Seizure
| “ | What is happening? Wh- What is happening? What is happening? Call 9-1 oh, oh! Ohhhh! Can't you see I'm seizing? You just watched me have a seizure and this is the way you treat me? YOU JUST WATCHED ME HAVE A SEIZURE AND THIS IS THE WAY YOU TREAT ME? | ” |
| — Josh faking a seizure in Chicago[1] | ||
A seizure is a sudden, brief disruption of brain activity caused by abnormal, excessive, or synchronous neuronal firing. Depending on the regions of the brain involved, seizures can lead to changes in movement, sensation, behavior, awareness, or consciousness. Symptoms vary widely. Some seizures involve subtle changes, such as brief lapses in attention or awareness (as seen in absence seizures), while others cause generalized convulsions with loss of consciousness (tonic–clonic seizures). Most seizures last less than two minutes and are followed by a postictal period of confusion, fatigue, or other symptoms. A seizure lasting longer than five minutes is a medical emergency known as status epilepticus.
Seizures are classified as provoked, when triggered by a known cause such as fever, head trauma, or metabolic imbalance, or unprovoked, when no immediate trigger is identified. Recurrent unprovoked seizures define the neurological condition epilepsy.
Josh claims to suffer from seizures, often in tandem with heart attacks and strokes, but all evidence points towards faking it.