forestx5

Brain researchers  say the eye is the window to the soul, and  if you have a soul, that it resides in the temporal lobe of your brain.  They also say the temporal lobe is "exquisitely prone to insult"

My temporal lobe was insulted when I was 17.   Immediately  following my first exposure to cannabis, I had powerfulI temporal lobe seizures.  I lost my emotions and also lost limbic resonance.

https://en.wikipedia...imbic_resonance

I could no longer relate to my mirror image as I once had.  The damage in my limbic region  was clouding my vision.  I developed recurrent major depression featuring severe insomnia and anxiety

from this incident and I continued to experience focal temporal lobe seizures for decades thereafter. I also experienced frequent ocular migraine aura.

40 years later, I had an EEG which showed I had significant pathology in my dominant temporal lobe. That damage had occurred when I was 17.

At 57, I was told I was disabled from an event which had occurred 40 years earlier.  I had retired early, so I just added the disability check to my monthly income.

I had ECT in 2014, which seems to have cured the depression.  The focal seizures stopped somewhere in the mix.  Life goes on.

I solved  the riddle of the origin of my mental illness, but it took me a while. I experienced powerful temporal lobe seizures, preceded by an epigastric aura, during my 1st cannabis intoxication.

Since I had no prior experience with epilepsy or cannabis intoxication, I couldn't figure out how a part of me died that warm December night in 1971. I was 17 years old and

a junior in high school.  I was in the top 10% of my class and had earned the president's all American physical fitness award. I barely made it back to school, and barely made it to graduation.

I experienced frequent spells I assumed were panic attacks.  Frequent ocular migraine auras.  An episode of major depression about every 8 years, which lasted almost 2 years in duration.

By the time I reached age 57, I had spent 25% of my adult life battling recurrent major depression with horrible insomnia and anxiety, the focal temporal lobe seizures and the rest of it.  Then I

found a case history that matched my own in every detail in a British Neurological Journal.  I learned I  was suffering from a rare epileptic syndrome whose worst case scenario was when

"the post ictal psychosis segues into an affective disorder of major depression". I was a worst case scenario.

It explained everything I had experienced in the 40 years of my adult life.  I contacted a neurologist who specialized in epilepsy and had an MRI and EEG.  The EEG verified my self diagnosis.

After serving in the military (honorably) and working in industry for 40 years, I was told I was disabled from an event that occurred at age 17. I went to the social security office with the paperwork

and received a check that very month.  No hassle.  I did undergo ECT in 2014, and that seemed to restore my firmware to factory defaults.  I no longer have focal seizures, and do not believe I

will ever experience another episode of major depression.  The moral of my story is simple.  Get an EEG.

It can be an indicator of several serious neurological conditions and can be critical in sorting yourself out.

I don't think there is anything after life is over.  I don't remember anything before life began. Life is based on physiology.  When your heart stops pumping blood through your brain, the lights go out and everything goes quiet.

Dying can't be that difficult.  It is perhaps, the one and only thing that everyone will successfully do some day.  The real difficulty is living with a serious wound.  It makes one wonder if life is worth the effort.

Consciousness is a tool.  Use it.  Build a bird house.  The birds will appreciate you.  The more you engage reality, the more it responds to  you.

Immerse yourself in the pleasure and pain of  life.  Gaze at the stars and laugh.

As far as I know, the block universe model is the widely accepted one in physics. The past, present, and future all equally exist at the same time. 

Jump to search

Eternalism is the theory that past, present, and future exist at the same time.

Personally, I haven't seen evidence for any of it. 

DP wasn't my main symptom either. I became ill in 1971 at age 17.  The internet didn't appear until the mid 80s, and I guess I discovered this site in the mid 90s.  It had a smaller audience then, but there were some great people on this forum and they meant a lot to me.

I lost 40 years to mental illness, but I am as recovered as anyone can be from a serious mental illness. I feel confident in saying that most individuals who had symptoms as severe as mine, and got treatment as poor as mine, likely died of their illness.    My depressive episodes were

epic struggles for survival.  I once went virtually sleepless for 52 days, during which time I continued to work 40+ hours per week. I can't even begin to describe what that was like.

