Thanks for the tip about the voice. It's a two-hour class, and although my voice is usually fine, it might get slurry towards the end. If it does, I'll tell the students it's their fault--they're not participating in the discussion enough.

Last spring I went to my son's senior breakfast (graduating from high school), and had a really weak spell. As my husband was dragging me out (not literally, more like half-carrying), the chaplain asked if my foot had fallen asleep, and my husband (who's a teacher at the school) explained that no, I was drunk. That was hilarious, given the context. It was easier to explain than the truth!

But I read about a nurse who was fired for being drunk while she was on-call. She wasn't drunk--she had MG and answered the phone sounding drunk. She sued and won. When I'm weak I walk drunk as well as talk drunk, which makes sense, because I understand that alcohol inhibits neurotransmission. Do you suppose Mestinon could be used to sober someone up?

Abby

Abby

The original and full name of this illness is Myasthenia Gravis Pseudoparalytica.

Or in plain English-severe fatigable muscle weakness which looks like paralysis (probably meaning stroke) but is not, because there are no anatomical findings (such as one would expect to find in the brains of people who die of stroke).

Friedrich Jolly coined this term and he was also the first to document objective evidence for a physiological abnormality. He showed that on repeat nerve stimulation the muscle contraction rapidly diminishes.

Patients with myasthenia are also tired, because it is very tiring to constantly think what you can or can't do, when trying to perform simple daily activities that don't normally require actively thinking about them.

And it is also very tiring to have to think of how to explain this to other people and justify your peculiar behavior.