They often leave large chunks of his memory of what he’s seen and done the week before permanently deleted.
But there is one particular incident that sticks out as a particularly terrifying example of just how hard that aftermath
can be.
“On one occasion, I regained consciousness after a seizure and found myself in the middle of the night, wandering around on the open top deck of a ferry, wearing nothing but my underpants. I had absolutely no recollection of how I’d got there, why I was on the ferry, where I was travelling to, or who I was travelling with,” he said.
Tristan managed to ask a crew member of help who initially thought he was drunk or on drugs. After he started to come round, he learnt they were sailing from Portsmouth to Le Havre, but he still had no idea why he was on the ferry. He gave various names of relatives and friends to the crew, but none of their names were in the bookings. Eventually, after naming a friend, the crew worked out he was travelling on a group holiday and took him to his cabin.
He said: “My friends told me I had climbed off the top bunk, mumbling about going to find a toilet, and walked straight out of the door without putting any clothes on. When I hadn’t returned within a few minutes, they started looking for me, but hadn’t managed to find me. I had been gone for over an hour! While it’s amusing to look back at what happened, it’s also quite terrifying to think of what could have happened.”
“I believe such events would be far easier to cope with if people could be made more aware of the amnesia and general confusion that can be symptoms of epilepsy and other neurological conditions.”