I had my first Gran Mal when my 2nd child was 6 months old. I was 23 years old. The first thing I remember was I couldn’t see, I walked down the hall. The next thing, I could hear voices, sight came back, a doctor was trying to get a needle into me. I’d been out for over ten minutes. Memory after is gone.
I’m now 61, I had countless drugs. Carbamazepine now 300 mg, twice, per day. Amlodipine 10 mg one/morning. Atorvastatin 20 mg 1/evening, Colecalciferol 800 iu (20 mcg) 1/morn., Omeprazole 20 mg, 2/morn., Atenolol 100mg/morn., Cetirizine 10mg/morn., Doxazosin 4mg/morn., Ramipril 10 mg 1/morn. These are the medicines I’m on. Looking back on my childhood I may have been having absences. I was called dopey, daft, stupid, dreamer, etc. I couldn’t concentrate in class unless it was silent, anyone speaking would wipe whatever I was thinking like a duster in a blackboard. Not sure if this has anything to do with epilepsy…
List if triggers: sunlight through tree’s, geometric figures, had a lot of gran mals in trains, 3D patterns. One time, had to leave a friend’s house as their wallpaper was jumping at me, posters with fluorescent colours pulse out at me, make me feel nauseous, and trigger petite mal, or gran mal. Same in shops chemists, with coloured boxes. Boots I go to give a spinning shelf, I feel sick when the spin the shelf, have to look away immediately.
Good sunglasses have been a godsend for me, very sensitive to the sun. Even dully days. TV is an example, watching the Olympics, determined to see the disabled swimming. Water moving, swimmer moving, when the camera starts to pan, I fit. Ok if it’s a straight shot, any movement, then epilepsy kicks me in the gut!
Usually my first feeling in my belly, if it’s a big one, goes up and over my head like a wave. Unconscious. Stripes are another like on people’s clothes, especially if close together stripes, like if I look down on escalators, the effect me, also the grid at doorways etc., Multitasking can affect me: stress and trauma.
I volunteered at Paisley Abbey shop; I found the till weird as it worked the decimal point out so my system in my head was different. And couldn’t retail new information. Also counting out change ok, until people talked, and my counting is wiped like a blackboard. Had to give the shop up.
”Thank you, for the opportunity to talk about epilepsy
Had a few fits in group, find I’m not invited into groups of friends, I just stick to one or two good friends. People are wary of me. Injury’s, recent one I, felt unwell, walked for kitchen, later I don’t remember anything after. Came too, with someone lying beside me at the living room door, (it was my son), on the phone to the hospital, talking, 999 caller. I got a fright until I realized it was my son, behind me. First thing I remember is him saying it’s Gary mum, your leg is at a weird angle, the pain was off the scale, they asked, if I could move it, I had to try. The pain got less immediately. I’d fell, like a giraffe. I went to my osteopath, who’s an angel, her team examined it, it was like a football injury. Sorry I rambled on; I’ll better stop.
Thank you, for the opportunity to talk on epilepsy, I still attend the Paisley Natural Therapy Centre, they helped me first, as I went to Louise Rohan the homeopathic, for my mood, as the drug’s anti-depressants, don’t mix with anti-epileptic drug’s, they made me suicidal. The homeopathic pills lifted my mood. I currently see the osteo in the same Clinic Carol Mitchell. Has helped me so much, they both have, kindness personified. The Centre for integrative care, Gartnavel, Glasgow, Elaine Hamilton is my nurse in there, retiring soon. Happy for her, her homeopathic work continues, even in retirement, an angel.
