Mum, 29, misdiagnosed with PTSD and depression discovered she actually had terrifying condition
Topics: Mental Health, Health, Real Life, Life, True Life
Rhianna Benson
Featured Image Credit: SWNS
Topics: Mental Health, Health, Real Life, Life, True Life
When 22-year-old Madeleine Dippnall began suffering with panic attacks following the conclusion of a turbulent relationship with her ex, she thought it wise to be checked over by her local GP.
Following a brief assessment, the mother-of-one was immediately told by doctors that she was suffering the anxiety-related side effects of several mental health conditions, including post-traumatic stress disorder and depression.
She was also diagnosed with anorexia after her weight plummeted.
It wasn't until six years later that she discovered how wrong they were...
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Following her initial, incorrect diagnosis, graphic designer Madeleine was prescribed the antidepressant medication lamotrigine.
She was also handed a batch of anti-sickness medication, as well as a dosage of sleeping pills and appetite-inducing medication.
An anorexia specialist went on to determine she did not have an eating disorder.
Speaking later to press, however, the mum insisted that the treatment she'd been given only assisted with eradicating a couple of the health issues she'd been battling.
The panic attacks she's consistently been suffering after she and her former partner split - after which she moved from London to her parents' on the coast - saw the Cornwall mum 'hysterical' with tears.
The couple had parted ways following an 'traumatic' relationship, which Madeleine later claimed she'd needed to escape from for some time.
"I needed to be by the sea," she recalled. "We had to get away. It was horrible".
Describe her attacks, the doting mother went on: "You have the adrenaline equivalent to being on a roller-coaster. Everything sweats. I'd have to go to the toilet to be sick.
"I'd be hysterically crying. You have this fear of God in you that something awful is going to happen."
A now-29-year-old Madeleine continued: "My mum used to put my head under a cold water sink. Sometimes I’d get catatonic. I couldn’t move. I’d go within myself.
"But if you were looking at me you wouldn’t really know what was going on."
One day in April last year, however - following the six-year continuation of her panic attacks - Madeleine woke up lying on the bathroom floor with a mouthful of blood.
After seeking immediate medical attention, is was discovered that she'd suffered a severe, out-of-the-blue seizure in her sleep.
"My body was cramping all over," she remembered. "I had bitten the insides of my mouth. I had a nocturnal seizure, a tonic clonic [where the muscles twitch and start jerking]. The next night I woke up on the bathroom floor."
Madeleine - who'd since remarried her carpenter husband Chris - recalled: "I said to [him], oh my God I think I’ve had a seizure."
After being put through an urgent referral, the designer was finally given an accurate diagnosis: temporal lobe epilepsy.
"I felt relieved that I wasn’t crazy," she admitted. "I was angry at all these authoritative people who told me I had mental problems. If this went untreated I could have really had issues.
"My dad had an instinct all along. He said, 'those are not normal panic attacks that you're having'."
Following the news, Madeleine has finally been able to rebuild her life with her son, husband and step-children.