17: A Passage to India

In this chapter, Dr. Sacks has a patient (Bhagawhadi) who is suffering from Grand Mal seizure (serve shaking and muscle contraction) due to a tumor inside her brain. These seizures began to move rostral entering through the Temporal Lobe of the brain. Changing from unconsciousness status to peaceful almost “dreamy” looking seizers. The 4 lobes to the human brain are Frontal lobe, Parietal lobe, Temporal lobe and finally Occipital lobe and each lobe is special because it controls specific functions of the body at the highest level. So in “ Passage to India”, the patient is experiencing Nostalgic visions and Reminiscence, she is basically in her own “phantasy” which is causing some hallucination.

Bhagawhadi was difficult to treat because she had major intracranial pressure, which was leading to cerebral edema. They immediately placed her on steroids to monitor and slow the swelling down; she began to see visions of trees, gardens, villages, and homes. She seemed to enjoy the seizers because she could vividly imagine being in India, she claims that people are singing, dancing and roaming around in her village. Clearly, the steroids were not helping because she continued to have this repeated seizure but without them she would have been a vegetable. The seizers were now almost readily and she was experiencing them longer throughout the day, she knew that her time was coming to an end. When sometimes ask what she was feeling she responded ‘I am dying,’ she answered. ‘I am going home. I am going back where I came from—you might call it my return.’

The patient conditions became worse, she was no longer responding to any external stimuli. She was no longer to feel pain or pressure. No longer to hear and talk, death had Bhagawhadi by the throat and she was rapidly diminishing. However, she did always have a smile to her face and seemed to be pleasant, within three days Bhagawhadi had passed away. Her case would never be forgotten because it was rare and unique. Normal cases had a fixed format, she had the exact opposite, and she began to see visual hallucinations lucidly. “They seemed more like certain paintings, or tone poems, sometimes happy, sometimes sad, evocations, revocations, visitations to and from a loved and cherished childhood.”