[Roaming_bird]

The weirdest thing happened on Friday while I was volunteering at my daughter's class. When I was trying to write the date, I couldn’t figure out what number was which. I had to keep writing the date I knew the end number was the year, but I could not figure out if the first number was the day or the month. It looked like a fraction to me - ¾. I looked at other examples and even things like remembering 2/18, but it still did not make sense to me. It was the weirdest thing.

The other incident happened when Abby was driving. I could not figure out which lane was the fast lane and which was the slow one. We were driving in the middle.

The driving thing was exactly what happened when I had ECT.

It's hard to explain how utterly confused I was. It wasn't like forgetting a phone number. It's almost like a foreign language. With the date thing, it was two hours of being completely confused. I thing I finally figured it out by looking at the calendar or something.

Please, has anyone had this?

[Ocean Swimmer]

Yes. I couldn't remember the name of the street our lake house is on.
And lots of other crazy things.
I'm a victim of ECT too. Even things I've done a million times seems strange to me at times.

Originally Posted by Roaming_bird

...It's hard to explain how utterly confused I was. It wasn't like forgetting a phone number.
Please, has anyone had this?

Not the exact examples, but very similar ones, yes. Being utterly baffled at some everyday thing (and not just momentarily!) It's very disconcerting.
(I've never had ECT, btw.)

Roaming, i have suffered strokes, mini strokes and brain seizures. There are days i don't even know where i am or what day it is. And when i go to write or spell i forget how. it is a very scary feeling. stress will make your mind do weird things.... get it checked out medically and tc

[Roaming_bird]

Thanks. I'm glad I'm not alone in this. It was so unsettling and scary. Being forgetful is in my nature. I forget my zipcode, my office suite number and address. But nothing like forgetting how to write the date. So weird.

I have my annual physical tomorrow morning. I plan on not mentioning it because I see my pdoc on Tuesday. Hopefully this is just med or stress related.

[Tucson]

That happens to me from time to time. Fortunately it is rare, but it does happen. I remember being at a customer service desk and when the rep asked me for my address, I could not remember it. I hastily looked on my phone for this information, not wanting to come accross as an idiot. It never occured to me to look at my drivers license. LOL

Tucson

[Roaming_bird]

It was like I was seeing a foreign language in a way. I knew numbers represented dates, but I didn't know how to write them. I pictured in my head 1/18 and I couldn't figure out if 18 was the month or the day. There were dates in a column that I had written weeks ago, and I could not comprehend what they meant.

So half the time in wrote 3/4 and half the time I wrote 4/3. The teacher is going to either be confused or think I'm an idiot, lol.

Oh, and I also thought the year was 06!

[Tucson]

I just now have remember a disassociative episode that I had experienced a couple years ago. It repeated a couple days later. I went outside of a Dennys restaurant to get in my car. Just when I reached out with a key to unlock the door, the next moment came where I did not know where I was, I did not know what I was doing, and I had no idea what was in front of me. I did not recognise the car as being a car. I heard a familiar sound coming from the background but could not comprehend what is was. Everything was incomprehensible to me. This lasted what I think was several minutes. My mind kept reaching out for my bearings. A picture of a a familiar face came to mind. But I did not know who he was at that moment. I just felt he was some kind of freind. Then it all came quickly back to me. I was OK once again. That sound that I was hearing was of traffic on the road right next to the parking lot. That picture in my head turned out to be the freind that I had just talked to in the restaurant.

A few days later, I was driving around trying to find an Urgent Care facility that I knew was somewhere around there. I then had this completely lost feeling quickly come over me. I stopped recognizing where I was and what I was doing. I had stopped with a road in front of me. I did not know which direction to go. I was completely and utterly lost. I made a turn left, but I was confused which lane to turn into. I then slowly moved forward and stopped. I could not see what was directly before me. I felt something was very wrong but did not know what. I sat there for what seemed to be several minutes. Then my awareness about me quickly came back. At this point I was OK and everything was familiar once again. But it is then I found myself driving on the wrong side of the road! LOL

OMG this stuff is coming back to me. I was in that same restaurant at another time speaking to this new freind who I had met there a couple months ago. I started feeling very detached. It is as though a large distance had come between us and his voice melted into the background. I was aware that there were voices of people talking around me. This freind of mine was talking, but I did not know what he was saying. I began to get the feeling that I did not know where I was. I could not remember what we were talking about. I wanted to appear like everything was OK with me. I tried to act this way by continuing to nod my head. Then he said something that sounded really funny to me, so I laughed. But I did not know what he actually said. Then the reality of the situation came back to me.

I then found out he was telling me something that he did when he was young. It was terribly personal, so personal that I felt very uncomfortable listening to it. He was saying that everytime he physically pleasured himself, he ended up feeling very depressed and worthless, and had this overwhelming fear that his life had no meaning. Apparently this is where I found myself laughing. I could not believe I behaved terribly like this toward him. He and I were speachless for several moments. Fortunately, the conversation continued.

OK now, the SHORT of this is that you are not alone in experiencing moments of disassiation. Apparently, this has happened to me more than once. I have read that these moments can happen at times of severe stress. At that time, I was under severe stress as I took care of my mother full time. I think it was around the time she told me she did not know who I was.

I apologize for this long reply. I really do. I just wanted you to know that since I have been OK ever since, even though all of those episodes happened really close to each other. And you will be OK too! There was another episode, but I will stop here. I am becoming a little distressed now.

Tucson

[BlueInanna]

That is scary . I have some similar stuff but it passes pretty quick. Not knowing date or year, I wrote the date was 2005 recently, only to correct it to 2006, then to oh right 2016. I can be driving somewhere I've been going my whole 40 years and not know where I am, a general idea where I am, but make a wrong turn and get very confused. Sometimes I look at road or street signs and it looks like Chinese characters. I've never had ect, and it also happened when I was med free last year. I took it as a sign that I'm overwhelmed. It passes pretty quickly for me though, so not near as serious as what you're going through.
Please do talk to both doctors about it if you can, just to make sure. If you're going to have general docs ear for a few moments why not.
And try not to worry about the teacher will think. I imagine they must go through plenty we don't know about, managing a room of 30+ kids, all day, every day. A couple of my best friends are teachers & I'm so glad they do it. I don't think I could deal.
Hoping you're ok

[1278]

This has happened to me too, I don't know if its ECT or the topamax but I wrote down the date as 2008, looking at a word for long and not recognising it, my spelling of words is so atrocious I fear using pen and paper and rely on autocorrect. I also mix up letters when spelling.

[Roaming_bird]

I did tell my primary care doctor, and he said not to be too concerned unless it happens again, that people have this happen occasionally. I appreciate that he didn't make me feel stupid for bringing it up.

However, I did majorly make a fool of myself when I insisted the medication I was on was Lorazepan rather than Lamotrigine. I was absolutely sure and basically told him he was wrong! Oh well, just another reminder that my memory is....f%$@ed up.