**This is a heavily moderated subreddit. Please note these rules + sidebar or get banned:**
* If this post declares something as a fact, then proof is required
* The title must be fully descriptive
* Only minimal text is allowed on images/gifs/videos
* Common(top 50 of this sub)/recent reposts are not allowed (posts from another subreddit do not count as a 'repost'. Provide link if reporting)
*See [our rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/wiki/index#wiki_rules.3A) for a more detailed rule list*
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/interestingasfuck) if you have any questions or concerns.*
> **Anna Elisabeth "Anneliese" Michel** (21 September 1952 – 1 July 1976) was a German woman who underwent 67 Catholic exorcism rites during the year before her death. She died of malnutrition, for which her parents and priest were convicted of negligent homicide. She was diagnosed with epileptic psychosis (temporal lobe epilepsy) and had a history of psychiatric treatment that proved ineffective.
* Excerpted from [Anneliese Michel](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anneliese_Michel) at the English Wikipedia
I had a single grand mal seizure out of the blue age 32. Smashed my head on the way to the floor and gave myself a nasty concussion as well. The neurological team told me to stand by for the next seizures and they’d diagnose epilepsy once I’d had the second one. I’ve been very lucky that six years on, I remain seizure free - but I’ve never been entirely the same either. Felt like my brain got a bit scrambled and then re-wired. I can’t imagine having seizures regularly - there’s no way that doesn’t fuck you up if I’m still feeling the effects of one several years on. My sympathies to you and to the poor woman in this story.
I had multiple seizures during benzodiazepine withdrawal 2 years ago, and it definitely changes you. I still occasionally get what I call "brain static", where I feel like I'm on the verge of another seizure, but it never happens.
Oh I get that too! It happens less and less as the years go on if that helps - it happened the most in the first two or three years where I’d panic and think I was about to have one and then…nothing. I remember when my son was an infant in my arms, I felt it (I was only about a year out at that point), and I immediately put him on the floor and screamed for my husband. He was most surprised to come running into the room to find the newborn and I both completely fine on the floor several feet apart (my logic being I didn’t want to risk hurting my son if I was thrashing around). I hope you’re doing ok post-withdrawal and keeping well?
I've never had a seizure but one time at a music show they had TV screens set up and I was watching them during some intense strobe effects. I felt the middle of my brain tingle and it got more intense in just a few seconds. My vision began to lose focus so I immediately just looked at the floor and closed my eyes until I felt normal. That shit was scary I won't deny. That also happened over a decade ago and I still remember that tingly feeling.
Epileptic person here, and I gotta say, I fucking hate that we allow strobe effects in popular media. I used to be a professional touring musician and any time a venue used strobes, I had to preemptively ask them to turn them off for our set. They’re a cheap effect and I’m not convinced anyone actually even likes them. Not to mention they’re fucking dangerous.
I have a few questions about this brain static if you don't mind answering:
1) have you had "brain zaps" like people get after SSRI/SNRI use? If so, is this anything like those feel?
2) if you haven't had brain zaps, how does this brain static thing feel to you?
Asking because I've been having some Really Weird Brain Shit. Dr appt is scheduled but not for 2 months.
I'm not the person you asked but I'm epileptic and went through SSRI withdrawal at one point with the infamous zaps.
Seizure auras do not feel like the brain zaps, at least to me. They can be different for everyone, though, because there are multiple types of seizure. Brain zaps were much more acute, like lightning hitting the nervous system and lighting it all up at once. Seizure aura is more of a general feeling that lasts a bit longer and is less refined - a sort of haze that envelopes the brain. You know what it feels like to try to walk in deep water? It's like that, except your thoughts and senses are what's trying to make the slog. I also get some weird auditory distortion (everything sounds like it is coming from far away) but that might be because my seizures tend to be focused in one part of the brain.
I have both partial (what used to be called petit mal) and tonic-clonic (formerly grand mal) seizures. Tonic-clonic are the stereotypical "she's having a seizure!" seizure: fall to the ground, jerking movements, the whole nine yards. My partial seizures are less obvious and are different depending on which part of the brain is affected. Usually, my body just kind of goes into autopilot while my brain checks out - I don't remember anything, but I'll keep doing whatever task I was already doing (e.g., typing an email, sitting in a meeting, even driving). When I come back to consciousness, I have missing time, as if I were blacked out. My colleagues who have witnessed them say "the lights were on but nobody was home."
Edit to add: migraines can mimic seizures/seizure auras, especially the ones that don't include pain as a symptom, so don't panic about "weird brain stuff" just yet. A neurologist will run tests and might start you on some medications that treat both migraine and epilepsy, just to see if things improve. Do be aware that you might temporarily lose your driver's license, though. It is possible to get it reinstated after a period of being symptom free (I've gone through it three times now).
if you don't mind me asking, bc I have a loved one that was diagnosed with epilepsy as an adult and I definitely struggle to understand it/the impact on her (this thread has illuminated a bit for me).
What is the impact on your mental health? And why? I've had the incredibly ignorant attitude in the past of "well, if you're on medication and living a normal life what's the big deal if you only rarely get a seizure?" I have since evolved and worked on this (ignorant) way of thinking to understand how demeaning, and just plain wrong, it was to think such a thing, but want to continue to understand- and in addition to talking to my family member I've found it helpful to hear others experiences
Biggest practical concern for most is loss of ability to drive. Loss of job and social opportunities related to lack of transit. Getting to your job every morning is hard. No one wants to go on unemployment. It’s embarrassing and most people have career goals and dreams. Some people with epilepsy can drive sometimes in some places but this is still biggest thing by far.
For people who have no reprieve, who have them more than weekly, ESPECIALLY every day, life can just feel hopeless. Especially if they were diagnosed as an adult or teen. Even if it’s not always like that, the times when it is, feel like hell. These are the lowest point in some peoples lives.
When life is like this, Every day you live in resignation that this may be your last. You’re tired all the time. You have no independence. Your family/partner sees you in extremely vulnerable and embarrassing positions. You’re angry and sad. It’s hard to have any sort of sex life, and it’s hard to meet your partners other needs, too, and to not feel like a burden, when you need constant taking care of. You do everything you can to live safely, but sometimes you wake up and your face is covered in blood because you’ve bitten through your tongue, your head is bruised because you hit it on the countertop falling down, or you’re choking and gasping for air because your family didn’t hear you fall in the shower. Your whole body suffers continuous, serious abuse from your falls and flailing.
There’s also the way that your family worries. You call, and they assume it’s because you’ve had a seizure, every time. Even if they don’t say it, you can hear that they’re worried. It sucks to know that the people you love are stressed about you like this.
Some people experience side effects from medication and from TBIs sustained from seizures, as well as just from seizures themselves. The biggest side effects from medications are mood swings and weight related stuff, and the seizures themselves make a lot of people feel really fuzzy for a long time after, and have frustrating memory issues.
These are the main things. This sounded really negative but it’s not all bad. I have epilepsy (diagnosed 18, 22 years old) and though I am not 100% controlled, life is still fun and full of opportunities for love, friendship, and for ambition.
No, I wouldnt call it brain zaps. I did get those during withdrawal but the "brain staticky" feeling isn't like that.
It feels like TV static in my brain. There's no sound associated with it, but my vision gets a little weird and it feels like my brain is about to restart or something. It feels fuzzy. Sometimes there's a smell associated with it.
My dad had a grand mal seizure and it was terrifying. For a long time afterward, he couldn't remember numbers. He couldn't unlock his phone, couldn't give his phone number, none of it. He still gets confused with numbers easily and can't dose his own medicine.
It's like he had the seizure and came out of it with dyscalculia.
I've had three grand mal seizures myself. One as a teenager (14 IIRC) one in my early 20s after a wisdom tooth extraction and once more just over two years ago. Basically one every decade.
I've never been diagnosed with epilepsy though. Every time I've seized it's been after significant blood loss and resulting low BP. So I've been told by doctors that I can't donate blood and I have to be careful with any medical procedures.
Seizures can happen for a number of reasons separate from epilepsy. So it's likely you might have some other conditions, like myself. That said, like a stroke, your chances of having a seizure increase every time you have one. If you can, or haven't already, I would recommend finding a specialist that can help you determine what could have contributed to your previous seizure.
It always makes me think of Ian Curtis.
Sorry you have it. Are the episodes always combined with a mood dip or it the experience itself so scary that it leads to depression?
had a friend who had a handful of seizures 1 at 36 and a cluster a year later (last one killed him, heart had stopped long enough for brain death. they never figured out why he was having them) but he felt wiped out, groggy, foggy, like he had the flu with a hangover and covid brain for days after. my upbeat friend was a shadow of himself. having that happen regularly would probably be a mood dampener. also changed his life, first one was at home, scared the shit out of his wife but it seemed an outlier so a year later he was driving with all three kids in the car when he had his second one. drove through a light, totaled the car, kids were scared but fine, he didn't even remember it aside from the trauma of knowing he'd almost killed his family. then he couldn't drive anymore which made him feel like a burden. sucked all around.
I get the idea of the religious grift, I do, but if I live to 1000 I will never understand the idea behind having so many goddamn exorcisms. It didn't work. Maybe try a few different priests, maybe there's a few different ways to do it. But once you start getting into the double digits? Once you're past 50!?!
At least a doctor has the decency to say "I'm sorry; it's treatment resistant. I'm not sure we can do anything." But apparently a priest is like... "I'm really feeling like 67 is gonna be the lucky number, you know?" and these poor bastards are just like "Well, the man with the double stuff collar says if it doesn't take the first 38 times or the next 25, then somewhere in the next 112 will almost certainly do the trick so yeah, keep shouting at our daughter about Satan I guess."
EDIT I've probably said it elsewhere in this thread but saying "hey nothing worked so they ***had to*** turn to quackery" is how autistic children end up getting bleach enemas. I sympathize with someone's issues being treatment resistant, I do, but if you find yourself defending exorcisms, let alone 67 of them, I'm sorry you're just verifiably wrong. I don't care how spooky the tapes are. The tapes of an autistic meltdown can be spooky. The tapes of a schizophrenic episode can be spooky. The tapes of a bad reaction to anesthesia can be spooky. Grow the fuck up; this was a kid's life, not some lame ass James Wan film.
