[forestx5]

Somebody mentioned panic attacks the other day, and I had to think about it. I don't think I've had one since I had ECT, which was 11 years ago. I have what I would call a neuro psych illness. When I was 4 or 6, my grandmother used to take me to town to shop on Saturday morning. She complained to my mom that I wouldn't let her buy me anything. That was because I knew we were poor and that I was a burden on my family. I had no sense of self worth. My mom used to say she wished she had drowned us all when we were babies. (I had 3 brothers). By 7 or 8 I had life figured out and wanted no part of it. I had suicidal thoughts. I was emotionally and physically abused by my father and all that fun stuff. I have to presume this made me neurologically vulnerable to the seizure I experienced at age 17. I lost my positive emotions and libido over night. I began to suffer blinding migraine and focal seizures and panic attacks. I didn't know what any of it was and I didn't get medical treatment or diagnosis for decades and then it was incomplete. Throughout my adult life, I would have several big panic attacks a year. Say my consciousness was an orchestra of 6 people playing instruments. The first sign of an attack was one of the players playing out of tune. Then he stopped playing. The next player stopped and so on until I was in a complete panic with the sensation of dying. Well, the ECT I had in 2014 put an end to that and that made a big difference in my life. Having an EEG at age 56 showed a history of epileptic seizure which put my life into focus. Every neurological illness has a psychiatric component, and vice versa. It's a chicken egg thing. Don't abuse children. I was told I had an IQ of 146 in the 4th grade. I guess I was a bit on the sensitive side.