I have epilepsy, and have had it since I was three years old. I do believe that I had my first seizure right on or close to Christmas of 1993. Some people can grow out of it after a certain point, though unfortunately for me, I still have it, and I'm twenty two years old :/. My doctor tried to see if by chance I still was showing seizure activity when he decided to try to take my off my meds slowly. Yup, that didn't work lol. But I haven't has a seizure since 2006 :3

@ Laila - Good to know you haven't had a seizure in a long time... someone I know can have seizures from being suddenly woken up, loud noises, hitting their head, and flashing lights.

It's really scary to interact with someone like that at first... knowing if you do the wrong thing you put someone in danger.

I also heard about something called "auras" with epilepsy, which was numbing of the fingers and lips. Has that ever happened to you?

People can have seizures from all sorts of things. One thing people should understand is that it's not just strobe lights that cause them. Things like what you stated can cause them. A really bad impact to your skull can cause one. I watched a show called 'Scarred' and this guy fell from his skateboard after doing a trick and hit his head first into the cement and had a seizure. I think that they said that it was to kick start his body again or something to that affect.

But the last one that I had was because it was the first week of school of my Sophomore year, and I was reading some manga on the bus, and had one for some odd reason. Though my seizures are controlled quite well with my medicine.

And yes, that has happened to me quite a few times. Also sometimes I get this odd feeling in my head where I suddenly feel light-headed, and also there will be this weird feeling in my brain, it's hard to explain. Though I do believe that it is seizure related, and whenever I feel that, I sit down for a moment and try to relax until the feeling goes away, and then I'm good to go again.

Well one thing I've been taught about the "auras" is to place ice on the forehead and both wrists (palm side). My friend seemed to recover much better that way. Her dad said it was something about "shocking" the brain back with the cold. No idea where he gets his weird little "invention fixes" though o.o

Kick start the body? That would make sense... seeing as how the body's goal is to keep living. I've hit my head pretty hard before but thankfully I have never had a seizure before. From the video's I've seen and the stories I've heard it's not pleasant o.o

Seizure on the bus? Ah... that's likely because the design of a bus added with the light going through the window sometimes makes a strobe-light effect. It doesn't happen a lot, but I've noticed it from time to time since I learned about seizures. Certain light fixtures (I forget what kind, but we have some in this house) can cause seizures too... as the flickering of the light is very visible.

Depression and a type of anxiety that they haven't quite figured out yet. Doc is torn between social and generalized. [:?]

For me, they're both really intertwined with the other. I rarely feel one without the other.
Most mornings, I just wake up with anxiety. I dread things like maybe making a left turn at traffic. I manage to find at least a couple things to dread everyday. Social situations, don't even get me started. I have to have a friend or family member around, and I'll just freak out if I don't. I'll feel almost suffocated and just look for any way out asap. It's not that I don't like people, people are really nice to me, I'm just scared of them because I never know what they think of me. Hell, even posting on online forums can be a struggle for me. The only reason I have friends is because of one girl I befriended in elementary school. She just introduced me to people. Even now, I only make friends because they're my friend's friend, so I know that they are likely to think a bit higher of me than bad. So I'm more at ease.
Which, of course, feeling anxious about everything makes me just feel depressed about everything, hence why they tie in with each other. It makes me question why I bother talking to people, and from 7th - 10th grade, I just isolated myself in general. I never hung out with people, school, then home. Everyday. For over 3 years. And I was totally okay with that, I saw nothing wrong with it. And I loved not having a boyfriend too, didn't have to worry about humiliating myself. Plus I thought love was fake, you just find someone you're attracted to and can tolerate. Nothing more.
I had constant existential crisis while I isolated myself because I constantly found myself just sitting in a room by myself most of the day. Which I think resulted in the depression.

For the past year, I've been going out with friends 2 times a week at the very least, and every friday and saturday night I'm not home. I even got my first boyfriend and we're still together after 5 months, which I think is pretty damn good for a first relationship in high school. I still struggle with it, I can't do public places alone. When I'm having fun I just think "this is only temporary, I'll be sad again soon for no reason.."
I'm improving though! I can actually tolerate making orders and restaurants and talking to nice looking strangers. I remind myself that I'm young, and I have plenty of fun times to come. This is just the beginning.

What is helping a lot is that my boyfriend understands, and I actually respect him more than anyone else I know because he has everything I have and more - yet he still goes up to random people, will try to cheer up a stranger, can stand up for his friends, anything. Even cheer me up on my worst days. You wouldn't guess he was like how he is until you got close to him. He's helped me a lot with it, and having somebody who understands how I feel about things is wonderful. Neither of us have ever had that before. We just bottled everything up, but we're totally open about everything to each other. And it showed me that it's worth it to get to know people, they have their own insecurities too, no matter who they seem to be.

