Stiffening Of Muscles
In a tonic-clonic type of seizure, there are alternating episodes of increased muscular jerks, the clonic phase, punctuated with increased stiffness of muscles, the tonic phase. The muscles become stiff as a result of interrupted initiating neural stimulus, or a prolonged inhibitory stimulus. The patient may describe the feeling as increased rigidity in muscles, which prevents free and fluid movements. A sudden stiffness of the body may occur in sleep. A seizure attack with muscle rigidity while standing may cause the person to fall. This rigidity is also short-lived, and tends to go away as the spell of the seizure wears off.