Hello everyone,My name is Matina Alexis, and I’m so grateful to be here. I live with Psychogenic Non-Epileptic Seizures (PNES), and I’m still in the process of healing. I continue to experience seizures, and through my diagnosis, I uncovered the deeper cause: repressed childhood trauma. I once believed I had already faced and understood my […]
Announcement: new poetry book by a young person living with PNES Read More »
For this month’s blog post, we have invited a young researcher to share her call for research subjects on this site. This research has been approved by an institutional review board and is completely voluntary. If you are interested in reading more about it or in participating if you fit the inclusion criteria, click on
Moral injury in female US combat veterans diagnosed with PNES Read More »
It is important for mental health professionals to be cognizant of this because these patients exist and are encountered in psychotherapists’ offices with certain regularity. For decades if not centuries (if we look back to Pierre Janet and Sigmund Freud) it has been understood that psychological trauma is an important risk factor in the development
A few weeks ago, I was contacted by one of the leaders in the field of research of Psychogenic non-epileptic seizures (PNES); he proposed a project to several professionals in the field of PNES focusing on a topic that is often overlooked not only in PNES but in many other conditions and a variety of
Shame and Psychogenic non-epileptic seizures (PNES): research topic? Read More »
This poem was written by a young adult living with the effects of Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and psychogenic non-epileptic seizures (PNES). Through this poem she communicates to others what her experience is like. Perhaps these words may resonate with you too. ITS BLINKING I SEE A BIG FLASH IM MY HEAD YOU FALL WITH
On October 19, 2019, we will hold our now historic annual conference on psychogenic non-epileptic seizures (PNES). This will be the sixth year running that we offer this educational program on psychogenic non-epileptic seizures for patients, loved ones, and health professionals. As always, the event is free of charge. As always, registrations are streaming
Kanaan and Craig recently published an article “Conversion disorders and the trouble with trauma” (see reference at the bottom of this page) in which they present the reader with a cogent overview of the current debate of whether conversion disorder should be conceptualized as “psychogenic” or instead “as a yet unexplained neurological disorder.” They argue,
Recent article: Conversion disorder and the trouble with trauma Read More »
In June, our team (Myers, Trobliger, Bortnik, Zeng, Segal and Lancman) published: “Dissociation and other clinical phenomena in youth with psychogenic non-epileptic seizures (PNES) compared to youth with epilepsy” in the peer-reviewed journal Seizure: European Journal of Epilepsy. The article had some very interesting findings which I will discuss below. This paper compared 15 youth
This poem was shared by someone who has lived with PNES. Her first seizure occurred with no warning while she was at work. After an initial diagnosis of epilepsy, rounds of medicine, and realizing that medication was not stopping the seizures, she was diagnosed with PNES. A traumatic event that occurred to her decades before
Frozen in time: trauma and psychogenic non-epileptic seizures (PNES) Read More »
Today I want to write about an experience I had a few weeks ago. I was speaking with some of my colleagues at a conference about working with patients who are diagnosed with PNES. Several of them explained that they had been working with patients who had been having seizures (some of them very frequent
