Functional Neurological Disorder - Blog Posts
It’s FND awareness month so I’ve decided imma talk about my experiences.
So if you don’t know what FND is, it’s basically the brain sending messages incorrectly throughout the body. In my case, I have various conditions alongside it. Particularly Epilepsy and Tourette’s Syndrome
I started having seizures very abruptly towards the end of 2021, which led to me having my entire life change. I had to drop out of school and I had no clue what to expect for my future.
I’ve had confirmed EEGs and my Tourette’s started before anything else. However, it wasn’t long before I developed other neurological issues. This included tremors and dystonia, along with other gait issues that would result in me needing mobility aids. I also learned that not all of my seizures were epileptic in origin. I had PNES, or Psychogenic Nonepileptic Seizures.
It’s been frustrating and rough on my already messy mental health, but I’m still making it day by day. I am trying to finish my high school diploma and do what it takes.
At one point I was practically housebound, and I’ve fortunately had an improved quality of life. However, that doesn’t remove how rough everything is.
That’s enough for me yapping though. If you have a friend with FND or any chronic illness for that matter, just remember to have patience.
I may not understand psychosomatic disorders, but damn, people definitely should stop stigmatizing them. Like, why the fuck it's called pseudo just because it has mental origin? You wouldn't call someone depression pseudo, so why the fuck you're calling functional symptoms pseudo?
Guys with FND/Conversion disorder/Idk, whatever you call it, you're completely valid. I genuinely don't care about your disease being psychogenic, you're still a legend with completely real symptoms, just not psychical origin.
PNES are PNES. It's a psychological, conversion, functional, dissociative seizure. Of course it's non-epileptic. But. Often missing the word of the seizure being functional can harm those who have non-epileptic, but NOT psychological seizures.
Non-epileptic ≠ Functional.
Get over it.
"Epilepsy this!" "PNES that!"
Yeah, yeah... I got it, now, when will we bring awareness about paroxysmal dyskensias? I bet, there's at least one person who's reading this post and instead of FND has some kind of dyskensia. Do not let doctors down your disorder. The thing that might be seen as psychogenic, can actually be a genetic.
Bring awareness about paroxysmal dyskensias. Do not let them put us down.
Non-epileptic seizure doesn't mean that the seizure is due to FND or PNES! There are much more conditions than epilepsy and PNES. Stop seeing only white and black, when there exists a gray side.
Speaking about dyskinesia always makes people assume that you're talking about FND. Errr....
Not all seizures are epileptic, and not all non-epileptic seizures are PNES. Hope this helps!