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Could this be epilepsy? Freaking out
Sat, 03/23/2019 - 02:09Topic: Teen Zone
Hey, I'm new to this site. I'm a 16 year old girl who's been having violent shaking in my upper torso for about three years. It's gotten a lot more severe in the past year, I get 100+ a day. I usually get these shakes when I'm around people that I want to impress or thinking about particularly stressful things. They used to be just during school, but then started happening when I am with friends, then when around my family. Now I get them at any point in the day, even alone, when I'm thinking about stressful things. The shaking is usually around my neck and shoulders, but sometimes my legs and arms jerk as well. I've fallen down before, or out of a chair that I'm sitting in. When it's a bigger one, my fingers sometimes flutter in my right hand.
I saw a doctor, they said that it could be myoclonic jerks but until I have an EEG they can't tell, and the next opening for an EEG is in a month and a half. It's already been two weeks and I'm going crazy trying to guess what it is. Even during these two weeks it's gotten worse. I don't want to self diagnose but I would love to have some sort of idea of what it could be instead of being completely in the dark. This is beginning to seriously affect my social life and my school work. I'm desperate for advice or answers, anything. Thanks for taking the time to read.
What you describe sounds very
Submitted by birdman on Sat, 2019-03-23 - 16:53
What you describe sounds very much like epileptic seizure and you are doing a great job making note of the situations where they occur and what all happens. With epilepsy it is common for us to have more seizures when we get stressed out so you are in some very stressful situations or mindsets that would make any of us more prone to having seizures. The one thing that I think any doctor needs to rule out with EEG is the possibility of psychogenic non-epileptic seizures or PNES. The name makes it sound like these are less significant and even fake but I like how Wikipedia puts it, "In the vast majority of people, the production of seizure-like symptoms is not under voluntary control, meaning that the person is not faking..." I just think the treatment for PNES is different than epileptic seizures. Read more about Nonepileptic Seizures https://www.epilepsy.com/learn/types-seizures/nonepileptic-seizures-or-events Again I don't know but am just offering what I see as a couple of possibilities.Mike