I would lose over 30 lbs of weight during a depressive episode.  I would go from an athletic 205 to anemic 175 in 6 months time.  I look back over those years and my memories are more faded than normal, because I never made them in full color.  I acted for most of those years and I feel a bit guilty about it

because no one ever really knew me.  I wouldn't let them. 

All childhoods are rough.  Look at the Hyena.  They are born twins, and the stronger immediately kills the weaker one. Is Hyena milk that tasty?   That's got to make you feel a little better.

As for religion, look at it this way.  You figured out it was a farce and didn't have to waste your life worshiping false idols.  That's bound to save you some valuable time

for reading about the quantum field theory or just working out.  Try not to let the human condition get you down.  Ask yourself this important question - in a hundred years, will it have

made any difference?  If the answer is probly not, then just allow yourself to enjoy your life.

I once found myself in the basement of my home, staring at the wall.  I had no idea how I had gotten there, or what I intended to do there.  I had been there for some time.  There were times when I was driving, that my vehicle would turn towards my place of employment.

I wasn't working that day.  That's not where I had intended to go.  I would lose my focus and habit would take over.  I wasn't always fully aware of what I was doing. My mind was so preoccupied that I was frequently on "auto-pilot".  I day dreamed a lot.  My daughter once

asked me "daddy, where do you go when you do that?".  I was staring  off into space.  Turns out I was suffering from  an epileptic syndrome.  My stares were absence seizures, a form of focal temporal lobe seizures.  When I learned of my syndrome, it explained

everything I had ever experienced.  I had severe weather in my brain.  Bad electrical storms. I learned all this stuff through my own research.  When I got the appropriate neurological tests, the doctors had to agree with my self diagnosis.  Knowing what it was I was

dealing with made all the difference for me.  Reduced fear and anxiety reduced my symptoms and made life more manageable.

Think of it like a stock market correction, only in this case it has to do with population.  There are actually several good things which could come of this pandemic.  The air is cleaner today than when this started.  I see less contrails in the sky.

Less jet fuel is being expended. I used to work for a local fortune 500 that routinely sends a dozen employees to Europe every week.  Why? Can't they teleconference? Is the business they are conducting so confidential that it has to be done orally

in a confined room? They probably do this in a crony capitalistic threesome with the airlines and Congress.  If they patronize the airlines, they get government contracts, and everyone is happy.  Why shouldn't we be able to vote from home?  Take the census from home? 

Take the majority of school classes at home?  Why do we use education resources for day care and cafeteria services?  The US is letting people out of jails.  Maybe they shouldn't  be there in the first place? Maybe Americans will stop giving their

government money for promises of defense, when it is obvious those funds are being used for offense, and when defense is necessary, there is nothing to defend with.  DP sufferers excel at social distancing. 

This pandemic should pose no real threat.  This pandemic has extended the life  of US social security by a decade so far. The roads will be safer without octogenarians falling asleep at the wheel. 

In any event, get used to it.  Enemies of Western Powers have viable grievances to resolve, and now that they see the underbelly of their foe, pandemics will be more frequent. That might actually result in a more peaceful planet.

If the bully knows he is going to get punched in the nose, he might just stop bullying his neighbors.

You might consider yourself lucky.  It is possible to lose all positive emotions and have them replaced with horrible sensations like fear of impending doom, imminent death, profound hopelessness, anxiety so strong one cannot chew or swallow food.

Thoughts that are so ugly they cause a physical reaction like your stomach knotting up.  If it's any consolation, in a hundred years it is unlikely your existence will  have made any difference. On the flip side, I went through all this stuff and came out

the other side with a smile on my face.  Where there is life, there is hope.

I suffered dp for 40 years, since age 17.  I had severe temporal lobe seizures then, but didn't understand what happened to me for 40 years.

I found a case history in a British neurological journal at age 57, that explained I was suffering from a rare epileptic disorder

and the worst case is when the post ictal period following the seizures segues into an affective disorder of major depression.

I had a recurrent episode of major depression on average, every 8 years.  Each was an  epic struggle for survival. My illness ended

in 2014, when I underwent Electroconvulsive therapy.  I had an induced grand mal seizure every other day for 2 weeks.  I would say

those seizures reversed the effects of the seizures I had at age 17.  It was as if my firmware had been restored to factory

defaults.  I don't own stock in any electrical utility.  ECT is still the most effective treatment for major depression, despite all the big Pharma

hype over pharmaceuticals.  Maybe you should look into it. 

