Tamara's Story

Conversion disorder is a rare disorder of the brain that occurs in young people, and can cause numbness, fits and for a person to become paralyzed. Despite this, not many people have actually ever heard of it.

The doctors think I first developed conversion disorder when I was 6 years old and went blind for a month. The doctors didn’t know the cause and put it down to the headaches that I kept getting. Then in 2008, I was in a car accident and had to be cut out from the car, though luckily I suffered only minor injuries.

Things turned worse

Three months later I began to have trouble with more headaches and then my left foot began acting up. This got worse and when my mum came home from work, my first words to her were, "Mum, my foot's numb!" It caused so much pain in my whole leg that I couldn’t stand on it.

Mum took me to the hospital the next day and the doctor told me that I should rest my foot for a couple of days. I did exactly that, but two weeks later it spread to my right foot too.

Suffering

I was rushed see the doctor again, who said that my reflexes were really slow. She made me go straight to the hospital where I had two MRI scans (‘Magnetic resonance imaging’ – a scan that produces detailed pictures of the inside of your body), but they had no luck in finding what was wrong.

I could barely walk because it hurt so much and, as a result, I began to go through depression. I used to hide it from everyone, including my parents as I didn’t want them to feel bad about me. I’d go into the bathroom and just cry by myself. My depression continued to get worse.

Some names have been changed.

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What was wrong?

Eventually I got used to walking on my painful feet, but one day I collapsed after a bully at school threatened me. That was the last time I walked.

After collapsing, I couldn’t move or feel anything from the waist down and I began to panic about the pain in my back. I was rushed into hospital where I stayed for three weeks. There they tested and found nothing wrong again, so they gave me the diagnoses of Conversion disorder but they weren’t totally sure.

Coping

It was a massive struggle to get me back into school, as the teachers had thought I had been faking the whole thing and most of the school used to shout at me, "faker!" and other horrible names. Luckily my friends and family have stuck by me the whole time and have really helped me get through this.

We recently got news that I was going to an educational development centre and then back to school. I can’t wait to restart school. People know I’m not a faker now, and I’m sure they feel guilty and ashamed for ever doubting me. I’m telling my story because I feel that more people should know about the disorder… and if there’s one thing I’ve learnt in all this, it’s who my real friends are. And that’s something I’ll never forget.

Help & Advice:

BBC Surgery page on being bullied