6 ms·

I've experienced this, not as a result of having a stroke, but as a result of severe dehydration and depleted potassium making parts of my brain shut down, or a

I've experienced this, not as a result of having a stroke, but as a result of severe dehydration and depleted potassium making parts of my brain shut down, or at least malfunction horribly. It is terrifying, and even looking at this picture makes me begin to feel the panic I felt during that episode. I could not identify anything, or figure out the connection between what I was touching and what I was seeing. Bath taps became cats, my hands were strange alien objects that kept intruding into my field of view, the ambulance was some kind of great bloody animal that I was about to be fed to. I screamed blue murder and wept while clinging to a towel rail, apparently, until the paramedics sedated me. It's hard to quantify just how scary losing that connection to reality is. I need to go have a cup of tea. Looking at that has really shaken me.

nkozyra 8y ago
I've had this experience before enough times that it's no longer frightening but means I urgently need some Gatorade or I may start shaking and pouring sweat. For me it's more like a moving shade that makes it impossible to see what's behind it rather than not being able to recognize it. Do you have some detail on what you think it's the brain shutting down rather than an effect on the eyes themselves?
- Mirioron 8y ago
  Maybe it's the electrolytes. An electrolyte imbalance can lead to a situation that mimics the symptoms of a stroke.[0] >For me it's more like a moving shade that makes it impossible to see what's behind it rather than not being able to recognize it. Are you aware of the shade or does it behave like your blind spot? Because I've had a few instances in my life where it felt like my blind spot took up a much larger portion of my vision. I've also had the shaking then suddenly starting to profusely sweat that goes away when I eat something. [0] https://atlasofscience.org/stroke-mimics-why-we-need-to-consider-changing-the-protocol-for-stroke-treatment/ https://atlasofscience.org/stroke-mimics-why-we-need-to-cons...
  - michaelgrafl 8y ago
    I've had this about three times in my life. The first time I thought I was having a stroke and went to bed, in the hopes it would go away. The next morning I was alright. The second time happened at work and a co-worker brought me to the hospital. Turned out I was having a migraine attack with aura. The third time happened at work again. I took an aspirin and took it easy for about an hour. My project manager asked me to go home, but that felt more troublesome to me than just sitting it out.
    - Mirioron 8y ago
      Man, that's terrible. What happens if this hits while you're driving?
      - kozak 8y ago
        I assume we're talking about scintillating scotoma here - you have about a minute to find a safe place to stop until the "blind" zone grows enough. But yeah, this precludes the bearer from piloting mechanisms that can't come to a stop within a minute.
      - brimstedt 8y ago
        i get something close to this before I get a migraine: https://images.app.goo.gl/XS938pFYT6a2Juuq7 https://images.app.goo.gl/XS938pFYT6a2Juuq7 starts as a small spot right in the "centre of vision". then it grows until I can't see anything at all. Then vision comes back and is replaced by a headache so bad, even the tiniest movement hurts like a knife cut. Then I sleep between 4 and 12 hours. The day after I'm something like hung over and the day after that it's like nothing happened. Luckily, I don't get it often any more :-) But it's hard to explain to other people when it happens. the good thing about the aura is I get a warning what's about to come, usually it means I can get home before it breaks out. I can only remember once when the headache broke out before I got home and I started sobbing like a baby on the bus. An old lady worriedly asked me if I needed help and I don't really remember how I got home.
  - kozak 8y ago
- 99052882514569 8y ago
  What makes you dehydrate so severely so often? I've never had this happen, and I'm not that on-the-ball about hydration.
  - nkozyra 8y ago
    I drink an inordinate amount of coffee (and often a few servings of beer the night before) and exercise quite a bit. I'm bad about drinking water
    - ZeroFries 8y ago
      Are you sure it's dehydration and not hypoglycemia?
      - nkozyra 8y ago
        My only real hint is it's instantly fixed with a few glasses of water. I'd expect that I'd need some glycogen change if it were hypoglycemia.
