Excellent and detailed article on "brain fog"

[GreyGoose]

Greetings

I have had bouts of brain fog off and on for years and have always wondered what caused it and whether I was alone. It can come on at any time, last for any length of time and at times it is so severe that I feel like someone has injected my brain with an anesthetic. I feel dull, dazed, disconnected, stuporish, fuzzy, foggy, retarded, etc. I did some looking around and have come to realize that this symptom is very common. I also found an excellent article about it written by a doctor and thought others here might be interested...

http://www.drlwilson.com/articles/brain_fog.htm

- Regards, GreyGoose

[adamb]

goose, this was the symptom that started it for me, i completely blame every symptom i ever had on this one symptom.

it was the worst by far, and the most disturbing. I also tried emailing that doctor but never got a reply.
but i agree with you that site is great for information on brain fog.

[mrgreen]

goose, [bgcolor=#ff0900]this was the symptom that started it for me[/bgcolor], i completely blame every symptom i ever had on this one symptom.

it was the worst by far, and the most disturbing. I also tried emailing that doctor but never got a reply.
but i agree with you that site is great for information on brain fog.

intersting you should say that, although I am not sure if I understand you correctly.

My troubles started when I was around 25 years old (I'm 53 now...!). I remeber that I was driving back from seeing my father, who was very ill as he had just had a stroke. I did have a lot of personal problems at the time, Marriage and money preoblems among others!!! Anyway, as I was saying, I was driving back, it was at night and I just turned my head to look out of the side window and it seemed like the whole world suddenly tilted and I felt a wave of diziness!! The feeling really shook me up as I had never felt anything like it before. Well, that was the start of everything for me...

I was sure I was terminally ill, had loads of tests via doctor and Hospitals, became a hypochondriac, worried constantly that every day was my last etc etc etc.

28 years later I'm still alive and as reasonably healthy as I should be at my age and lifestyle. Now diagnosed (4 years ago) as GAD and taking 30mm peroxatine which has made a tremendous difference to my health worries (I don't worry about my health now!). I do however still have a bunch of other probs such as anxiety, fatigue, social phobias but feel that had I known at the begining, all those years ago, that I was not the only one to get the brain fog, dizziness feelings that lfe may have been different for me.

Message to any newbies out there is IMO get group therapy if you can. Talking to others with similar/same symptoms as you can be more than reassuring.

[easyheimer]

goose, [bgcolor=#ff0900]this was the symptom that started it for me[/bgcolor], i completely blame every symptom i ever had on this one symptom.

it was the worst by far, and the most disturbing. I also tried emailing that doctor but never got a reply.
but i agree with you that site is great for information on brain fog.

My troubles started when I was around 25 years old (I'm 53 now...!). I remeber that I was driving back from seeing my father, who was very ill as he had just had a stroke. I did have a lot of personal problems at the time, Marriage and money preoblems among others!!! Anyway, as I was saying, I was driving back, it was at night and I just turned my head to look out of the side window and it seemed like the whole world suddenly tilted and I felt a wave of diziness!! The feeling really shook me up as I had never felt anything like it before. Well, that was the start of everything for me...

Wow, thats amazing because that's what started the anxiety and things for me too. I was hanging out with a friend and we went to go check out some cars at a dealership and I got out of the car and immediately I felt as though the whole ground was tilted one way and I asked my friend if he felt it too and he kind of just laughed and said no. After that I have just felt so on edge and anxiety all the time. I started thinking I had a brain tumor and such because my mother just recently went for an operation for a brain tumor and I was freaking out trying to read up on what I had. The more I read the worse the anxiety was. The brain fog just feels like your in a dream all the time, and it's like your out of body just looking around and it feels as if your on auto pilot or something. Some days can be really good as far as the brain fog, sometimes its just there a tiny bit and I feel great. Other times I just can't do anything, and it makes me have panic attacks and think I'm going to die.

I also get really fatigued and my arms and legs feel like they are a million pounds and I feel dizzy and like I'm not able to get around without trouble.It's so awesome to hear that people have felt the same thing as me. Have you been tested and stuff? I got an CAT scan and a MRI and everything came back normal, and even blood tests and nothing.