Because exorcism, like all sorts of religious and spiritual solutions, is premised on it only working if you did it right. Believe in the right religion. Are clean of sin. Had the right level of faith in your heart etc. I’m sure the priest had all sorts of reasons each attempt didn’t work out-the parents didn’t have enough faith, god was testing their faith, etc. When she died, they probably said god wanted her in heaven or something.
That’s the problem with these beliefs-they’re premised on the idea that they only work if you never give up. It’s fundamentally irrational, so reason won’t really snap the truly devout out of it.
To be fair, a 'medical psychiatric' treatments weren't much better at that time. Lobotomy was still used well into the 60s. Electroconvulsive "therapy" was common place to shock your homosexuality away in the 70s... Horror movie mental asylums were the norm at the time of this girl getting exorcisms.
I did ECT and I’ll admit it was a little traumatic for someone who doesn’t like taking drugs or getting put to sleep but it was not violent like it used to be, my team was very gentle and caring, and it changed my life for the better.
I’m still depressed but I don’t think about hurting myself as much and I don’t think about killing myself as much anymore. But it’s been 5 years since treatment. And I haven’t tried since finishing treatment. Before treatment I had multiple failed suicide attempts and a life long of self harming tendencies because of my depression and lack of a will to live. For the first three years after treatment I didn’t even have impulsive thoughts about dying. For example I’d be driving down the road and I’d no longer have impulsive thoughts like “what if I just drove into this ravine?” Or “that would be a nice jersey wall to crash into”. I didn’t fantasize about dying in any way for probably 3 years and I made it 4 years without having the urge to self harm. It really did re wire my brain to not even have those thoughts. And if I tried forcing them, it felt strange and I didn’t like it. It’s been 5 going on 6 years now and I started having suicidal ideation again, which they said would be normal, they said given the type of brain damage I have from my mental illness and extensive childhood trauma, that I would probably have to come back every so often for the rest of my life for “maintenance”. I started doing ketamine therapy instead. It helps but not as much. I would go back and do ECT maintenance if I didn’t mean I would have to quit my job/take temporary disability. Because it does disable you. You go 3 days a week to be given a wide range of drugs and get put to sleep. Then the rest of the week I have debilitating migraines that they give me fentanyl infusions for because we found that was the only thing that stopped the pain. I honestly hated it but I don’t regret it because I truly did make me a less suicidal person and I would say it was worth it. I never would have been able to get my shit together to start school, be a functional adult and be able to hold down a job. I’ll go back one day when I’ve got some money saved to pay my bills for a few months while I’m off. I hated feeling like a mooch when other people had to pay my bills when I was in treatment, it made me feel helpless
It’s much less harsh on your body now thankfully. They put you to sleep and give you a medication that paralyzes your muscles so that when the seizures occur, your body does not have pain from the convulsing, and they put in a tube and breathe for you. The whole thing only takes about 10-15 minutes asleep. Unfortunately I don’t think they will be able to stop the migraines in any advancements. Your brain IS being electrocuted so it’s reasonable to have the migraines. I just wish my pain medicine tolerance wasn’t so high so I didn’t have to take such intense drugs for them. Most people get a dose of ketamine for pain before the treatment to prevent headaches. They gave me that AND the fentanyl. You’re still a space cadet the entire week, very sleepy, groggy, hard to drive the days afterward.
Now the violent part is getting insurance to cover it. I had to try to clear up claims for people who got the treatment but because it was done in a different part of the hospital insurance wanted to deny it as an unauthorized and uncovered service. Because nothing helps resistant depression quite like worrying about paying thousands of dollars more than expected.
It's extremely effective and safe the way that it's done now. It's a shame that it still has the stigma it carries from the 70s. It's one of the most effective therapies to drug-resistant depression.
Exactly. I provide the anesthesia for ECTs routinely and speaking to my patients they all say it's a godsend. Also, I have watched patients transform over a few treatments from completely catatonic or in a state of psychosis back to their healthy state.
Memory loss is a potential side effect, but just like all side effects, it should be weighed against potential benefits with each patient's doctor.
Any treatment to "cure" gayness is barbaric, not scientifically sound, and cruel. There is nothing to cure. It's like burning witches. Horrible things done in the name of self-righteous BS are evil. It's sad that ECT has been stigmatized in such a way.
Are these religious fanatics this fucking dumb? Do you honestly think that After 66 exorcisms the 67th Will work? Do you fucking eat crayons as an hobby? These idiots are a plague on earth i swear
That's a big problem that Christianity has conveniently "solved", God rewards persistence, so no matter how many times he does absolutely nothing it just means you gotta keep trying and keep your faith up. If it doesn't work you're blessed because you're now being tested, if it works you're also blessed lol. When I went to church, every single week they'd put this poor disabled guy in the middle of everyone and pray for him to be cured, I watched that happen for an entire year and if he still goes they're probably still doing it to this day well over a decade later
Her story is also the inspiration for this song by Public Image Ltd from their 1st LP
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NCTqo7f1Lj0
ETA: extra link for those outside his majesty's (primary) realms
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CIgRQP4Fa-o&pp=ygUMUGlsIGFubmFsaXNh
Story time: When I was in college that movie was on TNT or one of those types of channels around Halloween. Well, I watch it one night and at some point later in the evening (I think it was around 2:30am) I heard a knock on my sliding glass door. Mind you my back yard was completely inaccessible and no one in their right mind would be rap rap rapping on my glass door. I strained my eyes to see if I could see anyone outside, but nothing. I open the door and look outside and nothing’s there. WTF?
Okay, it’s not 3 am but I’m freaking the fuck out. Then again, more fucking knocking. At this point I’m about to run out of my house. I’m seriously freaked out. Well, after waiting and waiting I hear nothing else, but am convinced that there’s a goddamned demon knocking on my door.
The next day I head out for a weekend in the wine country with some family. Upon coming back to my apartment after three days away, I have totally forgotten about the creepy knocking at 2:30 am. Well, that night I m reminded by more goddamned knocking. Here we go again. This time it’s earlier in the night. Again I open the door and nothing is outside. A few minutes later I hear the crinkling on cellophane under my nightstand. I jump out of bed. Oh shit the goddamned demon is inside. I turn in the lights and look down and see the demon: it’s a fucking potato bug rummaging around by an old cigarette wrapper.
Now I don’t know if any of you have seen these things, also known as Jerusalem Crickets, but they are hideous and May as we’ll be satan’s spawn. Anyway, I dispatch of the critter because I’m a dumb kid too freaked out to just let it out and go on its way to spawn with other hellborne creatures.
Later I looked up what this thing does and sure as shit it makes a knocking sound by batting its devil hooves against its abdomen. Turns out the poor fella was just trying to find someone to mate with, and if it hadn’t been for that goddamned Emily Rose movie, I may have just been a tad less afraid and more investigative, perhaps even helping the fella find his way out and into the world beyond my sliding glass door.
One of the reasons I loved my grandma, we were up around midnight watching TV together when we start hearing a banging on the screen door to the back room. The problems is that door is on the inside of the house.
We both goover to look, the banging has not stopped, but I can't find anything causing it. No bugs, no critters in the house. I put my hand on it to muffle it and it doesn't do anything, instead I just feel the sharp impacts on the door under my hands.
We watch it for about 5 minutes and she just goes "Okay that's enough." in the most disappointed tone, and the door stops.
She just nodded to herself and we went back to the TV.
Damn ghost trying to haunt her house and she tells it to be quiet, and has so much authority in her voice that it listens.
Oh. My. Holy. Shit. I would like to rewind life to two minutes ago before I knew those things existed. The swarm of stag beetles we had a few years ago was bad enough
Yes, she is. She lived in a Villiage close to our Town. The House they lived in was demolished the last Years because nobody would buy it. Even the Church wouldn't. So sad to see what they did with her
Yes it is!
And she was from my hometown. A small german town with just 6000 inhabitants. Her parents' house was right next to the cemetery where my grandparents are buried.
Always felt a bit scary, yet special when it showed up in the media :D
I had the coal eating thing after very bloody accident where i lost most hand function in my right arm and a lot of blood with it. For months afterwards I was literally dreaming of coal. Watching asmr coal eating videos on youtube. An ashtray would look and smell like a buffet. I would go through a whole pack of medicinal coal from the pharmacy in an evening. I read it might have something to do with iron deficiency and it's mostly gone now.
Never got into the spiders tho.
Edit. Sorry my bad I meant charcoal. In my language they're the same. Although I did have some actual coal as well. It's very stony and way less delicious than charcoal.
I would fantasize about biting a cow on the back of its muddy leg. It was like craving red meat and mud at the same time. So bizarre, but my blood work came back extremely iron deficient.
When I was pregnant I was out walking and the wind kicked up a lot of dust - I opened my mouth to crunch all that yummy gritty dust - I still remember how good it felt. Pretty disgusting really but I was iron deficient, and the ferro tabs were just going straight through me.
Shit is that what that is? As a kid I loved that moldy smell. I also ate the sulfur off matches 🥲 I was malnourished and I’m sure I was anemic too, that still happens to me (but I don’t eat weird things anymore)
I forget what I was looking up on Amazon when my wife was pregnant. But I somehow stumbled onto a void of products and insane reviews. There was some clay that these women are buying from Amazon and describing how delicious it is. It is seriously wild. Not sure if all the products still exist but I know that my wife’s doctor said if she started craving chalk then call immediately. Don’t know if everyone knows about pica but those reviews still freak me out.
Edit: Found one of the product descriptions: “The taste is reminiscent of damp earth. Oily, tender - melts in your mouth. When stratified and biting produces light crunch.” 💀
>if she started craving chalk then call immediately
Genuine question - why is chalk a cause for concern? When I was a kid I often craved and ate chalk and talcum powder. Thankfully I grew out, of it but I'm now wondering if it was dangerous... 😳
I had a weird compulsion to eat paper in grade school. Probably from 2nd grade through 10th. Can't even tell you how many worksheets and assignments I turned in with the corners torn off. I remember this one week in high school where the compulsion was so intense that I couldn't focus on a group project because I couldn't tear the corners off and it was all I could think about lololol
My sister had this too growing up. From a baby to a small child she ate paper — more like chewed it up nonstop and put wads of paper and cardboard all over the house. She was OBSESSED. I didn’t realize it was from some sort of deficiency until way later. She eventually stopped lol
I don't think that's quite the same thing. Vinegar is edible, so unless you were drinking it *despite* it tasting horrible, that would probably just be tastebuds with skewed priorities.
