C-PTSD and FND (Conversion) - anyone else out there with both conditions?

[Pilgrim]

Hi

I'm new and in addition to C-PTSD also suffer from a very rare neurological disorder - Functional Neurological Disorder. If you have that one  alone it totally destroys your life - the symptoms are literally crippling. Me - I was lucky to get a double whammy. Is there anyone else out there with both? Just don't want to be the only unicorn in the horrible forest.
FND (Conversion) is in the mental disorders diagnostic manual and now also the neurological diagnostic manual. The mental health hypothesis is that past (and on-going) trauma cannot be dealt with by the person and so the brain tries to deal with it subconsciously in other ways by converting it into something "physical" (as if it isn't physical enough anyway).  FND  affects the neurological signals in the brain causing damaging and lasting physical impairments.  And that condition in itself affects your mental health even if you did not have any mental health issues before. Just layer upon layer of more trauma.
So please let me know if you're also in the same forest.
Thanks for reading.
Pilgrim

[ah]

Hi Pilgrim,

I'm so sorry, sounds like an astounding amount of pain. I hope you get good days, good hours.

I'm not a doctor, not a therapist, only a person, so... just my two cents based on very bad personal experience:

I've got c-ptsd and only found this out on my own a couple of months ago. My whole life I didn't know what was going on with my body and mind. For double whammy (I'm totally with you there!) I also have severe physical problems leading to physical disability, resulting from abuse and accelerated and worsened by abuse and by stress. But for decades these were misdiagnosed, explained away as psychiatric by mistake, over and over till it was too late to treat them.

It seems to me that conversion and c-ptsd could share many symptoms, so it makes me think of Ockham's razor. Did your doctor/s consider the possibility that a newer diagnosis of c-ptsd may explain all your symptoms? Just in case it can.

But if it can't then welcome to the forest of unicorns. I'm one too.

[Dee]

I looked up FND because I have never heard of it.  It sounds awful and I'm sorry you suffer with that.

I don't have anything that extreme, but I have severe IBS.  It can get very bad and when I am more stressed it is hard to leave the house.  Though not the same, this is an example of how trauma resulted in physical symptoms.

[Pilgrim]

Hi Peeps

Thanks for your words and Ah hopefully we'll meet up in the horrid forest and turn it into a National Park. The diagnosis of C-PTSD didn't make any difference to my FND. On that side of things I am going to make a public petition to the Scottish Parliament for more money to go into researching it and making sure that GPs, paramedics and A&E staff know about it. These are the people who chose to go into an area of medicine where you don't know what will walk in through your door and so they have a duty to keep their knowledge base wide. The pain of being in an FND seizure and being unable to move, speak etc and hear health professionals describing your seizures as "pseudo" and some saying worse things (faking etc) just kicks you where your C-PTSD really doesn't need it. TRIGGER WARNING

I was physically assaulted by a paramedic on duty when I took a seizure which paralysed my legs. He demanded that (and I'm female) as I had walked into the hospital I could walk back to the ambulance and get in. I was an in-patient at a psychiatric unit at the time and had self harmed and had been taken to the hospital for stitches. My complaint was upheld by the Scottish Ambulance Authority who have apologised profusely. I don't know whether to press charges. I am actually a lawyer (lol) but have been told that pursuing things could worsen my mental health. It's such a quandary - leave it alone or not. But we've all been in that dilemma haven't we and been made to stay silent. I don't want to silence myself but i also want some peace. But enough of my low mood. I don't wish anyone to have a bad time here. Sorry if I have. Honestly I'm normally really funny and a wicked gallows sense of humour - I'm Northern Irish.
Cheers
Pilgrim

[Three Roses]

yes, i like your humor, i chuckled aloud at the forest -> national park reference. I have some Irish ancestry, quite a bit actually. Very proud of that.

[Andyman73]

This here Unicorn has a broken horn...if ya'll aren't embarressed to be seen with a broken horned Unicorn...I'd love to join your herd.

Hmmmm...well 3 or 4 times great grandpa was a Captain of the Inniskillin Dragoons(if I said that right). And great grandma Agnes McGinnis was Irish...And that one dude...Thomas Perronet Thompson....is the father of my father's father's father's dad. Not sure what that makes me...but in for a penny in for a pound, right?

Pilgrim...just curious...are you a John Wayne fan? Pilgrim was one of his favorite nicknames for folks in his western movies.

[sanmagic7]

hey,

i'm suffering from neurological misgivings as well.  restless leg syndrome, for one, is caused by sending faulty messages from the brain to the nerves in the legs.  alexithymia, an inability to recognize or verbalize feelings, is due to faulty wiring in the brain.  from that has come all kinds of physical ailments, including ibs and fibromyalgia.

when i looked up fnd, i discovered that dissociative disorders can come under that broad heading.  i've certainly experienced depersonalization, as well as an inability to move my legs normally when under duress.  a generic  mri showed no abnormalities.

no, you're not the only unicorn in this forest - a national park would be wonderful.    big hug.