ADD has an inhibitory effect on the emotions, thus relaxing. But why my emotions went from logical and simple to loving, emphatic, etc I don't understand.

I guess I will understand myself better with time. It seems paradoxical that I likely have ADD, yet epilepsy, since stimulants can worsen epilepsy, and anti-epileptic agents may worsen ADD. So about my opposing emotional polarities, have you ever heard of anything like this? I haven't. I don't know whether I will grow out of it or anything.
 
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