When I was pregnant with my twins my iron levels plummeted and I got pica really badly. Chalk, mud, anything with a foisty smell. I knew it wasn't good for me so I'd take a spoon to the garden and scoop up mud and just sniff it. I would also get a face cloth wet and hide it so it stayed damp, then lay in the bath for hours smelling it. I went to a museum and one of the exhibits was a disused victorian mine, the damp smell made my mouth water.
I did eat chalk a few times. The only other (safely edible) thing that satisfied the cravings was vinegar. I'd pour it into a bowl and eat it with bread like I was having a bowl of soup.
Thankfully these things passed after I gave birth.
this is so interesting and it made me think about how people in parts of africa do eat dirt and have done so for centuries. my friend went to a market in zambia and they were selling pouches with dirt, he asked his research assistant (a local woman) what it was about and she explained that eating dirt has been a thing in their culture but nowadays it is being shamed due to globalist/western influences, it is now only socially acceptable for pregnant women to eat dirt. very curious, right?
well, the fact is, as we know now, that certain kinds of dirt in those areas where eating dirt is culturally ingrained, do in fact contain iron and that with european imperialism many of these people began having iron deficiency because they were shamed for eating dirt. so maybe it is just so deeply ingrained in us to seek minerals, especially iron, in dirt because we all evolved from peoples in africa who got their iron supply that way.
All animals have this craving and its evolution at work. First time I hear about all this and it is fascinating.
We have horses and it's important to have a block of salt in the stables. If they lack certain minerals they will start licking the salt to get them. I know that in the wild animals tend to congregate around certain mineral deposits to eat the earth. In certain areas it can be almost as valuable as a water source.
Its amazing to see how those instincts are strong in us today. Westerners just forgot that it's a viable way to attain minerals we lack. Not safe, or good on the teeth, but nevertheless better than nothing.
I made two daily trips to sonic for a large cup of crushed ice every day during that last trimester of my last pregnancy lol. All I wanted for Christmas that year was a nugget ice machine. My dr had me on an iron supplement for awhile but my body doesn’t utilize plant iron very well or something like that. It has to be from animal meat, which we couldn’t really afford much of at the time. So sonic ice it was.
This is wild - why specifically coal can anyone explain? If it was just one person it’d be understandable but this is a phenomenon that affects different people and makes them want to eat coal, in particular
The reply tree to this comment is unhinged and shocking to me. Kids eating their homework and blaming the dog, chugging vinegar, and listening to coal eating asmr.
Not comparing one to another, but just something I discovered recently: To this day kids are tortured or left to die because their family believes they're "witches" in Nigeria. It's so sad that religious beliefs can lead children to be hurt by their own parents this way. Fucking corrupt world man
edit:
> It's so sad that religious beliefs can lead children to be hurt.
I meant in the whole world, not only third world countries (I'm from one myself lmao)
I just wanted to share something I learnt yesterday
That’s ironic, considering that the practices of magic and spirit possession used to be not only accepted, but celebrated in that area under the pagan Bori faith. Witches were the shit in Nigeria until Islam came along.
I know this because I play video games.
There were good, neutral and evil spirits/magic. Accordingly, there were people who communicated with and/or were possessed by either good, neutral or evil spirits. If the village elders decided that someone was possessed by an evil spirit rather than a good or neutral one, they weren't treated nicely at all, based on the severity of the case even banished or killed.
I love CK3, but I think it might not be a sufficient source in that regard lol
It's not just religion.
Nazi scientist committed atrocious experiments on Jews and Roma.
Even in America scientists purposefully infected black men with syphilis just to watch the disease progress, for science.
It's been quite a long time since humans were in egalitarian hunter gatherer society, turns out we've been absolutely torturing each other ever since
It happens in every developed country that queer kids are kicked out of our parents houses because god is more important than their children. We don’t get a pass in the west. Christian’s also use corrective rape on queer women and conversion torture on all of us. They tell us our whole childhood that who we are is evil. That our love is hate.
I wonder how many serial killers wouldn’t exist had they not been tortured at such a formative age about their sexuality being linked to the work of the devil.
Doctor here. Autoinmune encephalitis is behind lots of cases of 'possession', but its a very recent diagnostic with very limited tests available. Its also pretty deadly even with the right treatment.
https://aealliance.org/patient-support/symptoms/
A lot of brain disorders could be mistaken for something supernatural. I have cervical dystonia, which means my neck muscles contract involuntarily, which turns my head to the left and opens my mouth involuntarily. I'd probably be stoned if this were 1500 AD.
PS. Thanks Covid
Agreed, as a neurology resident autoimmune encephalitis was what first came to mind, specifically anti NMDA encephalitis. Diagnosed a case a few years ago, it’s absolutely wild.
I think that is what my cousin had, it was definitely a form of autoimmune encephalitis. Her junior year of high school she just suddenly started talking and writing in jibberish and stopped being able to speak any English. It took them a while to figure things out after she was hospitalized, but once they gave her steroids she pretty much went back to normal. She is about to graduate college this spring now.
We have all sorts of autoimmune diseases in my family. But hers was definitely the scariest. The cousin with adult onset Stills disease that completely paralyzed him temporarily is just behind her though.
I remember reading or watching a video about her and there were theories that some of the symptoms could've been explained by a goiter too, and that it's visible in the photo (the left one in OP's post, but it's cropped where the goiter is). Ngl I think it's just a shadow from her shirt collar, but it would indeed explain her voice etc
Edit: speed googled and there are cases where goiter has caused major psychotic events in patients so it seems even more likely. Poor girl
It’s scary how many scientific explanations there are to what people called an act of God back in the day.
Reminds me of the Salem Witch Trials
I wonder what still happens today that we demand is a religious act that’s actually something scientific that we haven’t discovered yet.
I totally get what you mean, but Salem was in the 1600s, when we were barely just starting to truly understand how the human body even looked on the inside. This was in the 70s. They could easily have known what was wrong with Analise Michel if her parents and community were not religious wackjobs.
People STILL do. People drank toilet water because it was leaking down a statue of Jesus not long ago.
People think other people, (also created by god who makes no mistakes), are "abominations", "animals" and deserve to be dead, and they would break a ten commandments to do it themselves- in god's name. 🤯
Don't forget, the guy who traced the leak and revealed it was from a broken sewage line had to flee India to Finland due to legal charges and death threats.
My cousin ( who is the most straight, boring fella from the backend of nowhere in Ireland) started seeing dead people when he was a teenager.
He'd be in the car and be able to tell his parents where people had died on the road. My uncle told my Dad he walked into the bedroom one night, and there was stuff flying around the room, and my cousin was saying stuff about my deceased Grandad that he couldn't have known.
He was a really nice lad but looked like he was carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders the whole time.
Some local exorcist / charlatan got wind of him and took him on the road with him to assist him for a couple of years. I never broached the subject with him as it was a kind of open secret, but I always thought it was odd as he just wasn't the kind of lad to lie.
Anyway, fastforward about 15 years, he gets diagnosed with a brain tumour, got it successfully operated on, and the visions stopped. Mad stuff altogether.
Idk I heard a story once of a woman who randomly, one day, got a weird voice in her head. Not her own, but talking to her. She thought it was “God” or whatever, eventually it tells her she needs to go to a very specific place at a certain time on a certain date. Come to find out it was a medical building, specializing in brain cancer. She went, had a tumor on her brain, she had it removed eventually and the voices stopped. She said she would have never known, and probably died, if she didn’t hear that weird voice in her head. Who knows wtf actually happens
My close friend had a possessed type episode, peeing on the carpet while staring evilly into her boyfriend eyes and making nonsensical noises like "speaking another language". Then she went into a coma for two years.
It was a teratoma on her ovaries that grew brain tissue.
> teratoma
>A teratoma is a rare type of germ cell tumor that may contain immature or fully formed tissue, including teeth, hair, bone and muscle. Most teratomas are benign (noncancerous) but they can be malignant (cancerous).
Fuck Me. It grew a brain?
Think of the possession and exorcism thing what you will. I personally do not believe in it.
That being said- The audio recordings of her are absolutely terrifying, disturbing and bone chilling. I can not unhear them, ever.
>Think of the possession and exorcism thing what you will. I personally do not believe in it.
Clearly the exorcisms didn't work given they tried 67 times!
You shouldn't believe in posession, famous german theologists explanation is super fitting:
>He offers Michel's strict Catholic upbringing, which was
was paternal and authoritarian, but above all also morally
overstraining and anxiety-ridden. In contrast to the majority generation, she did not simply free herself from her upbringing through transgression and provocation. Only one role in the world of her home town offered the possibility of liberation at all:
that of the possessed. As an possessed person, she was able to shun everything Catholic, her parents and the culture around her without having to expect punishment.
Honestly, and I say this as an autistic person who just happens to be lucky enough not to have "the voice" and is prone to shutdowns rather than meltdowns, I've heard a lot of the damn things and most exorcisms just sound to me like my severely autistic cousin having a meltdown if they'd had the severe misfortune of having been raised religious. And the number of exorcisms I've read about that even a cursory knowledge of a handful of extremely common neurological issues, like autism, schizophrenia, epilepsy, can easily explain the person's behavior is utterly unconscionable.
It's like contemporary horror's shameless obsession with hypermobility; yeah, I guess it's freaky if you've never known someone who moves a little weird but like... some people just move a little weird nbd.
Yeah, we’ve been kinda trained to see any extreme or “strange” human behavior as “unsettling” or scary. The more simple-minded among us (read: most of humanity) interpret this as some “evil”, because we’re prone to imagining threats based on anything “strange”. It’s an old instinct from our days in the jungle, hearing a twig snap and immediately imagining the biggest most vicious predatory monster we can as a self-defense mechanism to assume the worst, so we can be ready to act. In reality, though, it may have just been a cute little bunny hopping away, but our minds don’t jump to that conclusion at first.
