Why do people smell burning toast before having a stroke?

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You know how you always here that you smell burning toast or smoke of something like that right before you have a stroke? Why is that? Is it just anecdotal or is there science behind it?

In: Biology

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Anonymous 0 Comments

according to the other comments youre talking about something that has to do with a woman who reported smelling burnt toast before her seizures. i dont know anything about the original video/story thats referenced, but since no one has specified this i thought i would add this:

having something like that happen before a “classic seizure” (tonic-clonic seizure) are called “seizure auras”, and they are actual seizures in and of themselves, just to a smaller localized area. sometimes they occur on they own, and sometimes they spread/progress into a tonic-clonic seizure, and sometimes there are no “warnings”/”auras” and generalized seizures just happen. there are actually alot of different types of seizures, and their presention, as well as the perceived experiences someone has of one can vary from person to person (to a certain extent) even with the same types of seizures.

i learned this when i was talking with my neurologist and was confused on why sometimes my “auras” were accurate at preceding seizures, and other times just came and went, and he told me they were seizures themselves as well, and i should still treat them as if theyre accurate at detecting them, because i cant really know if theyll progress into full (generalized) seizures or not until it happens. then i did a bunch of research, and learned i was probably having way more seizures than i thought, but didnt even know couldve been symptoms of epilepsy. and im glad i looked into it, so i could address stuff more accurately with my drs. i was also able to ask people around me if i ever did some of the things listed and was surprised to find out i did alot of different behaviors associated with seizures, that i didnt remember and never would have known to bring up to my dr about.

thanks for asking this question, i didnt realize terminology has changed for seizure classifications until i re-looked stuff up to add a link here. but you could always read more in the link below, there are also individual pages that describe different types of seizures in more detail which are still simplified and easy to understand.

[www.epilepsy.com What is Epilepsy, Seizure Types](https://www.epilepsy.com/what-is-epilepsy/seizure-types)

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