Jerrod Balzer

I left Monday morning for Columbia, MO (3 hours from me) to check into the problems I’ve been having. They can see there are definite problems, but they were unable to pinpoint the causes just yet.

I had an attack in the office, so the doctor kept me for 24 hours for testing. He figured it was either cataplexy (I have every single symptom during an attack, and they increase in frequency with less sleep) or catatonia (a mental issue as opposed to physical, where you go into a shock-like catatonic state with stress or anxiety).

That night, I wasn’t on a CPAP so I didn’t get much rest, and therefore had pretty steady attacks the following morning.

My brain waves during sleep didn’t follow normal cataplectic patterns, so they’re not convinced of that, but when I have an attack, I lose muscle tone (go completely limp) which is more like cataplexy. That’s important because it rules out catatonia, where people retain their muscle tone. Instead, they stiffen up and remain rigid.

So, they don’t know. And though they were genuinely concerned (I’m not dumping on them), they did just as doctors in the past had done when my skull was pushed into my brain – back in the early 90s:

Then, doctors couldn’t figure out why I was seeing things, having severe dizzy spells, and had trouble holding food down, so they said it was all “in my head” and put me on psychotic meds. Three years later, a chiropractor fixed my skull and all my symptoms gradually went away.

The final thoughts before they released me yesterday were that I should see a therapist (that didn’t sound familiar at all, lol) because it could be stress related from taking care of my disabled spouse.

Sure, people who care for disabled loved ones are often victims of chronic stress, and I don’t doubt that I have that. But someone please tell me where stress causes cataplectic attacks without technically having cataplexy? And it’s amazing how this hits at the same time that sleep apnea comes on so strongly that I couldn’t function until I got a CPAP machine for it.

I think it’s all related to the apnea, and the entire field still has a lot of question marks over it. But naturally in medical science, if they don’t know right now what’s causing something, then the suffering patient must be loony. It’s the easy answer.

Ugh. It’s frustrating, but I’ll push for more tests and treatments. I can’t keep living like this. There must be something that can help. As it stands, I’m being treated for sleep apnea but I’m getting zero for this other crap.

And again, they all seemed genuinely concerned. It was a great hospital with a wonderful staff. It’s just always hard when you can’t get answers. I won’t fault them for lack of trying. I just hope they don’t give up (as doctors have done in the past).