“I recently went to a new doctor and noticed he was located in something called the Professional Building. I felt better right away.”

Forgive me friends. I am about to commit a small sin. A small one mind you. I'm not about to commit a murder, or covet my neighbour's ass, for instance. I believe the original religious text was referring to the animal and not Israelite "booty", and, on this basis, I couldn't do so even if I wanted to, because he doesn't own one, and nowhere does it say "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's bird feeder".

I am, however, about to break a rule that I made in the very first post I wrote. For those who have not been following this since the 28th of June 2010 (that's everyone except my girlfriend, my mum and a man in Texas who believes me to be an incarnation of the Dalai Lama), in those heady early days of writing I stated that I never wanted this blog to become something like a diary, where I invest the dull, mundane details of my life with a greater detail than they deserve and parade them about on the internet in an attempt to find sympathy/ meaning/ a girlfriend. I am, however, going to have to infringe ever so slightly on this principle, as it will set us up nicely for what I hope will be an interesting post. So sit back, relax, have a brew and enjoy.

This afternoon I had an appointment at the hospital. Nothing serious, just following up some tests that I'd had done a few months back. After an hour long wait with nothing but 'Angry Birds' on my iPhone for company, I was called in, told that everything had come up as normal, that they couldn't find anything wrong with my heart or brain (always reassuring) and that they'd pass me on to a specialist.

So what's up with me? Like I say, nothing serious, nor anything embarassing; I'm not about to confess to wierd growths or something similar. The reason for my visit is that I have what have been medically termed "funny episodes" which take place during lectures. Put me in a bright classroom, have me take notes off a whiteboard and ten or fifteen minutes in I start to go a bit wierd. I call it the 'Vista effect' because basically my brain responds like an overloaded computer; it freezes. Everything's still there, but I can't interract with anything, and pressing control, alt, delete won't help; for one thing, I don't come with a keyboard.

For about ten minutes I'm a daft mess; I'll start one sentence and finish it with a completely different one, I'll start writing neatly and finish up in some illegible scrawl that looks like a drunk slug stumbled its way from an inkwell and onto my page. Sometimes I'll even nod off. Then something will catch my attention and three, two, one I'm back in the room. Nothing but a headache and a page of illegible notes to show for it. Wierd stuff.

Looking into it, my condition is fairly tame. There are some seriously wierd and wonderful conditions out there, some of which scientists are only just beginning to come to grips with. Take 'Koro' as an example. Many blokes are (how to put it) "concerned" with their penis size, compensating for it with Ferraris, Alsatians and an unhealthy interest in football, but this particular condition, also known as 'Genital Retraction Syndrome', is an irrational fear held by some that your manhood (or nipples in the case of women) is shrinking to the point that it will disappear altogether. Sounds like something out of a horror film, and it gets worse: patients fear that, should their genitals dissappear altogether, they will drop down dead and they attempt to counteract it by tying weights to the end of their... well... you know. But what's even wierder is that it is almost entirely exclusive to China, and even there can be pinpointed further to Southern China and the lower Yangtze Valley. Why? No-one really knows, but God I feel for them.

Another is 'Alien Hand Syndrome' which is also known as 'Anarchic Hand' (which sounds more like a Heavy Metal Band than a medical problem) and the somewhat more sinister 'Dr Strangelove Syndrome' (imagine having him as your GP). In this disturbing condition, often caused by the surgical seperation of the two hemispheres of your brain as a drastic treatment for severe epilepsy, you not only lose control of one of your hands but the hand then appears to take on a mind of its own. This rogue hand will do things completely of its own accord, attack the sufferer and even attempt to strangle them in their sleep. It will refuse to put on certain items of clothing (seemingly posessed by the spirit of Gok Wan) and one patient reported trying to light a cigarette, only for their alien hand to whip it from their mouth and throw it away. He could only conclude that, "I guess 'he' doesn't want me to smoke that". A health conscious hand. Who'd have thought?

Many affect the body rather than the mind. Ever at the age of thirteen accused someone of smelling "fishy"? Could be the condition 'Trimethylaminuria', where sufferers can't break down a chemical in certain foods, causing their bodily fluids to smell of fish. Ever accused a girl of being overly hairy? You cruel, cruel man; she could have 'Hypertrichosis' or 'Werewolf Syndrome', where the body produces an excessive ammount of hair. Others affect the mind in a way that can have serious and embarassing consequences. 'Sexsomnia', recognised only in 2003, causes the sufferer to engage in sexual activity in their sleep much like sleepwalking, and the recognition of the condition has already helped acquit many defendents accused of assault. 'Jerusalem syndrome' is again area specific, where religious people who have embarked on a pilgrimage to the holy city have a sudden religious fervour that leads them to believe that they are a character from the bible. Many end up dressing in white robes and preaching at famous points around the city and, since its recognition in 1980, there have been on average 100 cases per year. Fascinatingly most do not have a history of mental illness, unless you consider religion a form of madness in itself of course.

These conditions have all been recognised and many can be treated, but there are many who suffer from problems that doctors cannot understand; conditions that appear to have no precedent and that modern science either cannot explain or can do little to help. 24 year old Sarah Carmen is a woman who orgasms constantly. I'm sure to many this sounds like a dream, but the poor girl has reported periods when she has orgasmed over 200 times in a day. Let's just hope she's not as expressive as Meg Ryan in 'When Harry Met Sally'. Ashleigh Morris suffers from an incredibly rare condition known as Aquagenic Urticaria, an allergy to water, and Debbie Bird is allergic to the Electromagnetic field produced by such objects as computers, mobiles and microwaves. She's one lady I can be certain isn't reading this.

Such conditions are undeniably amusing to picture, but it is heartbreaking that normal people suffer on a day to day basis with such problems, many of which doctors have little idea about. Researching for this blog, I came to have a certain respect for such people and for the doctors who try to treat them. Dressed smartly, adorned with a small name badge and a stethoscope dangling from their neck, Joe Public can't help but believe that this man or woman is the fount of all wisdom, little understanding that, in many cases, they are as clueless as we are. My girlfriend's mum was being violently sick recently, went to the doctor's for various blood tests and, when they found nothing, set about doing her own diagnosis. She found that she most likely had a form of parasite only transferred to humans from young calves; young calves she had been feeded at a farm park a few weeks before. The poor doctor could only shrug and admit, "it's not a particularly common problem".

Going back to my appointment today, the doctor said something which was the inspiration for this blog; "We doctors don't have all the answers. We can't always tell you what it is, but at least we can tell you what it isn't". It's a remarkably humble thing for a consultant neurologist to admit, but does it bother me? Not at all. In fact I'm somewhat heartened that we don't know everything and that, if anything, we've hardly scratched the surface of the miraculous, magnificent and often mad world of the human body. Life would be boring if we knew all the answers. And besides, at least I know it's nothing serious.

At least my hand is not attacking me.