Didn't know I was gonna write a novel! Sheesh!

TL;DR Depression and anxiety suck. But you have to get out of your comfort zone so that you can live your life to the fullest is how I see it. It's just hard to do sometimes.

Aaaand medication? Not any yet, doc wants me on anti depressants here soon. But I want to do more research on them because I hear some can seriously mess you up. I'm really hesitant, but I'll probably go on them here in a few months at the most.

@ Abduco - TL;SR (Too long; Still read)
I completely understand all of the anxieties you talked about. I was bullied 6th grade to 10th, so for those years I did school to straight home every day. Plus... people are just plain scary when you don't know what they'll do/say.

If you want a natural anti-depressant that is much less likely to cause you to gain weight (I've noticed a lot of them do that), try having a little bit of dark chocolate when you're feeling down. It has natural chemicals in it that make you feel happier ^^
[One thing to keep in mind though, is to get dark chocolate with minimal sugar/no corn syrup in it]

I have Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Though it is technically un-diagnosed, I've been told by a few psychiatrists that it 'sounds like OCD' based on my symptoms.

For example, we have these plastic cups in our kitchen in a bunch of different colors. If I walk into the kitchen and spot the cups 'out of order', I cannot rest until I take them down off the fridge, put them in proper order and replace them. My brothers used to rearrange them so that none of the same colors touched just to bother me. It would drive me insane!

I also have an issue with writing. I have a dry erase calendar in my room. Every month when it's time to change it, I rewrite the numbers some times up to 7 or 8 times because I'm unsatisfied with how it looks. In reality, it looks the same almost every time. My mom calls me a perfectionist, but I know it's gone beyond perfectionism. I can get downright obsessive over stupid things like how I write my phone number on a piece of paper. If it's not 'right', I redo it until it is. It can be frustrating. Even though I recognize what's happening in my brain, I can't stop it.

I also have Dyslexia. It's not nearly as bad as it could be and I'm thankful. I'll have a phrase in my head as simple as 'Can I have that?' and it comes out 'Can I that have?' and won;t realize I've fudged it until someone tells me lol That gets fun. I have a friend with the same disorder. It's fun talking to him because while we fudge our sentences, they still make sense to us lol It effects my reading some times, too, but not as much as when I was a kid. I'll read a whole paragraph sometimes, though and realize after I'm done that none of it made sense because my brain rearrange the words, flipped them around, or just plain skipped over them. I'll re-read things a 4 and 5 times just to fully take in the information. It can get annoying, but I got into the habit of reading a little slower than most and taking a break between sections.

Disorders, don't we love 'em?

A lot of people have OCD...
Honestly my parent's house in general makes me twitch like an OCD mania. Nothing being together would drive me nuts too... I mean seriously... colors or shapes go with their colors or shapes right?

My brother was working on a large lego ship when he realized there was a "front" to every lego... almost drove himself nuts for a minute until his OCD gave up XD (he was almost done so taking it apart was far from worth it)

I dunno if my brain just hates me or not but I get REALLY OCD when I'm bored... but if I'm in a rush I don't care.

Dyslexia? I have typing dyslexia... where one hand types faster than the other >.>" it's annoying as heck... cause I reverse so many letters... (not "diagnosed" or even sure if it's a real version of dyslexia, but it's annoying either way)

I don't read aloud specifically for the reason that I will butcher most sentences I don't write myself. I try to "finish them my way" and everything just falls apart. I don't think "Can I that have?" is that big of a mistake... I see it online all the time... honestly I have to reread it because my brain fixes it without telling me XD
Example <- my point right there... I read that without even slowing down... now aloud on the other hand I'd never be able to do it... o.o it's weird...

Skipping words? My brain does that constantly omg o.o I have to reread sentences because my brain is like "I got this dude, go to the next word" and never reads it. And I read extremely slow for it... o.o weird...

i have ADD(i guess they're calling it ADHD now), ODD, and OCD

I haven't been diagnosed, but I have every symptom of Social Anxiety Disorder.
It's weird, but when I first read about it, it didn't occur to me that "oh shit, that's me," like it seems to do for other people. The only reason I figured it out is because I was watching this documentary about it, and the people who had it started talking about being utterly panicked at the idea of making a phone call to someone they don't know well, making all sorts of excuses to avoid social activities, and literally feeling like they were going to die when teachers anounced that they were doing partner projects in school. That is when it hit me that I was pretty much hearing the story of my life. :/

It gets frustrating. Not only is it impossible for me to hold a conversation with anyone in real life, but then the few people I do talk to are always telling me I should be more social. "Why don't you talk?" is probably the question I've been asked more than any other. When I give them the honest answer ("I don't know what to say/I just can't") I get a lecture from my dad about how it isn't anywhere near as hard as I make it out to be. All you have to do is walk up to someone and say "Hi, how are you?" It sure sounds easy, but it's not that simple for me. I literally can't. It's like my brain freezes up when I try to talk to people. >:\ Like I said, frustrating.