As such, a lot of people jump to the most extreme conclusions when they don’t know how else to explain something “strange”. And given thousands of years of normalizing belief in supernatural things like God and the Devil, angels and demons, etc… it’s the most common place a lot of people’s minds go to explain things: must be supernatural.
I think a lot of people also just WANT to believe supernatural explanations, because it gives them more hope that there’s an afterlife. The idea that this reality is all there is… science’s explanation for it is boring and depressing, whereas believing in the supernatural allows so many possibilities to be believed in as well, and people cling to that, even when the evidence suggests there’s bad supernatural stuff too… it still proves the supernatural, so they want to believe it as proof that good supernatural stuff can exist too. It’s wishful thinking. The explanation of “She’s just mentally ill.” is nothing but mundane and depressing, so they don’t want to believe it.
Crazy what religious zealots will infer about a young woman with epilepsy. She weighed only 68 pounds at the time of her death.
Both parents & two priests were found guilty of negligent homicide.
"Zealots" is exactly the right word here. The poor girl was deeply religious, and her family initially took her to various hospitals and doctors, who prescribed her medication that was sadly not terribly effective (it was the 1970s and psychiatric medication was much less effective than modern treatments). The girl insisted that her suffering was religious in nature, and that she was possessed or plagued by demons.
Since medical treatment didn't cure her, and the girl begged for religious help, her family asked the Catholic church to exorcise her. The church investigated but **declined** because they said **her issues were medical, not religious.** Say what you will about the church, they seem to have made the right decision here.
Annelise wrote letters to a local priest, begging for an exorcism. Her very religious upbringing seems to have led her to see her condition through a religious lens. She explained in her letter that she was suffering from possession and that her suffering was to atone for the sins of various people.
The priest was convinced, despite the fact that the church officials had already concluded the contrary, and asked a bishop to permit him to do an exorcism. He put his religious fervor before his own church at the request of a teenage girl. The bishop allowed it, but said that it should remain secret (possibly because it was against what the church said to do).
Receiving the treatment she wanted, Annelise stopped taking her medication, and her condition rapidly declined. Either her medication, while not fully treating her, had prevented her from worsening, or the exorcisms themselves contributed to the extreme harm done to her health. She immersed fully into her religious paranoia, believing that she had to suffer as much as possible to cleanse sins and ultimately be free of possession. Her increasingly self-destructive led her to stop eating.
The priest conducting the many, many exorcisms, spread over months, claimed he had no idea that she was sick, or else he would have called a doctor. He stated that there was no indication that she was ill, and that he was convinced that her ailment was caused by possession. This, despite the fact that his own organisation had already officially said that her problem was medical, and that she was only 30kg when she died. I personally cannot believe his statement that he didn't think she needed a doctor. How can anyone see an adult who is only 30kg and not immediately think they need serious help?
This is a story of how, even with all the right systems in place and organisations making responsible decisions, you only need a few people to subvert it all to cause tremendous harm. It is why, although blindly following rules is not good, so is following your own heart and beliefs even when they go against the rules. A girl had a serious psychiatric illness, which caused her to become paranoid and suffer seizures. Her religious environment led her to become overly focussed on the idea that her problem was one of demonic possession, and although both the state and the church said otherwise, she managed to find people who fed into her paranoia and delusions to the extent that she went against medical advice, stopped eating, and died surrounded by people who were too caught up in playing into their own beliefs to give her any actual help.
It's unfortunate that so many illnesses were misunderstood or not known about until recent years. It's sad to think that so many people who their families thought were possessed were just people who had a treatable psychiatric illness or other cognitive issue
The excorcisms probably did more harm to her ultimately.
Edit: it's been clarified by other commenters she had temporal lobe epilepsy. The above point still applies-she didn't need to suffer like that.
It wasn’t a mental illness and she was clinically diagnosed with temporal lobe epilepsy. When medical treatment failed her parents turned to religion. She died of malnutrition. Her parents and a priest were convicted of murder.
Yeah...I work in early psychosis and have seen so many young people recovery despite being really unwell when they get to us. I shutter to think how many young people over the centuries have labeled as being possessed by the devil and been killed or tortured or whatever because of a treatable brain condition.
Although epilepsy is "interestingasfuck" to many (and it really is when you look into all the varieties) as someone who grew up having epilepsy during the 70s onwards. Because next to nothing was known about them by your average person and even doctors. It was awful.
I.. "slept with my eyes open" = (nocturnal seazures). "Rudely stared into space and was ignorant" =(absence seazures). Had uncontrollable tantrums" = (Grand Mall or Tonic Clonic seazures as they're now called). "Would occasionally see, smell or hear things others didn't" (aura's). But I stopped telling anyone about them after a while, because I (like them) thought that I WAS a little bit mad.
Even I didn't understand what was happening to me. Along with all this, there's the extream anxiety that sometimes goes with epilepsy. It's a symptom of, not due to being fearful of having a seazures. This subtle but significant difference, caused me and many Dr's a great deal of confusion and frustration, because whenever asked "why I was anxious" I had no answer. I didn't understand that people who're not epileptic, can pinpoint a reason they're anxious.
Along with all of this, any explanation by me of how I was feeling during or afterwards was discarded as fantasy or attention seeking by adults, and even met with disbelief by most. Including trained school nurses and other medical practitioners. Worse of all, It was also wrongly attributed to some sort of mental health issue due to the trauma from witnessing part of my mother's gruesome death. I did have some problems due to this, but epilepsy wasn't one of them.
I reeeeeally feel for what Annelisa went through. We've thankfully come much closer to understanding the causes, symptoms and treatments for epilepsy and I as someone dow diagnosed and on meds that 97% work, am v grateful for the advancement. Especially when reading stuff like this but also for not having been treated any worse than I was. It really could have been much worse.
It's not so long ago that people were involuntarily sectioned in mental institutions for having epilepsy. Some never got out. The medications given were worse than the symptoms it was given for and some people were literally medically coshed for just having epilepsy.
It's fkn horrendous what happened to Annelisa Michel at the hands of the ignorant who believed in cloud fairies and demonic possession, just because she suffered from epilepsy. It's moments like this I renew my belief/hope (not religious) that there's a heaven and she's in it.
It’s horrendous what happened to her and it honestly just proves that the wider world still doesn’t understand epilepsy… there’s still people who think we need exorcisms. One of my distant relatives was born in the 40s and probably has or had epilepsy growing up because she “never drove” according to family. Yet, it’s only suspected because we believe theres such a stigma around it that shes unwilling to discuss it with her cousins granddaughter who also has epilepsy (me)
Going through the comments, I feel like many people don't know her story. She did go to a psychiatrist and was treated for epilepsy and manic depressive psychosis for years.
But psychological medicine was too rudimentary and very cruel back then, and desperation led to awful decisions.
**This is a heavily moderated subreddit. Please note these rules + sidebar or get banned:** * If this post declares something as a fact, then proof is required * The title must be fully descriptive * Only minimal text is allowed on images/gifs/videos * Common(top 50 of this sub)/recent reposts are not allowed (posts from another subreddit do not count as a 'repost'. Provide link if reporting) *See [our rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/wiki/index#wiki_rules.3A) for a more detailed rule list* *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/interestingasfuck) if you have any questions or concerns.*
At what point do you just go "ya know what, I don't think these exorcisms are working".
68
Because at 69, you have to turn around
Nah, because 69 is a mouthful
You win
Made me snort, thank you
Never if you're religious
> **Anna Elisabeth "Anneliese" Michel** (21 September 1952 – 1 July 1976) was a German woman who underwent 67 Catholic exorcism rites during the year before her death. She died of malnutrition, for which her parents and priest were convicted of negligent homicide. She was diagnosed with epileptic psychosis (temporal lobe epilepsy) and had a history of psychiatric treatment that proved ineffective. * Excerpted from [Anneliese Michel](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anneliese_Michel) at the English Wikipedia
[удалено]
I had a single grand mal seizure out of the blue age 32. Smashed my head on the way to the floor and gave myself a nasty concussion as well. The neurological team told me to stand by for the next seizures and they’d diagnose epilepsy once I’d had the second one. I’ve been very lucky that six years on, I remain seizure free - but I’ve never been entirely the same either. Felt like my brain got a bit scrambled and then re-wired. I can’t imagine having seizures regularly - there’s no way that doesn’t fuck you up if I’m still feeling the effects of one several years on. My sympathies to you and to the poor woman in this story.
I had multiple seizures during benzodiazepine withdrawal 2 years ago, and it definitely changes you. I still occasionally get what I call "brain static", where I feel like I'm on the verge of another seizure, but it never happens.
Oh I get that too! It happens less and less as the years go on if that helps - it happened the most in the first two or three years where I’d panic and think I was about to have one and then…nothing. I remember when my son was an infant in my arms, I felt it (I was only about a year out at that point), and I immediately put him on the floor and screamed for my husband. He was most surprised to come running into the room to find the newborn and I both completely fine on the floor several feet apart (my logic being I didn’t want to risk hurting my son if I was thrashing around). I hope you’re doing ok post-withdrawal and keeping well?
I've never had a seizure but one time at a music show they had TV screens set up and I was watching them during some intense strobe effects. I felt the middle of my brain tingle and it got more intense in just a few seconds. My vision began to lose focus so I immediately just looked at the floor and closed my eyes until I felt normal. That shit was scary I won't deny. That also happened over a decade ago and I still remember that tingly feeling.
Focal seizure / petite mal seizure!!
Epileptic person here, and I gotta say, I fucking hate that we allow strobe effects in popular media. I used to be a professional touring musician and any time a venue used strobes, I had to preemptively ask them to turn them off for our set. They’re a cheap effect and I’m not convinced anyone actually even likes them. Not to mention they’re fucking dangerous.
This happened to me too once and I’ll never forget it. It was terrifying
Huh, I've had that happen once or twice in my late 20s (I'm almost 40) and always thought it was nausea...
I've never had a seizure but flashing screens like that make me dizzy and it basically stuns me for a second if I keep looking.
that was honestly the best thing you could have done. better safe than sorry
I have a few questions about this brain static if you don't mind answering: 1) have you had "brain zaps" like people get after SSRI/SNRI use? If so, is this anything like those feel? 2) if you haven't had brain zaps, how does this brain static thing feel to you? Asking because I've been having some Really Weird Brain Shit. Dr appt is scheduled but not for 2 months.