In the previous six years, I haven't considered suicide as an option.

I precede this board by 20 years.  My trauma began in 1971, before there was an internet to support a board.

My trauma didn't care if the board existed, or not.

I ruminated about my illness and symptoms alone, before there was a practical way to find others

who shared similar symptoms.  I didn't seek psychiatric help for my first 20 years.

This group has changed quite a bit over the years.  Baby boomers to millennials.

I was off and on researching the origins of my illness for 40 years.  If I could have ignored it, 

I certainly would have.  As it turned out, I solved my riddle.  At 17, I had a series of powerful temporal 

lobe seizures that damaged my temporal lobe; gifting me with the affective disorder of recurrent 

major depression.  Researching my "rare epileptic syndrome" led to explanations of all the odd

symptoms I experienced, which grounded me for the longer haul.  No, I don't regret the time I spent

searching for my answers. But, I never considered myself a neurotic. 

I agree with you Abe89.  I have contacted my elected state officials to render my opinion that the term "behavioral health" is inappropriate in the context

of state funded public mental health organizations.  It is condescending and stigmatic.  I suffered a rare epileptic syndrome comorbid with recurrent major depression

for 40 years.   I had a host of symptoms associated with major depression, and I never misbehaved.  If it could be said I had eccentricities because of my illness,

I do not believe it would be fair to say I had a "personality disorder".  I'm intelligent, compassionate, and people who know me would be happy to tell  you I am

one of the nicest people they know. My comments to state officials are ignored.  State officials don't provide treatment.  They contract with a state organization 

that negotiates with the state for the provision of those services.  Calling it "behavioral Health" sends the message that if you don't give us the money we

are asking for, our clients are going to misbehave.  (And, you don't want that, now do you?)   

I wouldn't accept a diagnosis from a psychiatrist who has seen me for 15 minutes.  I saw several psychiatrists over a period of 40 years, and none of them 

ever gave me an accurate diagnosis.  I diagnosed myself after finding a case history in a neurological journal that matched my illness in every unique and

odd detail.  You write very intelligently.  I don't doubt that you have the intelligence to evaluate your own personality.  Research "personality disorder"

and decide for yourself if the diagnosis fits.  Good luck!

In August 2019, all research at US Army Medical Research facility for Infectious Diseases  was indefinitely put on hold after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention cited the organization for failing to meet biosafety standards.

This was the same  facility which released the Ames Anthrax spores which threatened US Senators and killed 5 back in 2001.  Was the closing of USAMRID caused by the release of Covid--19, or did some mad scientist,  angry over the facility's 

closing,  decide to get back at President Trump by destroying the US (and the world's) economy by releasing this bioweapon? 100 US soldiers took part in a military exercise in Wuhan, China in October 2019, just short weeks before

the appearance of the virus.  Any intelligent person would know the virus would quickly spread to other nations and eventually find its way back into the USA.  The US can call it "a Chinese virus" all they want, but a virus has no

ethnicity.  I guarantee that USAMRID had people working to weaponize the corona virus.  If they were more a facility to counter biological weapons, they would have created a vaccine for Ccorona by now.  But, they are "defensive" in the same

context as the US defense department.  The defense department makes war, and the Research facility makes bioweapons.  Call me a conspiracy theorist, but you heard it here first.

On the bright side, this virus could save US Social Security, and overall it has to be a sigh of relief for the environment.  A lot of cars and planes aren't emitting exhaust.  Who knows, the oceans could even cool off by half a degree.

Educational institutions might figure out students don't have to attend classes to learn.  People can vote from their homes.  Social distancing can give a lesson about overcrowdding, etc., etc.

My DP was not my only symptom. After 40 years of suffering with focal temporal lobe seizures, ocular migraines and recurrent major depression, I found out it could all be explained by a rare epileptic syndrome comorbid with

major depression.  I had five episodes of major depression. They were epic struggles for survival, featuring severe insomnia (52 days no real sleep), and anxiety (loss of 30 lbs due to naseau).  Not only can some mental illnesses

cause you to lose your mind, they can even lead you to kill yourself to end your suffering.   But, that's as bad as it gets.