I can't even go to the mall without feeling the brain fog, and I just walk around in a daze not feeling as if I'm even there. Like if someone comes up to me and talks to me it's like it takes a couple seconds to kind of react and talk to them ... but you feel as if your like a retard talking back.

PLEASE! If you know how to make this better or control it let me know. This would make my life alot better as it's very hard to go about my day to day routine feeling like this.

[Nasser]

First off let me say hi as I'm new here.

It's funny to one day think you have all these odd problems that are unique to you, and then the next read about all of them on a forum. Anyway...

If we are talking about the general sense of detachment, I whole heartedly agree on how much that sucks. But perhaps I am the only one here how gets a strange sense of enjoyment out of the flash of dizziness. I remember this one time I was walking down an aisle in a Best Buy when it struck. I got really dizzy and walked right into a display! You know, it's one of those things that cannot really be explained, but must be experienced first hand.

[Lauraloopy]

LOL this site is wonderful...I couldn't really describe this bizarre feeling to anyone before as i find it really hard to describe...I have it 24/7, sometimes worse then others but it was the reason for my hypochondrysis, i got over the worst part of my anxiety only to be confronted with this, i was convinced i had a brain tumor also as there had to be some explaination, i was sure that my anxiety couldn't have cause this weird feeling but obviously it can...I do find if i take a xanax the feeling goes away, but since its highly addictive i only take it as a last resort for my anxiety and thankfully i have a day without my "brain fog" as well. If anyone knows how to stop it can they let me know too!!!! Thanks guys!!!!!!

[Always Dying]

Dizziness and brain fog or confusion must have something to do with your breathing surely, hypo or hyperventilation due to anxiety.
I always find when i am dizzy or foggy i am holding my breath.

[mindcontrol3]

Great article! Thanks for sharing it greygoose!

infrared lamp saunas

i'm wondering does anyone use one and does it help with Seasonal Depression?

[LondonJulz]

Wow.  This was the one symptom that started it all for me also!  I find it hard to explain to anyone else.  You know on TV when someone is going to start a dream sequence and the entire screen kind goes wavy for a second or two?  That's exactly what it feels like to me.  I get the brain fog, feel about 50% "all there" and then the other night the entire room went wavy for all of 2 seconds.  This was enough to send me into an anxiety attack.  UGH!  Amazing how one symptom can control your life, huh?

[littlemiss_anxious]

Brain fog is a huge issue with me...I feel "very slow" at times.    I'll feel spacey, out of it, trouble focusing, dizzy and off balance -- I'll feel like whatever I'm looking at is tilting a bit.   When talking to people, I sometimes feel like I'm in a dream.  It's very weird and scarey and makes me not want to drive or even stand up.

[aeydownlow]

Guys will this ever go away?

[samantha j]

hi there i feel like im going through anightmare im getting severe tingling in my hands and feet has anyone else had this also my veins are really standing out i really feel im gonna die ive not slept for over a week nearly i cant cope, xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

[tigerpaw]

Samantha J what kind anxiety is happening in your life right now?

[Steve_P]

Really interesting article, and I'm not surprised to read that so many other people have described the same exact feelings and symptoms that I have in the past.

I once had a doctor tell me not to worry about this feeling, saying that it was simply my brain's way of checking out or taking a break from all of the unnecessary stress and anxiety I was putting it through (due to my excessive worrying and panic attacks).  Thinking about it this way ever since, I no longer let this symptom scare me and that helped tremendously.

I've found this is somewhat similar to tension headaches that I would get and would last for weeks - almost always coming during periods of intense stress and anxiety in my life.  Like the tension headaches, as soon as my life calmed down a bit, I also found the 'brain fog' symptoms subsided as well.

One thing that's really interesting is to me is how the body deals with stress residually - in that it often takes weeks or months after a traumatic event for your body to flush out all of the physical symptoms.  A perfect example being this 'brain fog'.

During one particular experience, I was dreading for over six months being in a wedding - I was an anxious mess.  After the wedding was over, I felt a tremendous relief - however the worst of my anxiety symptoms were yet to come.  I promptly developed cold sores, tension headaches and 'brain fog' - all of which lasted at least a few weeks after the wedding was over.

Amazing what we put ourselves through, isn't it?   

[pogge]

Excellent article