Well, this certainly isn’t the best comeback post. No images, nothing special. I’m sorry, life happened and this blog was pushed lower on the priority list. I wasn’t even planning on posting this one, but I feel I have to. This is still a personal blog, after all. Sometimes I write for whoever is reading, but mostly I write for myself.

Last night, I experienced something for the first time in years. I had this feeling of deja vu, followed by nausea and confusion and something wrong with my right hand. I had a seizure.

I had epilepsy when I was a child. Well, actually I still do. There is no cure for epilepsy. Medication only controls the seizures. I suffered a grand mal seizure ones, and regularly had a series of absence seizures. After taking medication for two years or so, I was cleared and my neurologist said I don’t have to take meds anymore if I don’t get any symptoms in a year. So I went on and had a normal teenage life.

2006, I had this strange deja vus followed by nausea and confusion. I remember it happening during a humanities 1 class (I was looking at the clock and I thought “this happened before”. Well of course. The clock strikes 1 twice a day) I suddenly felt like I was gonna get sick so I headed for the bathroom. Nothing came up. Another time it happened during org recruitment reporting. I don’t remember any trigger, but it just happened and I felt like throwing up but it subsided and while I knew where I was, I didn’t seem to want to believe myself.

I went back to my neurologist for the first time in 7 years. I had an EEG test again and yep, I still have epilepsy. I was prescribed medication again, but I told my parents I didn’t want to take it. I’m so done with that. Since no seizures of the sort followed, I went on to have a normal young adult life.

Until yesterday. I was on my way to Makati from eLBi for a watecolor crafternoon (I’ll blog about this separately ^_^ ). On the bus, I got that deja vu feeling. I shrugged it off. Doesn’t everyone get deja vus? On the bus ride back, I felt the same thing. It was as though the exact same V6 song has played in that exact same part of SLEX before. I had this deja vu feeling which I chalked up to the nostalgia-themed V6 song I was listening to. I felt a bit dizzy afterwards but it was a cramped bus and I was riding on the second to the last row. It’s always a bumpy ride over the wheel.

That night, I was ready to go to bed. I was just staring at the ceiling like usual and then got a sense of deja vu. Well I stare at the ceiling all the time. Of course it has happened before. And then my vision started spinning and I felt like vomiting. The type where you can’t even stagger to the rest room. I shoved my mess to the side, making room beside my bed on the floor for me to throw up. I didn’t.

Afterwards, there was this feeling of confusion. I knew where I was and what time and date it was, but somehow I wasn’t so sure. Like I won’t believe myself. Or like I’m slowly forgetting. I can’t quite explain it, it’s like you know something for certain and there is logic to it but somehow it doesn’t make any sense. There was also this part where I felt that feeling you get when you know the answer.

The part that makes sense, does not make sense. And the part the shouldn’t make sense, makes sense. It was a very confusing experience.

Worse of all, and this is something I haven’t experienced before, was the strange feeling in my right hand. I feel it until now, although mildly. I know my hand is there. I have control of it. But I don’t feel it properly, like the way I usually do. I grabbed a notebook and pen to scribble the date. I was able to do it easily, but my hand didn’t feel the way it should when I write something down. It was as if my body has less awareness of my hand.

That was scary because I haven’t experienced something like that before. It’s better now, but it still doesn’t feel quite the same yet.

I don’t want this kind of hassle again. Medication is pretty expensive. I’ll try to get a checkup as soon as I can, although it’ll probably involve the same things all over again (EEG definitely, maybe CT Scan if they’re annoying, and probably the same meds but in higher dosage). I really don’t need this right now.

I should probably cut down on substances that affect the brain. I don’t mean illegal drugs but even caffeine, alcohol and nicotine have certain stimulant and/or sedative effects. I’ve been drinking too much coffee/tea lately. I’ll cut back and hopefully I don’t get anymore of these strange things.

I’m in the academe now and I can’t afford to lose any more brain cells. And I can’t afford to have my already terrible motor skills to get worse dammit! I want to watercolor! Scumbag Brain, please behave.

PS. I don’t mean to scare you, but just because you’re having deja vus too doesn’t mean you’re also having seizures. How often does it happen? Does it have a physical effect afterwards, such as nausea or tingling hands/fingers like mine? I think everyone gets deja vus but your deja vu is probably different from mine.  If you think it’s bad, see a neurologist.

According to google, these deja vus are actually auras, like the ones people get prior to a migraine, except people with epilepsy sometimes get them prior to a seizure. Google “psychic simple partial seizure” if you think this is happening to you as well.

PS. There are different types of epileptic seizures, and I think I’m fortunate to have only gotten a tonic-clonic grand mal seizure (the jerky type) just once compared to people who have it everyday. Still, don’t judge. I know there’s an unfair negative stereotype against people with epilepsy, which is why I usually don’t tell people about this. So readers, please still love me after this.