Is this a seizure or just a related part of the condition?

[dragonlady1978]

My son is only 5 so it's hard to get him to explain some things adequately, especially because it's all he's known. I've read descriptions of similar things here so hoping maybe someone can shed some light.

Sometimes he hears and smells things that aren't there. Gasoline or smoke is usually what he smells, and he hears his name being called or people talking.

He has more than one type of seizure, and I know that there are types that would just make you zone out for a few seconds at a time so I'm wondering.....

When these sensory hallucinations happen, is it always accompanied by a seizure, or does it just happen to some people with epilepsy like a side effect of the condition? I'm wondering if he is having more seizures than I am counting, like I'm just missing them because I don't know what it is. I'm assuming that if it is in fact some type of seizure that by the time he tells or asks me about it the seizure would be over with so the time to witness anything would be over, if that makes any sense.

 

[Endless]

Hi, Dragonlady,

From the sounds of it, I'm guessing your son has Temporal Lobe Epilepsy?

There are all kinds of different types of seizures. This wikipedia article talks about CP, SP, and generalized seizures starting in the temporal lobe. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temporal_lobe_epilepsy

Here's a good article from Epilepsy.com: http://www.epilepsy.com/epilepsy/epilepsy_temporallobe

Your son's hallucinations are a type of Simple Partial Seizure. A partial seizure (also called a focal seizure) only involves part of the brain. A generalized seizure involves the whole brain.

I get partial seizures that are very similar to your son's. It can be kind of crazy-making sometimes, if the person having the seizure doesn't know what's happening to them. I'm glad you know with your son, so you can explain it to him. I see things, hear things, get Jaimas Vu (don't recognize people or places), smell weird stuff (anything acrid seems to be the most common for me). Also can feel things that aren't there, like a hand on my back or someone blowing on my neck.

These simple partial seizures may or may not lead to a generalized seizure (like a tonic-clonic, absence seizure, etc).

Understand as much as you can about what your son is experiencing. Yes - these should be counted as seizures.

 

[dragonlady1978]

EEG's show activity in right temporal lobe to be constant and aggressive doc says, and he also has activity in right occipital. His first EEG when he was about a year old only showed the right occipital, but from what I've read here it is hard to catch in the temporal lobe so I have no idea whether it was there all along or it has changed.

Most of his seizures are complex partials, and occasionally grand mals.

I am wondering now if he sees things also. He has told me before that our house is haunted.... because of his age I had assumed it was just his imagination because he wasn't at all upset about it just convinced he saw a person, and he's never mentioned seeing anything else out of the ordinary.

I suppose it has been hard for me to grasp because the seizures I am used to him having he is not ever aware during them. But the more I read people's experience's here the more I think is going on that I am just not associating.

At times he (and even I) can tell when one is coming on because his behavior is strange or he manages to come get right by me just in time because he senses it and gets scared, but during the actual seizure he zones out and doesn't respond, he stares off into space and/or eyes roll back.

I've been thinking all along that the smells and sounds were just a symptom of the brain abnormality, not a separate type of seizure (simple partial) in and of itself.

 

[Frink]

Hi Dragonlady,
Sorry your son is going through this.

I also have right side TLE and there are auditory and olfactory components to my normal seizures, I have simple and complex partial seizures.

During periods of uncontrolled seizure activity I would also "hear" stuff like people mumbling, my name, a very loud HEY! or a very load clap/bang, all of these were simple partial seizures

 

[mlbandura]

Luke had the same kind of things happening to him. He would tell me he heard me call his name when I was not there or that he had a bad taste in his mouth. Another thing he does is grab his ears and say they are cold (they are always warm when I check them). His doctor said that they were simple partials. I would definitely call his doctor to tell her what has been going on.

 

[Endless]

When my mom heard that hallucinations were a kind of seizure and that I have them now, she told me about some of the things that happened when I was a 5-year-old. She just assumed it was imagination or a night terror, too. I saw armies of ants crawling across the floor and up the walls. I saw a big brown bear, and a giant anatomically correct heart beating, among other things. Most of these were at night so she just thought they were night terrors. But I remembered being awake at the time. Now as an adult most of my seizures are at night, too. My epi says this isn't unusual.