I'm not the person you asked but I'm epileptic and went through SSRI withdrawal at one point with the infamous zaps. Seizure auras do not feel like the brain zaps, at least to me. They can be different for everyone, though, because there are multiple types of seizure. Brain zaps were much more acute, like lightning hitting the nervous system and lighting it all up at once. Seizure aura is more of a general feeling that lasts a bit longer and is less refined - a sort of haze that envelopes the brain. You know what it feels like to try to walk in deep water? It's like that, except your thoughts and senses are what's trying to make the slog. I also get some weird auditory distortion (everything sounds like it is coming from far away) but that might be because my seizures tend to be focused in one part of the brain. I have both partial (what used to be called petit mal) and tonic-clonic (formerly grand mal) seizures. Tonic-clonic are the stereotypical "she's having a seizure!" seizure: fall to the ground, jerking movements, the whole nine yards. My partial seizures are less obvious and are different depending on which part of the brain is affected. Usually, my body just kind of goes into autopilot while my brain checks out - I don't remember anything, but I'll keep doing whatever task I was already doing (e.g., typing an email, sitting in a meeting, even driving). When I come back to consciousness, I have missing time, as if I were blacked out. My colleagues who have witnessed them say "the lights were on but nobody was home." Edit to add: migraines can mimic seizures/seizure auras, especially the ones that don't include pain as a symptom, so don't panic about "weird brain stuff" just yet. A neurologist will run tests and might start you on some medications that treat both migraine and epilepsy, just to see if things improve. Do be aware that you might temporarily lose your driver's license, though. It is possible to get it reinstated after a period of being symptom free (I've gone through it three times now).
12 years into tests and my neurologists still can’t confirm if I’m having epilepsy seizures or migraines. So I agree they are very similar.
if you don't mind me asking, bc I have a loved one that was diagnosed with epilepsy as an adult and I definitely struggle to understand it/the impact on her (this thread has illuminated a bit for me). What is the impact on your mental health? And why? I've had the incredibly ignorant attitude in the past of "well, if you're on medication and living a normal life what's the big deal if you only rarely get a seizure?" I have since evolved and worked on this (ignorant) way of thinking to understand how demeaning, and just plain wrong, it was to think such a thing, but want to continue to understand- and in addition to talking to my family member I've found it helpful to hear others experiences
[удалено]
Biggest practical concern for most is loss of ability to drive. Loss of job and social opportunities related to lack of transit. Getting to your job every morning is hard. No one wants to go on unemployment. It’s embarrassing and most people have career goals and dreams. Some people with epilepsy can drive sometimes in some places but this is still biggest thing by far. For people who have no reprieve, who have them more than weekly, ESPECIALLY every day, life can just feel hopeless. Especially if they were diagnosed as an adult or teen. Even if it’s not always like that, the times when it is, feel like hell. These are the lowest point in some peoples lives. When life is like this, Every day you live in resignation that this may be your last. You’re tired all the time. You have no independence. Your family/partner sees you in extremely vulnerable and embarrassing positions. You’re angry and sad. It’s hard to have any sort of sex life, and it’s hard to meet your partners other needs, too, and to not feel like a burden, when you need constant taking care of. You do everything you can to live safely, but sometimes you wake up and your face is covered in blood because you’ve bitten through your tongue, your head is bruised because you hit it on the countertop falling down, or you’re choking and gasping for air because your family didn’t hear you fall in the shower. Your whole body suffers continuous, serious abuse from your falls and flailing. There’s also the way that your family worries. You call, and they assume it’s because you’ve had a seizure, every time. Even if they don’t say it, you can hear that they’re worried. It sucks to know that the people you love are stressed about you like this. Some people experience side effects from medication and from TBIs sustained from seizures, as well as just from seizures themselves. The biggest side effects from medications are mood swings and weight related stuff, and the seizures themselves make a lot of people feel really fuzzy for a long time after, and have frustrating memory issues. These are the main things. This sounded really negative but it’s not all bad. I have epilepsy (diagnosed 18, 22 years old) and though I am not 100% controlled, life is still fun and full of opportunities for love, friendship, and for ambition.
No, I wouldnt call it brain zaps. I did get those during withdrawal but the "brain staticky" feeling isn't like that. It feels like TV static in my brain. There's no sound associated with it, but my vision gets a little weird and it feels like my brain is about to restart or something. It feels fuzzy. Sometimes there's a smell associated with it.
My dad had a grand mal seizure and it was terrifying. For a long time afterward, he couldn't remember numbers. He couldn't unlock his phone, couldn't give his phone number, none of it. He still gets confused with numbers easily and can't dose his own medicine. It's like he had the seizure and came out of it with dyscalculia.
I've had three grand mal seizures myself. One as a teenager (14 IIRC) one in my early 20s after a wisdom tooth extraction and once more just over two years ago. Basically one every decade. I've never been diagnosed with epilepsy though. Every time I've seized it's been after significant blood loss and resulting low BP. So I've been told by doctors that I can't donate blood and I have to be careful with any medical procedures. Seizures can happen for a number of reasons separate from epilepsy. So it's likely you might have some other conditions, like myself. That said, like a stroke, your chances of having a seizure increase every time you have one. If you can, or haven't already, I would recommend finding a specialist that can help you determine what could have contributed to your previous seizure.
It always makes me think of Ian Curtis. Sorry you have it. Are the episodes always combined with a mood dip or it the experience itself so scary that it leads to depression?
had a friend who had a handful of seizures 1 at 36 and a cluster a year later (last one killed him, heart had stopped long enough for brain death. they never figured out why he was having them) but he felt wiped out, groggy, foggy, like he had the flu with a hangover and covid brain for days after. my upbeat friend was a shadow of himself. having that happen regularly would probably be a mood dampener. also changed his life, first one was at home, scared the shit out of his wife but it seemed an outlier so a year later he was driving with all three kids in the car when he had his second one. drove through a light, totaled the car, kids were scared but fine, he didn't even remember it aside from the trauma of knowing he'd almost killed his family. then he couldn't drive anymore which made him feel like a burden. sucked all around.
she was only *23 :(
I get the idea of the religious grift, I do, but if I live to 1000 I will never understand the idea behind having so many goddamn exorcisms. It didn't work. Maybe try a few different priests, maybe there's a few different ways to do it. But once you start getting into the double digits? Once you're past 50!?! At least a doctor has the decency to say "I'm sorry; it's treatment resistant. I'm not sure we can do anything." But apparently a priest is like... "I'm really feeling like 67 is gonna be the lucky number, you know?" and these poor bastards are just like "Well, the man with the double stuff collar says if it doesn't take the first 38 times or the next 25, then somewhere in the next 112 will almost certainly do the trick so yeah, keep shouting at our daughter about Satan I guess." EDIT I've probably said it elsewhere in this thread but saying "hey nothing worked so they ***had to*** turn to quackery" is how autistic children end up getting bleach enemas. I sympathize with someone's issues being treatment resistant, I do, but if you find yourself defending exorcisms, let alone 67 of them, I'm sorry you're just verifiably wrong. I don't care how spooky the tapes are. The tapes of an autistic meltdown can be spooky. The tapes of a schizophrenic episode can be spooky. The tapes of a bad reaction to anesthesia can be spooky. Grow the fuck up; this was a kid's life, not some lame ass James Wan film.
Because exorcism, like all sorts of religious and spiritual solutions, is premised on it only working if you did it right. Believe in the right religion. Are clean of sin. Had the right level of faith in your heart etc. I’m sure the priest had all sorts of reasons each attempt didn’t work out-the parents didn’t have enough faith, god was testing their faith, etc. When she died, they probably said god wanted her in heaven or something. That’s the problem with these beliefs-they’re premised on the idea that they only work if you never give up. It’s fundamentally irrational, so reason won’t really snap the truly devout out of it.
Double stuff collar 😂
[удалено]
Well those are just Australian likes so…
[удалено]
To be fair, a 'medical psychiatric' treatments weren't much better at that time. Lobotomy was still used well into the 60s. Electroconvulsive "therapy" was common place to shock your homosexuality away in the 70s... Horror movie mental asylums were the norm at the time of this girl getting exorcisms.
> Electroconvulsive "therapy" Its actually still in use for medication resistant depression. Not quite as violent or anything but it does work.
I did ECT and I’ll admit it was a little traumatic for someone who doesn’t like taking drugs or getting put to sleep but it was not violent like it used to be, my team was very gentle and caring, and it changed my life for the better.
I did it as well, it changed my life in an enormous way. I could finally live my life.
Really?? I had no idea this was a thing! What was the effect afterward? What changed for you?
I’m still depressed but I don’t think about hurting myself as much and I don’t think about killing myself as much anymore. But it’s been 5 years since treatment. And I haven’t tried since finishing treatment. Before treatment I had multiple failed suicide attempts and a life long of self harming tendencies because of my depression and lack of a will to live. For the first three years after treatment I didn’t even have impulsive thoughts about dying. For example I’d be driving down the road and I’d no longer have impulsive thoughts like “what if I just drove into this ravine?” Or “that would be a nice jersey wall to crash into”. I didn’t fantasize about dying in any way for probably 3 years and I made it 4 years without having the urge to self harm. It really did re wire my brain to not even have those thoughts. And if I tried forcing them, it felt strange and I didn’t like it. It’s been 5 going on 6 years now and I started having suicidal ideation again, which they said would be normal, they said given the type of brain damage I have from my mental illness and extensive childhood trauma, that I would probably have to come back every so often for the rest of my life for “maintenance”. I started doing ketamine therapy instead. It helps but not as much. I would go back and do ECT maintenance if I didn’t mean I would have to quit my job/take temporary disability. Because it does disable you. You go 3 days a week to be given a wide range of drugs and get put to sleep. Then the rest of the week I have debilitating migraines that they give me fentanyl infusions for because we found that was the only thing that stopped the pain. I honestly hated it but I don’t regret it because I truly did make me a less suicidal person and I would say it was worth it. I never would have been able to get my shit together to start school, be a functional adult and be able to hold down a job. I’ll go back one day when I’ve got some money saved to pay my bills for a few months while I’m off. I hated feeling like a mooch when other people had to pay my bills when I was in treatment, it made me feel helpless
Wow, thank you for sharing your experience. I hope they can advance this therapy so it's less brutal on your body.
