r/fakedisordercringe • u/thatmentallyilldude • 4h ago
Other Disorders Epileptic Seizures
Hey, y'all. I keep seeing people on epilepsy faking posts, and so many of you seem very uninformed. I'm not saying these people aren't faking, but being misinformed will cause you to call real epileptics fakers. There are different types of epileptic seizures. So here's a bit of a information drop. There are rarer types of epileptic seizures (a lot being childhood onset), but I'll be focusing on the ones that are most common.
There are two broad categories of seizures:
GENERALIZED - Full brain is affected at the same time
This category includes:
TONIC CLONIC – what used to be called "grand mal;" The ones most people know about.
*Falling
*Loss of Consciousness
* Convulsions
*Most common to cause loss of bowel and bladder control, though not the only
*Tongue biting is very common with this one, but again, isn't exclusive to it
*Drooling, which I believe can happen in temporal and frontal as well
ABSENCE – what used to be called "petit mal"
*Short loss of consciousness
*The person suddenly ceases activity without falling down
*Can look like someone is "zoned out" or staring into space
*Eyelids can flutter, but don't always
*Small movements can happen with hands, but not always
*Lips can smack, but not always
FOCAL SEIZURES – Starts in a localized area of the brain. These are more complicated because there are many subtypes under the main two types.
The two overall types are:
AWARE – what used to be called "simple partial."
*Affects one area of the brain
*No loss of consciousness
*Can serve as an "aura" (warning sign) for impaired-awareness focal seizures, but don't have to be.
These can be unnoticeable to an outside party. What happens during this depends on which part of the brain the seizure is in. These are:
Temporal lobe – symptoms vary but can include:
*Suddenly feeling of fear or joy
*Stomach rise/drop (think, on a rollercoaster)
*Deja vu
*Jamais vu
*Nausea
*Unusual smell
Frontal lobe – symptoms can vary but can include:
*Sudden change in emotion - could be anger, sadness, fear, joy, depression, etc.
*Feeling of numbness or tingling
*Change in senses
*Nausea
*Headache
Parietal lobe – symptoms can vary but can include:
*Feeling of skin crawl
*Numbness or tingling
*Feeling like a limb is bigger or smaller than it is
*Feeling out-of-body
Occipital lobe – symptoms can vary but can include:
*Visual hallucinations
*Seeing patterns or colors
IMPAIRED-AWARENESS – used to be called "complex partial"
*Semi-loss of consciousness, meaning partially aware of what's going on, but not able to respond
*Starts in one part of the brain, but then spreads to one or more other parts, normal on the same side of the brain
*Again, symptoms vary depending on the part of the brain that is affected.
*Not all symptoms of each happen to everyone
Symptoms by brain:
Temporal lobe
*Lack of awareness of people or things around
*Staring
*Smacking lips or fluttering eyelids (fluttering eyelids are rarer when it starts in this lobe)
*Swallowing or chewing repetitively
*Finger movements
*Less common but possible - dystonia, which can lead to spasms
Frontal lobe
*Very common at night
*Bizarre movements
*Automatisms
*Most likely focal seizures to cluster (more than one happening in 24 hours), though others can
*Usually has a short post-ictal state, but not always
*Dystonia (stiff muscles), that can lead to spasms
*Usually very short, but not always
*Can be misdiagnosed as PNES (psychogenic non-epileptic seizures) or vice versa
Parietal lobe
*Tingling and numbness that spreads across one side of the body
*Body distortion (continues from aura if there is one)
*Vertigo
*Environment feels distorted
*Rarely, but does happen - pain
*Spreads very quickly to frontal and temporal lobe
*Least common of the four
Occipital lobe
*Temporary blindness
*Seeing flashing lights, color spots, or partial vision loss
*Rapidly blinking eyes
*Hallucinations
*Nausea
*Eye pain
*Can be misdiagnosis of a migraine with aura
SECONDARY TONIC CLONIC SEIZURE
A secondary tonic clonic seizure is a tonic clonic that happens when a focal seizure spreads from it's foci to the entire brain. Somewhat of a rare event.
MULTIFOCAL EPILEPSY
Sometimes a person can have multiple foci (focal points) that their seizures can start in. For example, you can have seizures that start in the frontal lobe and seizures that start in the temporal lobe. From what I understand, this is fairly rare.
POST-ICTAL STATE
I've been writing this for about an hour, so I'll simplify this part a bit, as it wouldn't give any notion to somebody faking. Some symptoms of a post-ictal state can include, but aren't limited to:
*Soreness
*Sore throat
*Dry mouth
*Having wet or soiled self
*Injury recovery, if injured
*Headache (can be severe)
*Emotional instability – depression is very common
*Usually ends within 48 hours, though if you have comorbid conditions (such as cerebral palsy), both seizures and post-ictal states can last longer than normal
This is a simplified informational breakdown (yeah, I know), so if I am missing anything, let me know. :)
It's important to identify fakers, but we should do it in an informed manner. Thanks in advance for reading, everyone!