Posted by Lyn on October 31, 2002, at 3:09:57
In reply to Re: ECT opinions cordially invited » Lyn, posted by Thrud on October 30, 2002, at 15:52:27
> Did you receive bilateral or unilateral treatments?
Firstly I had bilateral treatment then, later, unilateral for one single session. It was the unilateral that I found the worst. After that session my counsellor visited me. Although I could hear the sound when she spoke, I couldn't make any sense of it, let alone formulate a reply. She put an end to the madness (At that point I was being forced to have ECT against my will.)
>Was the disruption to your memory retrograde (memories before your ECT) or anterograde (sp?) (forming new memories after ECT) or both?
To a large extent retrograde. For example, I didn't remember my children or that I even had any; couldn't remember anything about the work I used to do, and so on. I do have problems remembering things currently (five years later), but am unsure whether to attribute that to ECT or simply to depression/PTSD/anxiety. Regardless, a great deal of 1997 (when I had the ECT, 10 sessions in all), is gone from my memory.
>Did you permanently lose some memories?
Definitely. See above.
>How long before you recovered your problems with speech?
Probably a few months before I started coming right again. Even now I can struggle to find common words; again, as with the memory issues, I'm not sure how much of the current problem is ECT-related and how much is actually a symptom of the illness itself.
Hope this helps. Again, as I said before, not all people have the problems I had. I see that there are already positive replies to your post. Elsewhere on this board you will find other threads discussing ECT and sharing similar enthusiastic responses.
All the best; I hope you find something that helps.
Lyn
poster:Lyn
thread:125772
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20021025/msgs/125910.html