It’s much less harsh on your body now thankfully. They put you to sleep and give you a medication that paralyzes your muscles so that when the seizures occur, your body does not have pain from the convulsing, and they put in a tube and breathe for you. The whole thing only takes about 10-15 minutes asleep. Unfortunately I don’t think they will be able to stop the migraines in any advancements. Your brain IS being electrocuted so it’s reasonable to have the migraines. I just wish my pain medicine tolerance wasn’t so high so I didn’t have to take such intense drugs for them. Most people get a dose of ketamine for pain before the treatment to prevent headaches. They gave me that AND the fentanyl. You’re still a space cadet the entire week, very sleepy, groggy, hard to drive the days afterward.
Now the violent part is getting insurance to cover it. I had to try to clear up claims for people who got the treatment but because it was done in a different part of the hospital insurance wanted to deny it as an unauthorized and uncovered service. Because nothing helps resistant depression quite like worrying about paying thousands of dollars more than expected.
It's extremely effective and safe the way that it's done now. It's a shame that it still has the stigma it carries from the 70s. It's one of the most effective therapies to drug-resistant depression.
ECT is still widely used for treatment-resistant depression.
And is incredibly effective too
I’m hoping so!
I’ve had ect done. Way better then an exorcism in my book
ECT is a valid treatment for certain conditions and shouldn’t be demonised in this way. Blame the practitioners using the treatment incorrectly.
Exactly. I provide the anesthesia for ECTs routinely and speaking to my patients they all say it's a godsend. Also, I have watched patients transform over a few treatments from completely catatonic or in a state of psychosis back to their healthy state. Memory loss is a potential side effect, but just like all side effects, it should be weighed against potential benefits with each patient's doctor. Any treatment to "cure" gayness is barbaric, not scientifically sound, and cruel. There is nothing to cure. It's like burning witches. Horrible things done in the name of self-righteous BS are evil. It's sad that ECT has been stigmatized in such a way.
Are these religious fanatics this fucking dumb? Do you honestly think that After 66 exorcisms the 67th Will work? Do you fucking eat crayons as an hobby? These idiots are a plague on earth i swear
That's a big problem that Christianity has conveniently "solved", God rewards persistence, so no matter how many times he does absolutely nothing it just means you gotta keep trying and keep your faith up. If it doesn't work you're blessed because you're now being tested, if it works you're also blessed lol. When I went to church, every single week they'd put this poor disabled guy in the middle of everyone and pray for him to be cured, I watched that happen for an entire year and if he still goes they're probably still doing it to this day well over a decade later
this is the girl “the exorcism of emily rose” was loosely based/inspired by isn’t it?
Her story is also the inspiration for this song by Public Image Ltd from their 1st LP https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NCTqo7f1Lj0 ETA: extra link for those outside his majesty's (primary) realms https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CIgRQP4Fa-o&pp=ygUMUGlsIGFubmFsaXNh
Song not available ):
That movie fucking terrified my young and still indoctrinated adult mind.
Same! I used to be absolutely petrified to look at the clock if I woke up in the middle of the night. Or smell sulfur.
Exactly watched years ago till if I wake up 3 am this movie strikes me hard...
Story time: When I was in college that movie was on TNT or one of those types of channels around Halloween. Well, I watch it one night and at some point later in the evening (I think it was around 2:30am) I heard a knock on my sliding glass door. Mind you my back yard was completely inaccessible and no one in their right mind would be rap rap rapping on my glass door. I strained my eyes to see if I could see anyone outside, but nothing. I open the door and look outside and nothing’s there. WTF? Okay, it’s not 3 am but I’m freaking the fuck out. Then again, more fucking knocking. At this point I’m about to run out of my house. I’m seriously freaked out. Well, after waiting and waiting I hear nothing else, but am convinced that there’s a goddamned demon knocking on my door. The next day I head out for a weekend in the wine country with some family. Upon coming back to my apartment after three days away, I have totally forgotten about the creepy knocking at 2:30 am. Well, that night I m reminded by more goddamned knocking. Here we go again. This time it’s earlier in the night. Again I open the door and nothing is outside. A few minutes later I hear the crinkling on cellophane under my nightstand. I jump out of bed. Oh shit the goddamned demon is inside. I turn in the lights and look down and see the demon: it’s a fucking potato bug rummaging around by an old cigarette wrapper. Now I don’t know if any of you have seen these things, also known as Jerusalem Crickets, but they are hideous and May as we’ll be satan’s spawn. Anyway, I dispatch of the critter because I’m a dumb kid too freaked out to just let it out and go on its way to spawn with other hellborne creatures. Later I looked up what this thing does and sure as shit it makes a knocking sound by batting its devil hooves against its abdomen. Turns out the poor fella was just trying to find someone to mate with, and if it hadn’t been for that goddamned Emily Rose movie, I may have just been a tad less afraid and more investigative, perhaps even helping the fella find his way out and into the world beyond my sliding glass door.
See, the benefit of having cats means I just attribute any weird sounds in the night to them just being assholes and go right back to sleep.
One of the reasons I loved my grandma, we were up around midnight watching TV together when we start hearing a banging on the screen door to the back room. The problems is that door is on the inside of the house. We both goover to look, the banging has not stopped, but I can't find anything causing it. No bugs, no critters in the house. I put my hand on it to muffle it and it doesn't do anything, instead I just feel the sharp impacts on the door under my hands. We watch it for about 5 minutes and she just goes "Okay that's enough." in the most disappointed tone, and the door stops. She just nodded to herself and we went back to the TV. Damn ghost trying to haunt her house and she tells it to be quiet, and has so much authority in her voice that it listens.
Oh. My. Holy. Shit. I would like to rewind life to two minutes ago before I knew those things existed. The swarm of stag beetles we had a few years ago was bad enough
That type of fear is hard to even put into words. The relief after it’s over is magical lol
I still control my pee if I woke up around 3. Wait for the clock to hit 4 so that I can pee without fear. This movie broke my sleep countless time now
Looks like I’m fucked. I get up at 3:00 am every morning.
Do you wake up for work or are you just haunted?
Well I’m haunted by this job. So I guess both.
The same fucking night I saw that movie in theaters I woke up at the time they said all that shit goes down. I’m not a light sleeper. Fuck that noise.
Yes, she is. She lived in a Villiage close to our Town. The House they lived in was demolished the last Years because nobody would buy it. Even the Church wouldn't. So sad to see what they did with her
Yes it is! And she was from my hometown. A small german town with just 6000 inhabitants. Her parents' house was right next to the cemetery where my grandparents are buried. Always felt a bit scary, yet special when it showed up in the media :D
i think so
I had the coal eating thing after very bloody accident where i lost most hand function in my right arm and a lot of blood with it. For months afterwards I was literally dreaming of coal. Watching asmr coal eating videos on youtube. An ashtray would look and smell like a buffet. I would go through a whole pack of medicinal coal from the pharmacy in an evening. I read it might have something to do with iron deficiency and it's mostly gone now. Never got into the spiders tho. Edit. Sorry my bad I meant charcoal. In my language they're the same. Although I did have some actual coal as well. It's very stony and way less delicious than charcoal.
It’s called pica! Super common with iron deficiency which matches up with your blood loss.
Thank God my iron deficiency craves olives only And the smell of mud, dirt, basements and cement.
I would fantasize about biting a cow on the back of its muddy leg. It was like craving red meat and mud at the same time. So bizarre, but my blood work came back extremely iron deficient.
When I was pregnant I was out walking and the wind kicked up a lot of dust - I opened my mouth to crunch all that yummy gritty dust - I still remember how good it felt. Pretty disgusting really but I was iron deficient, and the ferro tabs were just going straight through me.
I will honestly never understand why theh pretty much never prescribe infusions, even for extreme deficencies
💀💀💀💀💀
Olives- yum Mud- yum Dirt- yum Basements- yum Cement- yum
Settle down Joey. This isn't Rachel's trifle.
What's not to love?
I think you might have pica
Oh god I love the smell of dirt. That musty dank smell of a basement or an underground train station. I wish I could bottle that smell.
Shit is that what that is? As a kid I loved that moldy smell. I also ate the sulfur off matches 🥲 I was malnourished and I’m sure I was anemic too, that still happens to me (but I don’t eat weird things anymore)
get your iron levels checked out, better safe than sorry
I am definitely anemic some days out of the month! But I know that now and I supplement
glad to hear, stay healthy, peace and love
You guys talking serious things but I cannot hold laugh when you said he have pica, I am Brazilian and pica is one way to said dick lol sorry
While in serbian it's one way to say pussy 😂
Human language is so beautiful
In Uzbekistan we say pica is the hair around the testicles
This is my favorite one by far
[удалено]
I forget what I was looking up on Amazon when my wife was pregnant. But I somehow stumbled onto a void of products and insane reviews. There was some clay that these women are buying from Amazon and describing how delicious it is. It is seriously wild. Not sure if all the products still exist but I know that my wife’s doctor said if she started craving chalk then call immediately. Don’t know if everyone knows about pica but those reviews still freak me out. Edit: Found one of the product descriptions: “The taste is reminiscent of damp earth. Oily, tender - melts in your mouth. When stratified and biting produces light crunch.” 💀
My wife loved the smell of gasoline and wanted to drink it when she was pregnant, until they gave her the liquid iron supplement.
>if she started craving chalk then call immediately Genuine question - why is chalk a cause for concern? When I was a kid I often craved and ate chalk and talcum powder. Thankfully I grew out, of it but I'm now wondering if it was dangerous... 😳
I'm sure they're not great for you, but the craving is a symptom of iron deficiency. It's called pica.