@ Aqua - o.o I fit.... that... entire... first paragraph...

Bleh... normal people think everything is easy cause it's natural for them.

I am diagnosed as bipolar disorder, ADHD, and I have a debilitating (often crippling) skin disease called hidradenitis suppurativa. A therapist I've seen a few times also believes that I'm suffering from PTSD but I haven't see a doctor about it, because of my crippling anxiety (also un-diagnosed as a disorder but I can say for certain that I have a shitload of anxiety and that I cannot function because of it).
This therapist also thinks I may be on the autism spectrum, but she says she "isn't a doctor and doesn't specialize in that sort of thing, but it might be something [I] should look into." I think that might just be a load of crap though because I spent most of my childhood locked inside my house without social contact except for at school (so I never learned a lot of social cues when I should have been).
I also have some OCD tendencies.

I am considered disabled in the state of New York, because of my ADHD, bipolar and anxiety.

I've been diagnosed with social anxiety. Also, not really a disorder I guess? but very slight schizophrenia.

fade_to_grey: Synaethesia sounds fascinating. Were you born with these merged senses or did it develop at a later stage in your life? Also if you were born with it, how did you know you sensed things differently to others?

monstahh`: Well this should give you a good idea about the autistic spectrum:
Aspie-quiz

The most accurate online test I've seen about asperger's yet. I scored 170/200 [lol] Try to beat my high score XD

---------- Post added 09-10-2012 at 04:39 PM ----------

@ Fade - After some research I think I remember reading about this a long time ago. It's a really bizarre condition I gotta say... but somehow while I may not relate to it, it strangely makes sense.

I'd love to be able to "see" what the world would look like through your eyes XD

I think I have PMDD. I hate saying it because I know a LOT of women get upset about the idea of PMS/PMDD because it's turned into a joke about women and their monthly cycles. But frankly, I think that's what I've had. I'm keeping a journal now of my emotions throughout the month to see if I notice a pattern every month. Otherwise, I might just have depression or anxiety disorder of some sort.

I suspect I might have acute social anxiety disorder, though, because I get really, really wound up when I have to go places where I don't know anyone and one of my biggest issues in life anytime I'm going someplace new is "will I be able to park my car easily or am I going to get trapped in?"

I am going to keep the journal this month and then change my diet/exercise habits (by actually start exercising) and see if that makes any difference. Otherwise I will be going to the doctor. I might discuss whether the birth control I'm on could be contributing to the symptoms or not every month as well.

Now that I've officially grossed everyone out,

@ Estrella - Well women do tend to be more emotional during those times due to hormones and such. Plus, yknow being in pain and all.

Wandering Poet - Yeah, it's true but I've met people who get mad for women saying "PMS" or maybe they get mad because any bad mood a woman is in is attributed to PMS? I don't know. I know that I was awful for about a week and a half. Unbelievably short tempered, couldn't focus on anything, didn't care about anything. I also felt sad and guilty because it affected my daughter as well.

I have Aspergers Syndrome a high functioning one,ADD and Depression. when I was younger I use to have hyper activity. I found out I had depression a few years after Katrina had hit my home state. I would break down and start to cry a lot. cause I miss being around my family that lived down south in are state. at the time we had to live up north of are state. I started to take medicine in 2010 for my depression it dose help me a lot. yet at times I forget to take it,that will mess me up a little.

@ Estrella - Well I knew someone that, for the first day, she'd just curl in the fetal position all day. o.o

@ Star rainbow - There do seem to be a lot of people on that spectrum on menewsha. It's quite an interesting spectrum, one which I've been fascinated by since I first learned about it.
I'm always hyperactive. I shake sometimes because my body has too much energy in it. Like whole arm tremors as if I were shivering from the cold.

The Wandering Poet:

So, well, I guess, maybe, then. >_>;
The quiz also gave me a lil bit of insight.

@ Mon - Wow... 8 points under me.

Though mine are higher on both... so I'm not sure how that works lol

Wandering Poet - That's what I felt like doing but since I have a kid I know that I can't do that. So I just keep plucking along. And snapping at the stupidest of things. Like I legit screamed one time because I got another letter from the DHS. Not because it said anything bad but because they send me one every week and it's just irksome. But that day it was just enraging, apparently.

@ Estrella - Well if I were in tons of pain and bleeding I'd be snapping at people too...
When I had surgery on my foot (I didn't take pain meds) I was in so much pain that I'd have likely smacked anyone who did anything irksome...