What An Interesting Weekend…

…I admit to having.  I got to be the center of attention (always a good thing, but not exactly what I was dreaming of I have to admit) and everyone all concerned and worried about me – all they had to do was just let me sleep like I told them to do and I would have been fine.

You see, I had petit mal epilepsy when I was a child.  I had gone an entire year without a seizure from the time I turned 16 to 17 and the follow up EEGs that occurred after the fact showed that I had outgrown the seizures for the most part.  I continued to live my life as any other functioning normal 17 year old, and so life continued.  I didn’t have another seizure then until my daughter’s 1st birthday party – the last thing I remember of her birthday party was that I was trying to put on one of her tops and my friend (Kim) knew at the time that there was something wrong with me but not sure what.  They called the ambulance to come pick me up and the next thing I remember is laying in a hospital bed with all these strange people around me that I didn’t know.

That was the last episode until my eldest son was born.  I had gone to the office to show off my new baby to everyone – and felt ‘funny’ while I was driving but I was still in control of my motor skills and functions.  By the time I got to my office though – it had already started.  I vaguely remember dropping my son before slipping to the floor unconscious but he fell on the carpeting and we weren’t that high in the air so no permanent damage there.

The next time, however, was scarier than all three of these episodes put together. I do not recall which son it was – if it was my eldest son or my youngest son, or both (one of the drawbacks of seizures, they kill brain cells and mine seem to kill my long-term memory cells for whatever reason) – but I was alone in the house with one or the other or both until my daughter came home from school and was able to call My Man Thing and find out what to do. 

That was the last incident that happened about 7 to 8 years ago.  Until this weekend.  The seizures that I have had since becoming an adult are due to clear, grain alcohols, and also apparently the PM medication in Excedrin (which is used by Benadryl as well) – which I found out the hard way this weekend.  I couldn’t sleep Saturday night, so I took two Excedrin and that did absolutely nothing for me…so two hours later, still wide awake and unable to close my eyes – I took another one.  I think it was the extra one that pushed me over the limit.

Suffice it to say I ended up in the emergency room and then later was admitted to an actual room because they did not think they would have time to get the MRI done for me that evening, so I settled in for a night of needless worry by my family – I just overdosed on a medication – I’m not going to die here people – that was too strong for my system that’s all.  I know what is wrong with me.  Thankfully they were able to get the MRI done for me Monday evening and, since I refused the anti-seizure medication, they released me – there was no reason to keep me any longer if they could not monitor my medication and how I reacted to it.

I am fine now – still very sore from the calisthenics around the bed Monday morning when I had a grand mal seizure and the gargantuan lead they put in my arm to give me IV fluids – and my brain isn’t altogether there either yet, but its getting there.  I sent emails pertaining to my younger son and his class to my elder son’s class and teachers and unfortunately made a fool of myself – they had no idea what I was talking about.  So now I’ll have to explain myself to all of these people as well and hope that they will understand. 

It’s not easing dealing with seizures because you never know when they are going to come on or what is going to trigger them – I learned in the hospital that a simple UID can cause you to have a seizure as well as a plain old sinus condition from a cold as well.  Let’s just hope and pray that I don’t get that bad off that those simple minor things start causing me to have seizures!  But I just want everyone to understand that it isn’t something that we have control over – if I had known about the medication in Benadryl and the PM medications causing seizures I would have found a different means to help me fall asleep.  Sigh.  Live and Learn, right?