Alien hand syndrome video
Here's a video of a woman with alien hand syndrome from 2006.
From Mind Hacks:
As it turns out, the patient says she generally knows it is hers, but when it is draped across her body in a certain position and making involuntary movements she can think it is someone else's limb. In other words, she seems to have fleeting somatoparaphrenia.Alien hand syndrome videoThe video then shows the hand moving of its own accord and the patient having to use the other hand to keep it out of trouble.
Despite looking like she's in pretty bad shape, frankenerin later posted a wonderful follow-up video where she is back on her feet and feeling fine, although discusses how she's had to adjust her career aspirations owing to the longer-term effects of the brain injury.
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What a lovely lady. This is more apparent in the followup video. Here she's either medicated or strongly under the influence of the brain injury, or both. In the other video she bemoans the loss of touch typing, which keeps her from *coding* efficiently. :)
The doctor, on the other hand (no pun... ahh nevermind), is annoyingly condescending. That kind of baby talk would drive me nuts as a patient.
I've had a few issues with this myself. When I was in high school, my brother and I were asked to participate in a study being done on students whose performance was not up to their potential.
During the course of this, I found out that I had been switched from being left-handed to being right-handed, and in addition had suffered brain damage that affected my coordination. The woman conducting the study encouraged me to engage in activities that would utilize my left and right hands in identical activities. She specifically suggested that I try and make my right and left arms swing evenly when I walked. At that point in time, when I walked my right arm would swing while my left arm remained stationary.
Since I was, at that point, a fencer, I was troubled by this notion -- one of my favorite activities was very specifically asymmetrical.
Years later, when performing low-grade manual labor, I found myself cutting stacks of paper on an old-fashioned paper cutter. It was the kind of set up where the blade of the cutter was capable of slicing through multiple reams of paper with virtually no effort -- gravity did the job.
From time to time while I was working, my right hand would be arranging the paper and while doing so would be directly under the blade of the paper cutter. My left hand would sneak up and pull the safety knob. The handle (three feet of solid iron) would descend and whack me in the noggin.
If my head hadn't been in the way, my right hand would have been cut off. As it was, I sustained minor injuries -- some scabs, that sort of thing.
After leaving that job and returning to school, there were times when I'd stand at my locker and try and try to open it unsuccessfully -- only to realize that I was turning the cylinder on my combination lock mirror-wise with my left hand.
Some time after that I was strolling and discussing the whole left hand/right hand situation with my brother. I said to him, "You know what? I'm asymmetrical. If my left hand doesn't want to swing as I walk, I'm not gonna force it."
As soon as I said that my left hand started to swing on its own, totally independent of my intentions.
Go figure.
Very weird. It's a good thing it didn't go all 'Dr. Strangelove' on her.
Remindes me of Bruce Campbell in Evil Dead 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PzXk3nfEdMY
There's an excellent article about this subject (and related neurological mysteries) in the most recent New Yorker. Need to register to read the full text but here's the abstract:
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/05/11/090511fa_fact_colapinto
And it's on House tonight...