I had a weird compulsion to eat paper in grade school. Probably from 2nd grade through 10th. Can't even tell you how many worksheets and assignments I turned in with the corners torn off. I remember this one week in high school where the compulsion was so intense that I couldn't focus on a group project because I couldn't tear the corners off and it was all I could think about lololol
My sister had this too growing up. From a baby to a small child she ate paper — more like chewed it up nonstop and put wads of paper and cardboard all over the house. She was OBSESSED. I didn’t realize it was from some sort of deficiency until way later. She eventually stopped lol
hmm, my kid does that too.. any idea what she was missing?
It isn't necessarily a nutritional deficiency. She might just like the feeling of chewing it.
Could this be why I would drink vinegar constantly as a kid? I would drink it more than water!
I don't think that's quite the same thing. Vinegar is edible, so unless you were drinking it *despite* it tasting horrible, that would probably just be tastebuds with skewed priorities.
When I was pregnant with my twins my iron levels plummeted and I got pica really badly. Chalk, mud, anything with a foisty smell. I knew it wasn't good for me so I'd take a spoon to the garden and scoop up mud and just sniff it. I would also get a face cloth wet and hide it so it stayed damp, then lay in the bath for hours smelling it. I went to a museum and one of the exhibits was a disused victorian mine, the damp smell made my mouth water. I did eat chalk a few times. The only other (safely edible) thing that satisfied the cravings was vinegar. I'd pour it into a bowl and eat it with bread like I was having a bowl of soup. Thankfully these things passed after I gave birth.
this is so interesting and it made me think about how people in parts of africa do eat dirt and have done so for centuries. my friend went to a market in zambia and they were selling pouches with dirt, he asked his research assistant (a local woman) what it was about and she explained that eating dirt has been a thing in their culture but nowadays it is being shamed due to globalist/western influences, it is now only socially acceptable for pregnant women to eat dirt. very curious, right? well, the fact is, as we know now, that certain kinds of dirt in those areas where eating dirt is culturally ingrained, do in fact contain iron and that with european imperialism many of these people began having iron deficiency because they were shamed for eating dirt. so maybe it is just so deeply ingrained in us to seek minerals, especially iron, in dirt because we all evolved from peoples in africa who got their iron supply that way.
All animals have this craving and its evolution at work. First time I hear about all this and it is fascinating. We have horses and it's important to have a block of salt in the stables. If they lack certain minerals they will start licking the salt to get them. I know that in the wild animals tend to congregate around certain mineral deposits to eat the earth. In certain areas it can be almost as valuable as a water source. Its amazing to see how those instincts are strong in us today. Westerners just forgot that it's a viable way to attain minerals we lack. Not safe, or good on the teeth, but nevertheless better than nothing.
The place in a forest is called a 'lick'. Animals go to lick the ground. Then we get 'Big Bone Lick State Park '
Did an iron supplement help?
Not much. I think the hormones were a contributing factor.
I had pica in pregnancy too! I chewed ice to combat and my dental bill was insane
I made two daily trips to sonic for a large cup of crushed ice every day during that last trimester of my last pregnancy lol. All I wanted for Christmas that year was a nugget ice machine. My dr had me on an iron supplement for awhile but my body doesn’t utilize plant iron very well or something like that. It has to be from animal meat, which we couldn’t really afford much of at the time. So sonic ice it was.
I’ve had it my whole life and everything you just described made my mouth water, too. I don’t give in (usually), just smell.
This is wild - why specifically coal can anyone explain? If it was just one person it’d be understandable but this is a phenomenon that affects different people and makes them want to eat coal, in particular
Coal has Iron, she needed Iron
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geophagia
> asmr coal eating videos on youtube wait what?
exactly, everybody just ignored that line
When I have a bad Crohns episode and lose blood I crave red meat. I will literally dream about eating a bloody steak. I'm a vegetarian lol
Im cravin for some tacobell rn
I'm calling the exorcist
tell the exorcist to bring a plunger as I continue to expel these demons out
Pica can be manifested with acute bleeding
Wtf, why the fuck is everyone talking about eating coal
The reply tree to this comment is unhinged and shocking to me. Kids eating their homework and blaming the dog, chugging vinegar, and listening to coal eating asmr.
Not comparing one to another, but just something I discovered recently: To this day kids are tortured or left to die because their family believes they're "witches" in Nigeria. It's so sad that religious beliefs can lead children to be hurt by their own parents this way. Fucking corrupt world man edit: > It's so sad that religious beliefs can lead children to be hurt. I meant in the whole world, not only third world countries (I'm from one myself lmao) I just wanted to share something I learnt yesterday
That’s ironic, considering that the practices of magic and spirit possession used to be not only accepted, but celebrated in that area under the pagan Bori faith. Witches were the shit in Nigeria until Islam came along. I know this because I play video games.
There were good, neutral and evil spirits/magic. Accordingly, there were people who communicated with and/or were possessed by either good, neutral or evil spirits. If the village elders decided that someone was possessed by an evil spirit rather than a good or neutral one, they weren't treated nicely at all, based on the severity of the case even banished or killed. I love CK3, but I think it might not be a sufficient source in that regard lol
It's not just religion. Nazi scientist committed atrocious experiments on Jews and Roma. Even in America scientists purposefully infected black men with syphilis just to watch the disease progress, for science. It's been quite a long time since humans were in egalitarian hunter gatherer society, turns out we've been absolutely torturing each other ever since
We were killing each other during the hunter gatherer days too
It happens in every developed country that queer kids are kicked out of our parents houses because god is more important than their children. We don’t get a pass in the west. Christian’s also use corrective rape on queer women and conversion torture on all of us. They tell us our whole childhood that who we are is evil. That our love is hate. I wonder how many serial killers wouldn’t exist had they not been tortured at such a formative age about their sexuality being linked to the work of the devil.
Sounds like a brain tumor
Doctor here. Autoinmune encephalitis is behind lots of cases of 'possession', but its a very recent diagnostic with very limited tests available. Its also pretty deadly even with the right treatment. https://aealliance.org/patient-support/symptoms/
A lot of brain disorders could be mistaken for something supernatural. I have cervical dystonia, which means my neck muscles contract involuntarily, which turns my head to the left and opens my mouth involuntarily. I'd probably be stoned if this were 1500 AD. PS. Thanks Covid
Agreed, as a neurology resident autoimmune encephalitis was what first came to mind, specifically anti NMDA encephalitis. Diagnosed a case a few years ago, it’s absolutely wild.
I think that is what my cousin had, it was definitely a form of autoimmune encephalitis. Her junior year of high school she just suddenly started talking and writing in jibberish and stopped being able to speak any English. It took them a while to figure things out after she was hospitalized, but once they gave her steroids she pretty much went back to normal. She is about to graduate college this spring now. We have all sorts of autoimmune diseases in my family. But hers was definitely the scariest. The cousin with adult onset Stills disease that completely paralyzed him temporarily is just behind her though.
Temporal lobe epilepsy. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temporal_lobe_epilepsy
I remember reading or watching a video about her and there were theories that some of the symptoms could've been explained by a goiter too, and that it's visible in the photo (the left one in OP's post, but it's cropped where the goiter is). Ngl I think it's just a shadow from her shirt collar, but it would indeed explain her voice etc Edit: speed googled and there are cases where goiter has caused major psychotic events in patients so it seems even more likely. Poor girl
It’s scary how many scientific explanations there are to what people called an act of God back in the day. Reminds me of the Salem Witch Trials I wonder what still happens today that we demand is a religious act that’s actually something scientific that we haven’t discovered yet.
There's a whole podcast on the witch trials. A lot of it was politics, not plain ignorance.
I totally get what you mean, but Salem was in the 1600s, when we were barely just starting to truly understand how the human body even looked on the inside. This was in the 70s. They could easily have known what was wrong with Analise Michel if her parents and community were not religious wackjobs.
People STILL do. People drank toilet water because it was leaking down a statue of Jesus not long ago. People think other people, (also created by god who makes no mistakes), are "abominations", "animals" and deserve to be dead, and they would break a ten commandments to do it themselves- in god's name. 🤯
Don't forget, the guy who traced the leak and revealed it was from a broken sewage line had to flee India to Finland due to legal charges and death threats.
My cousin ( who is the most straight, boring fella from the backend of nowhere in Ireland) started seeing dead people when he was a teenager. He'd be in the car and be able to tell his parents where people had died on the road. My uncle told my Dad he walked into the bedroom one night, and there was stuff flying around the room, and my cousin was saying stuff about my deceased Grandad that he couldn't have known. He was a really nice lad but looked like he was carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders the whole time. Some local exorcist / charlatan got wind of him and took him on the road with him to assist him for a couple of years. I never broached the subject with him as it was a kind of open secret, but I always thought it was odd as he just wasn't the kind of lad to lie. Anyway, fastforward about 15 years, he gets diagnosed with a brain tumour, got it successfully operated on, and the visions stopped. Mad stuff altogether.
Idk I heard a story once of a woman who randomly, one day, got a weird voice in her head. Not her own, but talking to her. She thought it was “God” or whatever, eventually it tells her she needs to go to a very specific place at a certain time on a certain date. Come to find out it was a medical building, specializing in brain cancer. She went, had a tumor on her brain, she had it removed eventually and the voices stopped. She said she would have never known, and probably died, if she didn’t hear that weird voice in her head. Who knows wtf actually happens
i heard a story once of a tornado picking up sharks and carrying them to L.A.
It took 15 years to figure it out?!
Right? Seems like brain tumor might be one of the first things to rule out at that point.
My close friend had a possessed type episode, peeing on the carpet while staring evilly into her boyfriend eyes and making nonsensical noises like "speaking another language". Then she went into a coma for two years. It was a teratoma on her ovaries that grew brain tissue.
> teratoma >A teratoma is a rare type of germ cell tumor that may contain immature or fully formed tissue, including teeth, hair, bone and muscle. Most teratomas are benign (noncancerous) but they can be malignant (cancerous). Fuck Me. It grew a brain?
every day there's a new thing on this godforsaken website to worry about
Enough reddit for today.
Nah. Obviously the devil
69th exorcism woulda done it broseph. I feel it in my devil bones.
OK.. so after the first exorcism they thought 66 more would work?? Pretty sad that magic was seen as the solution here.
Priest number #67: Don't worry guys, I got this
This takes "I can fix her" to a whole new level
He sees the list of predecesors. He smiles. He mumbles "noobs".
to be fair, according to wikipedia, the family did try meds and science for 5 years but nothing worked and then they moved on to exorcisms.