    - SketchySeaBeast 8y ago
      Are you constantly incredibly thirsty? Coffee isn't actually a net loss in water - as Zerofries suggested, something else is wrong, or you're drinking a lot of beer all the time(which I'd argue is probably also "something wrong").
      - cferr 8y ago
        Caffeine is a diuretic. If he isn't drinking decaf, it's a net loss.
        SketchySeaBeast 8y ago
        While it is, it doesn't lead to a net loss in hydration. https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/nutrition-and-healthy-eating/expert-answers/caffeinated-drinks/faq-20057965 https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/nutrition-and-h... https://nationalpost.com/health/nutrition-fact-or-fallacy-does-coffee-dehydrate-you https://nationalpost.com/health/nutrition-fact-or-fallacy-do... http://time.com/5192272/coffee-tea-dehydrating/ http://time.com/5192272/coffee-tea-dehydrating/ https://www.webmd.com/diet/qa/does-caffeine-have-a-dehydrating-effect https://www.webmd.com/diet/qa/does-caffeine-have-a-dehydrati...
- madaxe_again 8y ago
  In my case, it was about day seven or eight of no water, no food, just profound vomiting until there was nothing left to vomit - anything I did drink came straight back out. As to it being brain rather than eyes - I had a seizure once I was in hospital (I’m not epileptic or anything of the sort), and I was unable to assemble any thoughts much beyond unbelievable thirst - although my eyes were also affected - blurred and double vision. My K levels were about 1.5 - imminent death zone. Heart kept stopping and starting. Thank Cthulhu for Hartmann’s solution.
  - ZeroFries 8y ago
    Can I ask why you didn't go to hospital for fluids by day 2 or 3?
    - NullPrefix 8y ago
      No insurance?
    - madaxe_again 8y ago
      Because this had become a semi-regular occurrence, and apart from three occasions out of some forty episodes, I managed myself back to a functional state. Hospitalisation is an absolute pain in the ass, means no sleep, no rest, and even more time lost. I also greatly lost faith in the medical establishment - they failed to diagnose me, and carried out an unnecessary surgery which made matters worse. I spent years excluding things from my lifestyle and diet to figure out what was making me ill to no avail. I finally left my business, as I was getting to the point that I was in a perpetual cycle of being ill and frantically catching up, which was immensely stressful over the last five years or so of my tenure there, and about six months later, the vomiting stopped. It’s now been years. I never took chronic stress seriously - now I do. It nearly killed me.
  - ArlenBales 8y ago
    Dude. You need to explain how you got into this situation of not drinking or eating for 7+ days. Right now we're all imagining you crossed the Saraha on foot or something equally reckless.
- cryptonector 8y ago
  For me it turned out to be sudden blood pressure drops. I'd see my vision fade to yellow from the outside in. At 12 I had every damned test done by an ophthalmologist, only to come up empty. Much later, I had blood drawn for a test and when I stood after the same thing happened, but worse, and from everyone else's pov I fainted (I could hear and think, but not see or move). That's when I realized the issue was sudden blood pressure drops. Sometimes this was accompanied by sugar lows, sometimes not. Mind you, I never saw anything like the picture we're discussing here.
_eric 8y ago
> I need to go have a cup of tea. Looking at that has really shaken me. I have had my episode of panic attack and just looking at that picture made me feel some of those bad feelings again. Really weird.
SolaceQuantum 8y ago
Admittedly I find this reaction very interesting in comparison to my own. I find not recognizing things very normal (due to the way my brain functions) and so upon viewing the photo my brain took the equivalent of a step back, squinting a little, and then moving on with its day. It identified black portions as cat fur, then there was an animal head, piles of garbage, some jewelery, mostly due to texture and internal pattern matching of what portions of things generally look like and projecting them onto the page.
dejawu 8y ago
This is really interesting (and horrifying - I'm sorry you had to go through that). I find it very curious how much these neural-net-driven visualizations map onto human neurological experiences - for example, deep dream resembling an acid trip. That makes me feel like, at least on a cursory level, that neural nets are a step in the right direction to meeting "human intelligence".

