I might write out some description of my medical episode to help writers out with writing them into stories!
for example: presyncope when standing up with pots. this is specifically AN experience, my experience and doesn’t describe everyone’s presyncope
I’m sit up to get out of bed. I feel lightheaded, it feels like everything in my head gets pushed up against the top of my skull creating pressure. Then I stand up. Sometimes I stand up very slowly but usually I stand straight up cuz I’m inpatient. Best case scenario I feel like I’m spinning like top for a few seconds and my legs feel a little heavy but then I can keep walking. But if I do have a bad episode:
My hearing cuts out, and sometimes a pitched ringing starts. My heart is either really fast and fluttery or go goes thud, thud, thud and I feel the heart beats in my whole body.
I get an itchy tingling that spreads down my legs. It’s a specific tingly feeling that only happens during presyncope. My feet go numb and my legs burn and almost feel hollow. I get really bad vertigo and sometimes lose my balance. Sometimes I have to immediately get to the floor, but often I’m able to just lock my knees and stand there. My vision starts going black and fuzzy from the edges in. Usually it takes over 70% of my vision and then vision starts to slowly fade back in. But sometimes it takes my vision completely and stays black for up to a couple minutes.
I feel trembly all over and I don’t really notice my breathing (sometimes i end up hold my breath) but it’s shallow and trembly. My face is hot and there’s a super loud electric buzzing filling my head, almost like a bunch of bees surrounding me but sharper. I have to wait for that to fade and then the other symptoms start to fade. Sometimes I can think but often at the peak I can’t think at all.
Usually an after affect lingers for 3-5 minutes, lightheaded, and a really bad pounding headache, tremoring hands, bad balance, and leftover flushing heat.
Something that occasionally happens, usually when it’s bad enough to end up on the floor is a short convulsion episode and twitching, usually after all the symptoms have hit but haven’t faded yet. This is called myoclonus and it can be muscle tensing, twitches, spasms, or the whole body shaking. It’s not a seizure but it can be confused for one. When this happens it’s called convulsive presyncope (or convulsive syncope if you actually faint).
One more details to note is that when I start getting symptomatic while upright, I sometimes still feel okay, until I lay down again. Then my heart beats super loud and slow and feel really out of breath and dizzy.