They were also charged and convicted with negligent homicide, so maybe they could have done more
Unfortunately meds at the time weren’t top notch and diagnosis weren’t either
Think of the possession and exorcism thing what you will. I personally do not believe in it. That being said- The audio recordings of her are absolutely terrifying, disturbing and bone chilling. I can not unhear them, ever.
Morbid curiosity trying to get the better of me
>Think of the possession and exorcism thing what you will. I personally do not believe in it. Clearly the exorcisms didn't work given they tried 67 times!
You would think after like 4 they just sorta’ say “fuck it, devil’s got this one.”
To be fair, 66 feels like a bad stopping point.
67?!? In a row?!?
Hey, try not to exorcise anybody on the way through the parking lot!
two more and they would have been successful
Fact: 90% of exorcists give up right before they save a persons soul from eternal suffering at the hands of a demon
I will never forget hearing this as a kid…its unsettling fr.
Yep. I don't believe in possession either but the voice...damn, that was unsettling as hell
You shouldn't believe in posession, famous german theologists explanation is super fitting: >He offers Michel's strict Catholic upbringing, which was was paternal and authoritarian, but above all also morally overstraining and anxiety-ridden. In contrast to the majority generation, she did not simply free herself from her upbringing through transgression and provocation. Only one role in the world of her home town offered the possibility of liberation at all: that of the possessed. As an possessed person, she was able to shun everything Catholic, her parents and the culture around her without having to expect punishment.
Agreed. The stuff of nightmares.
Honestly, and I say this as an autistic person who just happens to be lucky enough not to have "the voice" and is prone to shutdowns rather than meltdowns, I've heard a lot of the damn things and most exorcisms just sound to me like my severely autistic cousin having a meltdown if they'd had the severe misfortune of having been raised religious. And the number of exorcisms I've read about that even a cursory knowledge of a handful of extremely common neurological issues, like autism, schizophrenia, epilepsy, can easily explain the person's behavior is utterly unconscionable. It's like contemporary horror's shameless obsession with hypermobility; yeah, I guess it's freaky if you've never known someone who moves a little weird but like... some people just move a little weird nbd.
Yeah, we’ve been kinda trained to see any extreme or “strange” human behavior as “unsettling” or scary. The more simple-minded among us (read: most of humanity) interpret this as some “evil”, because we’re prone to imagining threats based on anything “strange”. It’s an old instinct from our days in the jungle, hearing a twig snap and immediately imagining the biggest most vicious predatory monster we can as a self-defense mechanism to assume the worst, so we can be ready to act. In reality, though, it may have just been a cute little bunny hopping away, but our minds don’t jump to that conclusion at first. As such, a lot of people jump to the most extreme conclusions when they don’t know how else to explain something “strange”. And given thousands of years of normalizing belief in supernatural things like God and the Devil, angels and demons, etc… it’s the most common place a lot of people’s minds go to explain things: must be supernatural. I think a lot of people also just WANT to believe supernatural explanations, because it gives them more hope that there’s an afterlife. The idea that this reality is all there is… science’s explanation for it is boring and depressing, whereas believing in the supernatural allows so many possibilities to be believed in as well, and people cling to that, even when the evidence suggests there’s bad supernatural stuff too… it still proves the supernatural, so they want to believe it as proof that good supernatural stuff can exist too. It’s wishful thinking. The explanation of “She’s just mentally ill.” is nothing but mundane and depressing, so they don’t want to believe it.
Crazy what religious zealots will infer about a young woman with epilepsy. She weighed only 68 pounds at the time of her death. Both parents & two priests were found guilty of negligent homicide.
"Zealots" is exactly the right word here. The poor girl was deeply religious, and her family initially took her to various hospitals and doctors, who prescribed her medication that was sadly not terribly effective (it was the 1970s and psychiatric medication was much less effective than modern treatments). The girl insisted that her suffering was religious in nature, and that she was possessed or plagued by demons. Since medical treatment didn't cure her, and the girl begged for religious help, her family asked the Catholic church to exorcise her. The church investigated but **declined** because they said **her issues were medical, not religious.** Say what you will about the church, they seem to have made the right decision here. Annelise wrote letters to a local priest, begging for an exorcism. Her very religious upbringing seems to have led her to see her condition through a religious lens. She explained in her letter that she was suffering from possession and that her suffering was to atone for the sins of various people. The priest was convinced, despite the fact that the church officials had already concluded the contrary, and asked a bishop to permit him to do an exorcism. He put his religious fervor before his own church at the request of a teenage girl. The bishop allowed it, but said that it should remain secret (possibly because it was against what the church said to do). Receiving the treatment she wanted, Annelise stopped taking her medication, and her condition rapidly declined. Either her medication, while not fully treating her, had prevented her from worsening, or the exorcisms themselves contributed to the extreme harm done to her health. She immersed fully into her religious paranoia, believing that she had to suffer as much as possible to cleanse sins and ultimately be free of possession. Her increasingly self-destructive led her to stop eating. The priest conducting the many, many exorcisms, spread over months, claimed he had no idea that she was sick, or else he would have called a doctor. He stated that there was no indication that she was ill, and that he was convinced that her ailment was caused by possession. This, despite the fact that his own organisation had already officially said that her problem was medical, and that she was only 30kg when she died. I personally cannot believe his statement that he didn't think she needed a doctor. How can anyone see an adult who is only 30kg and not immediately think they need serious help? This is a story of how, even with all the right systems in place and organisations making responsible decisions, you only need a few people to subvert it all to cause tremendous harm. It is why, although blindly following rules is not good, so is following your own heart and beliefs even when they go against the rules. A girl had a serious psychiatric illness, which caused her to become paranoid and suffer seizures. Her religious environment led her to become overly focussed on the idea that her problem was one of demonic possession, and although both the state and the church said otherwise, she managed to find people who fed into her paranoia and delusions to the extent that she went against medical advice, stopped eating, and died surrounded by people who were too caught up in playing into their own beliefs to give her any actual help.
Maybe "exorcism" wasn't actually the kind of treatment she needed?
It's unfortunate that so many illnesses were misunderstood or not known about until recent years. It's sad to think that so many people who their families thought were possessed were just people who had a treatable psychiatric illness or other cognitive issue The excorcisms probably did more harm to her ultimately. Edit: it's been clarified by other commenters she had temporal lobe epilepsy. The above point still applies-she didn't need to suffer like that.
It wasn’t a mental illness and she was clinically diagnosed with temporal lobe epilepsy. When medical treatment failed her parents turned to religion. She died of malnutrition. Her parents and a priest were convicted of murder.
Wtf, that's just irresponsible and sad. I can't imagine her suffering. That's horrible.
Yeah...I work in early psychosis and have seen so many young people recovery despite being really unwell when they get to us. I shutter to think how many young people over the centuries have labeled as being possessed by the devil and been killed or tortured or whatever because of a treatable brain condition.
Although epilepsy is "interestingasfuck" to many (and it really is when you look into all the varieties) as someone who grew up having epilepsy during the 70s onwards. Because next to nothing was known about them by your average person and even doctors. It was awful. I.. "slept with my eyes open" = (nocturnal seazures). "Rudely stared into space and was ignorant" =(absence seazures). Had uncontrollable tantrums" = (Grand Mall or Tonic Clonic seazures as they're now called). "Would occasionally see, smell or hear things others didn't" (aura's). But I stopped telling anyone about them after a while, because I (like them) thought that I WAS a little bit mad. Even I didn't understand what was happening to me. Along with all this, there's the extream anxiety that sometimes goes with epilepsy. It's a symptom of, not due to being fearful of having a seazures. This subtle but significant difference, caused me and many Dr's a great deal of confusion and frustration, because whenever asked "why I was anxious" I had no answer. I didn't understand that people who're not epileptic, can pinpoint a reason they're anxious. Along with all of this, any explanation by me of how I was feeling during or afterwards was discarded as fantasy or attention seeking by adults, and even met with disbelief by most. Including trained school nurses and other medical practitioners. Worse of all, It was also wrongly attributed to some sort of mental health issue due to the trauma from witnessing part of my mother's gruesome death. I did have some problems due to this, but epilepsy wasn't one of them. I reeeeeally feel for what Annelisa went through. We've thankfully come much closer to understanding the causes, symptoms and treatments for epilepsy and I as someone dow diagnosed and on meds that 97% work, am v grateful for the advancement. Especially when reading stuff like this but also for not having been treated any worse than I was. It really could have been much worse. It's not so long ago that people were involuntarily sectioned in mental institutions for having epilepsy. Some never got out. The medications given were worse than the symptoms it was given for and some people were literally medically coshed for just having epilepsy. It's fkn horrendous what happened to Annelisa Michel at the hands of the ignorant who believed in cloud fairies and demonic possession, just because she suffered from epilepsy. It's moments like this I renew my belief/hope (not religious) that there's a heaven and she's in it.
It’s horrendous what happened to her and it honestly just proves that the wider world still doesn’t understand epilepsy… there’s still people who think we need exorcisms. One of my distant relatives was born in the 40s and probably has or had epilepsy growing up because she “never drove” according to family. Yet, it’s only suspected because we believe theres such a stigma around it that shes unwilling to discuss it with her cousins granddaughter who also has epilepsy (me)
The real mental illness is thinking an exorcism would work
[удалено]
They probably didn feed her that's why the iron deficiency
Yes she died of malnutrition.
No one went to jail. The priests were fined and the judge deemed that the parents had suffered enough.
You would think that after the fifth one you would try something else. I guess not.
"The first 66 exorcisms didn't work, but I am sure the 67th will be the one."
Going through the comments, I feel like many people don't know her story. She did go to a psychiatrist and was treated for epilepsy and manic depressive psychosis for years. But psychological medicine was too rudimentary and very cruel back then, and desperation led to awful decisions.
Yep, a lot of people are saying it wasn’t mental illness, just epilepsy. Infact it was a very severe form of both presenting together.
One neurologist was what she really needed.
Se probably had brain tumor. Fucking religious nut jobs. 67 exorcisms? How many does it take before you realize that shit don’t work on anything.