Squirrel Fourteen
02-28-2007, 03:33 PM
Hi, all. Would you please coach me in how to get in to see the right people and how to behave with them? For one thing, I want to finally get in to see a neurologist and I want him to find out what is going wrong. Also, since I never trust any one doctor, I'd appreciate if you could refer me to the best forum in which (meanwhile) I could ask this question again.
I am almost 34. I am an engineer with a degree from a great university, and I had an excellent job with a Fortune 500 company until my brain had finally fried too much. It had begun in college. Since summer 1992, when I was 19, when I try to program computers or use complicated computer applications, the harder I concentrate, the faster I "burn out" and almost fall alseep, and my intuitive sense is that this near-narcolepsy is a sign; that I am having partial seizures. When I force past this warning, or even read too much at a time, I usually get the following set of symptoms: bad headaches, depression, hypersensitivy to audio and visual stimuli, slowness to integrate these stimuli (can't keep up with face to face conversation), and have flu-like symptoms. These last for days, weeks, or sometimes months. I tried a tricyclic and an SSRI antidepressant back in college, to no avail. I am getting small results from the orthomolecular (nutritional) school of MD's (Hoffman, Pfeiffer, Pauling, etc.). I'm diagnosed with pyroluria, histadelia, and poor blood sugar control, and I take supplements geared toward treating those.
If I go directly to a neurologist, will I be bypassing some sort of "chain of command?" I suppose I can mention what my urologist told me: "If you really do need up to 20-30 grams of vitamin C per day to control your headaches, you may have brain cancer and should see a neurologist." Would that fly? Would relaying that get me a reasonable workup?
If I go to a psychiatrist, will he just pump me up with meds, probably starting with Prozac?
I've seen some neurofeedback practitioners (Neuropathways and LENS) but they do not run a "real" QEEG and I've never had one.
I did once get an MEG eval under a research study by a fellow I met at a seminar while a public health student. (See, the health care seemed so bad, I figured I'd make it my mission to reform it.) The MEG showed impaired audio sensory gating: my response to a second identical tone was *greater* than to the first, where it should be smaller. Imagine if the same stimulus were repeated hundreds of times, how big the response might become.
In all this time -- almost fifteen years since the beginning, and amost seven since I had to quit work -- I've NEVER had a real neurological workup. This seems very ironic because both my means and the "stakes" were (originally) both way above average. Due to a windfall from employee stock options in 1999 and 2000, I originally had plenty of money to spend on medical care. And since I have been essentially disabled from my original occupation since late 1999, I resigned in 2000. (In doing so I walked away from another set of unvested stock options worth another $500,000 at the time.)
Yet since I am hypersensitive to people thinking I am a malingerer or a hypochondriac, I've been easily flustered and discouraged and never have pressed very hard for a diagnosis. Under pressure I even forget what I meant to say and have to read off a list, which makes me feel like a "phoney." (And when I do get a diagnosis, I eventually tend to piss off the diagnostician because I opt for more alternative types of therapies over the usually proferred drugs. I've simply read too much of Marcia Angell, her colleagues at the ICMJE, and any number of dissedents...)
Thanks for any tips on getting seen and on getting along with someone who sees me. If I can't find something here in the States, I may try to teach English in China where there is a more holistic and I believe more capable paradigm...
Thanks,
Squirrel :confused:
I am almost 34. I am an engineer with a degree from a great university, and I had an excellent job with a Fortune 500 company until my brain had finally fried too much. It had begun in college. Since summer 1992, when I was 19, when I try to program computers or use complicated computer applications, the harder I concentrate, the faster I "burn out" and almost fall alseep, and my intuitive sense is that this near-narcolepsy is a sign; that I am having partial seizures. When I force past this warning, or even read too much at a time, I usually get the following set of symptoms: bad headaches, depression, hypersensitivy to audio and visual stimuli, slowness to integrate these stimuli (can't keep up with face to face conversation), and have flu-like symptoms. These last for days, weeks, or sometimes months. I tried a tricyclic and an SSRI antidepressant back in college, to no avail. I am getting small results from the orthomolecular (nutritional) school of MD's (Hoffman, Pfeiffer, Pauling, etc.). I'm diagnosed with pyroluria, histadelia, and poor blood sugar control, and I take supplements geared toward treating those.
If I go directly to a neurologist, will I be bypassing some sort of "chain of command?" I suppose I can mention what my urologist told me: "If you really do need up to 20-30 grams of vitamin C per day to control your headaches, you may have brain cancer and should see a neurologist." Would that fly? Would relaying that get me a reasonable workup?
If I go to a psychiatrist, will he just pump me up with meds, probably starting with Prozac?
I've seen some neurofeedback practitioners (Neuropathways and LENS) but they do not run a "real" QEEG and I've never had one.
I did once get an MEG eval under a research study by a fellow I met at a seminar while a public health student. (See, the health care seemed so bad, I figured I'd make it my mission to reform it.) The MEG showed impaired audio sensory gating: my response to a second identical tone was *greater* than to the first, where it should be smaller. Imagine if the same stimulus were repeated hundreds of times, how big the response might become.
In all this time -- almost fifteen years since the beginning, and amost seven since I had to quit work -- I've NEVER had a real neurological workup. This seems very ironic because both my means and the "stakes" were (originally) both way above average. Due to a windfall from employee stock options in 1999 and 2000, I originally had plenty of money to spend on medical care. And since I have been essentially disabled from my original occupation since late 1999, I resigned in 2000. (In doing so I walked away from another set of unvested stock options worth another $500,000 at the time.)
Yet since I am hypersensitive to people thinking I am a malingerer or a hypochondriac, I've been easily flustered and discouraged and never have pressed very hard for a diagnosis. Under pressure I even forget what I meant to say and have to read off a list, which makes me feel like a "phoney." (And when I do get a diagnosis, I eventually tend to piss off the diagnostician because I opt for more alternative types of therapies over the usually proferred drugs. I've simply read too much of Marcia Angell, her colleagues at the ICMJE, and any number of dissedents...)
Thanks for any tips on getting seen and on getting along with someone who sees me. If I can't find something here in the States, I may try to teach English in China where there is a more holistic and I believe more capable paradigm...
Thanks,
Squirrel :confused: