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From: Diane
Thank-you for writing this. I had an episode like your husband's 4 years ago. For about a 2 months they thought I had had a seizure. They revoked my driving privileges, told me I shouldn't take a bath unsupervised and did a complete cardiac and neurological work-up. Everything was fine, of course.
I work in the medical field and finally had an episode at work right in front of a doctor who finally explained that it looked like a vaso-vagal reaction. He was the first one to mention it.
I've tried to do some reading about it but your message is the first one that mentioned seizure-like symptoms. The person who saw my first (and worst) one said that I did all of those same things: stiffened and eyes rolled back in my head before going completely unconscious. When I came to I was mostly coherent (knew who I was, where I was, the day, etc.) but wobbly on my feet and foggy/shaky (had a hard time signing my name at the hospital) for a couple hours afterward.
So, anyway, it's helpful to hear that someone else had those other kind of "seizure-like" symptoms in addition to passing out. It helps me really believe that it was just a vaso-vagal reaction and not a seizure (thankfully they restored my driving privileges after they did all of the neurology tests and they were fine).
I know it's scary - more so for the people who love me than for me. The hardest part was that my 9 year old daughter saw the whole thing for my worst one that looked lie a seizure and she was the one who called 911 while my mom tried to revive me. For two years afterward she worried about it pretty actively and to this day if I ever feel sick in any way she gets scared that I'm going to have another episode and die. It just breaks my heart to see her worried about it.
Anyway, it's reassuring the hear other people's experiences with this. It makes it less scary.