Posted 10/19/2006 8:57 AM (GMT 0)
I am supposed to be spending this time this morning learning how to use Microsoft Access. I have to create a new program for my Department at work to use on it. But I had a bad aura yesterday at work. Had to be driven home by work friends and spend the day sleeping. It was because I missed pills Monday... I had aura Wednesday, like Clockwork. Clockwork Orange. Remember? With the nasty men with black eyes? It came charging through my clean little world with violence.
Years ago my sister asked me what an aura was like so I wrote it for her.... thanks to the miracle of computers, I repeat that for you here. They haven't changed. I have just got older.... and there is no husband anymore.
"I have often tried to describe this before… never succeeded… never have found the words, the comparisons to make. I don’t know if I will now.
It can happen anywhere, anytime. It has happened to me while driving, in the grocery store, at home. I feel fine usually. Yes, I have my normal exhaustion and lack of recent memory, but for me, that’s run of the mill.
I start to feel slightly distracted? Maybe a bit aloof? A sort of spacey feeling, not dizziness, but rather disconnected. Then my limbs feel disconnected. If I am driving the car I am not quite sure that I am touching the wheel. My head gets light… the fear starts to grow.
At this time I usually say to myself “its coming” and try to put myself in a safe place… I have about 60 seconds. If I am driving, I pull over, If I am standing or sitting, I lie on the floor or put my head on my desk.
And then it starts to come, waves of fear, I feel disconnected from my body entirely and an inability to speak. If I can, I call out for help at this time, but often I can’t form the word “help” or if I can get the word out, I can’t make my voice loud enough to be heard.
If my children or husband are in the room, they know that it is coming just by looking at me. My eyes look fearful and I hold out my hand to them. They know to come and hold my hand to comfort me. If someone holds my hand at this point, the whole thing can go away.
As it gets worse, the déjà vu comes. I could swear, if I could talk, that this has all happened before. That I have been in the same room with the same people saying exactly the same words every time this has happened to me. A while ago it happened in front of a Red Lobster restaurant and I said to myself (in the soup that at that point was my mind) “Oh yes, we are always talking about fish when this happens” I used to find déjà vu interesting and amusing. Not anymore. The déjà vu is possibly the worst of it, when it comes I know that I will go further down before I come back up again. It terrifies me. I am furious that my misbehaving brain is doing this to me and there is nothing I can do to get it under control.
That brings up a point. My brain. Since this started to happen to me I have begun to view my brain as somehow separate from me, another entity. It is like a noisy neighbor that I keep telling to be quiet but who just ignores me. My brain doesn’t listen to a word I say, goes off on its own, doing what it wants without one bit of consideration for my needs.
“No brain… don’t do that now, I have work to do.”
“Screw you” My brain answers. “I do what I want, when I want, I am in control here”
I carry this badly behaved child with me wherever I go, and like a child, it is a source of great delight as well as frustration. It can lead me into green fields of imagination, it can remind me of past glories, it can delight and amaze me with its competence and quickness. But then it has a bad day, maybe not enough sleep or too much stress, and my brain gets angry, has a temper tantrum. “You’re not paying enough attention to me!” And then we’re off, my brain and I, into our own private hell.
After the déjà vu comes freezing… just freezing. I can’t speak, I can’t effectively move my body. And as always, waves of fear… this is it. If I am going to have a grand mal seizure this is when it happens, when my memory stops. If I have a grand mal the next thing I remember after this is usually waking up in a hospital or surrounded by concerned faces.
But I haven’t had a grand mal in three years, so what happens now is that it begins to subside. I remember my name, I remember the name of the person standing holding my hand. After a few minutes, I can talk… in short bursts and often unintelligibly, but I can talk. My tongue can move again.
The minutes pass and I begin to try to reassure whoever is with me that it will be OK. That I am coming out of it. I can feel their fear too. These things seem to open me up emotionally but only to the negative emotions I am surrounded by at that time… fear, anger, panic. The people around me are experiencing some or all of these emotions and I can feel it emanating from them in waves. I don’t believe I am usually the type of person that is unusually open to others feelings, but after an aura I can feel their emotion pricking me all over. Like little pins. “By the pricking of my thumbs”
If one of them overcomes that fear enough to hold me or say soft words to me, it helps, helps a lot. Just at this time though. If they hug me while I am in the middle of it, I just feel more fear…. And uncomfortable.
As the aura goes away and I begin to be able to talk, I get angry, angry at this stupid brain of mine that will not behave itself. And I am weak, weak, weak. The stupidness that comes after the auras is annoying too. For an hour or maybe more, depending on the severity of the aura, I can’t seem to put my thoughts together in proper order. Have to stumble over words and am so afraid I am not making sense. I become repetitive and confused. A big aura can knock me out for a day, make me incapable of action.
Auras don’t happen to me often, but I live in fear of them. Sometimes I can feel them coming… a teensy bit of spaciness, and can stop them by controlling my situation. I can take myself out of the situation that is starting them… tension or flashing lights or certain kinds of music… Rap or heavy metal especially. Often I have a warning and just put my head down for a minute or two and close my eyes. That can make them go away. I have done this even in business meetings and no one knows what is going on.
There… I have done my best to describe this. It is the best description I have come up with yet, but it still isn’t quite right. There is nothing to compare it to really. That is so frustrating because I am a very vocal person. I want to tell people what is happening to me all the time and yet, here is this awful thing that has become so prevalent in my life and I am unable to explain it. I wish I could meet someone else who experienced this and we could sit and talk and say “yes! I know what that feels like!” But that hasn’t happened yet, maybe it will soon. "
(I wrote this before I began to meet people on the net who were epileptic, and that was a great delight in my life)