PFM-

I know a little something about this.

I was given an epilepsy diagnosis back in 2009 after I fell from leaning against a desk in an inpatient ward and hit my head on a blood pressure machine. I got nine stitches in the back of my head. I hardly remembered any of it. My head would fall forward, my neck would drop, I would loose ability to function in my arms and legs. They looked like petit mals. I wasn't diagnosed DID. They did EEGs. Found nothing. Waited awhile. Did more EEGs. Found nothing.

They then decided to do a sleep study to find out if I was having cataplexy attacks from narcolepsy. They took me off my medications as it would effect my sleep study. In the middle of taking me off my drugs I had over 30 of the attacks in a row. I was rushed to the ER. I remember none of it. I was given sternum rubs, I remember none of it. I didn't respond to them. I would loose all body function, over and over and over again. The pumped me full of ativan to slow my heart rate and said to have serotonin syndrome from being taken off too quickly, so I was put back on and had to take the sleep study on the drugs. Which would make it inaccurate.

I was told for two years that it was in fact narcolepsy and that I was having cataplexy attacks, and that my anti depressents I couldn't get off of, were blocking things on the sleep study that would give a complete diagnosis. I was tired enough that I could be diagnosed with it. I was given stimulants. Lots of them. But I only got worse. I was given medical GHB, which is a new treatment for narcolepsy, but I became psychotic. In the midst of the psychosis episode I was given anti psychotics, where I suddenly learned that anti psychotics in all stopped the episodes. I was confused.

A few months later I was put on a trauma unit where I was told that I had DID and that when people with DID switch drastically, they can do things like drop to the ground, loose muscle functioning, drop their heads, and are often misdiagnosed as having seizure disorders and that anti psychotics can decrease the amount of switching, and particularly drastic switching that goes on, and therefore stop the episodes.

The only way to tell the difference is that DID treatment will not work for seizure disorders and seizure d/o treatment will not work for DID.