nkozyra 8y ago

I've had this experience before enough times that it's no longer frightening but means I urgently need some Gatorade or I may start shaking and pouring sweat. For me it's more like a moving shade that makes it impossible to see what's behind it rather than not being able to recognize it. Do you have some detail on what you think it's the brain shutting down rather than an effect on the eyes themselves?

Mirioron 8y ago
Maybe it's the electrolytes. An electrolyte imbalance can lead to a situation that mimics the symptoms of a stroke.[0] >For me it's more like a moving shade that makes it impossible to see what's behind it rather than not being able to recognize it. Are you aware of the shade or does it behave like your blind spot? Because I've had a few instances in my life where it felt like my blind spot took up a much larger portion of my vision. I've also had the shaking then suddenly starting to profusely sweat that goes away when I eat something. [0] https://atlasofscience.org/stroke-mimics-why-we-need-to-consider-changing-the-protocol-for-stroke-treatment/ https://atlasofscience.org/stroke-mimics-why-we-need-to-cons...
- michaelgrafl 8y ago
  I've had this about three times in my life. The first time I thought I was having a stroke and went to bed, in the hopes it would go away. The next morning I was alright. The second time happened at work and a co-worker brought me to the hospital. Turned out I was having a migraine attack with aura. The third time happened at work again. I took an aspirin and took it easy for about an hour. My project manager asked me to go home, but that felt more troublesome to me than just sitting it out.
  - Mirioron 8y ago
    Man, that's terrible. What happens if this hits while you're driving?
    - kozak 8y ago
      I assume we're talking about scintillating scotoma here - you have about a minute to find a safe place to stop until the "blind" zone grows enough. But yeah, this precludes the bearer from piloting mechanisms that can't come to a stop within a minute.
    - brimstedt 8y ago
      i get something close to this before I get a migraine: https://images.app.goo.gl/XS938pFYT6a2Juuq7 https://images.app.goo.gl/XS938pFYT6a2Juuq7 starts as a small spot right in the "centre of vision". then it grows until I can't see anything at all. Then vision comes back and is replaced by a headache so bad, even the tiniest movement hurts like a knife cut. Then I sleep between 4 and 12 hours. The day after I'm something like hung over and the day after that it's like nothing happened. Luckily, I don't get it often any more :-) But it's hard to explain to other people when it happens. the good thing about the aura is I get a warning what's about to come, usually it means I can get home before it breaks out. I can only remember once when the headache broke out before I got home and I started sobbing like a baby on the bus. An old lady worriedly asked me if I needed help and I don't really remember how I got home.
- kozak 8y ago
99052882514569 8y ago
What makes you dehydrate so severely so often? I've never had this happen, and I'm not that on-the-ball about hydration.
- nkozyra 8y ago
  I drink an inordinate amount of coffee (and often a few servings of beer the night before) and exercise quite a bit. I'm bad about drinking water
  - ZeroFries 8y ago
    Are you sure it's dehydration and not hypoglycemia?
    - nkozyra 8y ago
      My only real hint is it's instantly fixed with a few glasses of water. I'd expect that I'd need some glycogen change if it were hypoglycemia.
  - SketchySeaBeast 8y ago
    Are you constantly incredibly thirsty? Coffee isn't actually a net loss in water - as Zerofries suggested, something else is wrong, or you're drinking a lot of beer all the time(which I'd argue is probably also "something wrong").
    - cferr 8y ago
      Caffeine is a diuretic. If he isn't drinking decaf, it's a net loss.
      - SketchySeaBeast 8y ago
        While it is, it doesn't lead to a net loss in hydration. https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/nutrition-and-healthy-eating/expert-answers/caffeinated-drinks/faq-20057965 https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/nutrition-and-h... https://nationalpost.com/health/nutrition-fact-or-fallacy-does-coffee-dehydrate-you https://nationalpost.com/health/nutrition-fact-or-fallacy-do... http://time.com/5192272/coffee-tea-dehydrating/ http://time.com/5192272/coffee-tea-dehydrating/ https://www.webmd.com/diet/qa/does-caffeine-have-a-dehydrating-effect https://www.webmd.com/diet/qa/does-caffeine-have-a-dehydrati...
madaxe_again 8y ago
In my case, it was about day seven or eight of no water, no food, just profound vomiting until there was nothing left to vomit - anything I did drink came straight back out. As to it being brain rather than eyes - I had a seizure once I was in hospital (I’m not epileptic or anything of the sort), and I was unable to assemble any thoughts much beyond unbelievable thirst - although my eyes were also affected - blurred and double vision. My K levels were about 1.5 - imminent death zone. Heart kept stopping and starting. Thank Cthulhu for Hartmann’s solution.
- ZeroFries 8y ago
  Can I ask why you didn't go to hospital for fluids by day 2 or 3?
  - NullPrefix 8y ago
    No insurance?
  - madaxe_again 8y ago
    Because this had become a semi-regular occurrence, and apart from three occasions out of some forty episodes, I managed myself back to a functional state. Hospitalisation is an absolute pain in the ass, means no sleep, no rest, and even more time lost. I also greatly lost faith in the medical establishment - they failed to diagnose me, and carried out an unnecessary surgery which made matters worse. I spent years excluding things from my lifestyle and diet to figure out what was making me ill to no avail. I finally left my business, as I was getting to the point that I was in a perpetual cycle of being ill and frantically catching up, which was immensely stressful over the last five years or so of my tenure there, and about six months later, the vomiting stopped. It’s now been years. I never took chronic stress seriously - now I do. It nearly killed me.
- ArlenBales 8y ago
  Dude. You need to explain how you got into this situation of not drinking or eating for 7+ days. Right now we're all imagining you crossed the Saraha on foot or something equally reckless.
cryptonector 8y ago
For me it turned out to be sudden blood pressure drops. I'd see my vision fade to yellow from the outside in. At 12 I had every damned test done by an ophthalmologist, only to come up empty. Much later, I had blood drawn for a test and when I stood after the same thing happened, but worse, and from everyone else's pov I fainted (I could hear and think, but not see or move). That's when I realized the issue was sudden blood pressure drops. Sometimes this was accompanied by sugar lows, sometimes not. Mind you, I never saw anything like the picture we're discussing here.

_eric 8y ago

> I need to go have a cup of tea. Looking at that has really shaken me. I have had my episode of panic attack and just looking at that picture made me feel some of those bad feelings again. Really weird.

SolaceQuantum 8y ago

Admittedly I find this reaction very interesting in comparison to my own. I find not recognizing things very normal (due to the way my brain functions) and so upon viewing the photo my brain took the equivalent of a step back, squinting a little, and then moving on with its day. It identified black portions as cat fur, then there was an animal head, piles of garbage, some jewelery, mostly due to texture and internal pattern matching of what portions of things generally look like and projecting them onto the page.

dejawu 8y ago

This is really interesting (and horrifying - I'm sorry you had to go through that). I find it very curious how much these neural-net-driven visualizations map onto human neurological experiences - for example, deep dream resembling an acid trip. That makes me feel like, at least on a cursory level, that neural nets are a step in the right direction to meeting "human intelligence".