Observations placeholder
Dr Robert Efron’s patient
Identifier
001628
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
In 1956, Dr Efron provided a detailed description of his patient Thelma B, a middle aged professional singer................ just like the White Rabbit in Alice in Wonderland
A description of the experience
I can be perfectly well in every way when suddenly I feel snatched away. I seem to feel as if I’m in two places at once but in neither place at all - it is a feeling of being remote.
I can read, write and talk and can even sing my lyrics. I know exactly what is going on but I somehow don’t seem to be in my own skin. . . . When this feeling happens I know that I’m going to have a convulsion. I keep trying to stop it from happening. No matter what I do, it always comes. Everything goes ahead like a railroad schedule.
At this part of my attack I feel very active. If I'm home I make beds, dust, sweep or do the dishes. My sister says that I do everything at breakneck speed - I rush around like a chicken with his head cut off. But to me it all seems to be in slow motion.
I am very interested in the time, I’m always looking at my watch and asking someone the time every few minutes. That is why I know exactly how long this part of the attack lasts. It has been as short as ten minutes or may last the better part of a day; it is real hell then.
Usually it lasts about twenty to thirty minutes. All this time I feel that I’m remote. It is like being outside a room and looking in through a keyhole, or as if I’m God just looking down on the world but not belonging to it