I started falling over a year ago. Cursor blinking as I type
“I started falling over a year ago” it sounds like a chapter heading or the
first sentence of a love story, but this is not my love story, this is the first
sentence of my story of living with seizures, living my new normal of epilepsy
and all it entails. So as stated, I started falling. Not a blissful fall into
flowers in a meadow or bedding or on the trampoline with my kids, but falling into
walls onto sidewalks, curbs, gravel and the all-too-often asphalt of parking
lots. The first time or two I chalked it off to clumsiness and would be the
first person to tell on myself for doing so and laughing it off. The thing
about falling is not that it can be embarrassing and hurt your ego, but falling
hurts. Falling causes bruises. Falling causes scrapes and cuts and pain. Falling or tripping every now and then can
happen, but my falls had progressed to a point of every couple weeks. Just as
one bruise or scrape would heal to a point of disappearing, another fall would
create another wound to replace it. Laughing it off was no longer possible as I
pushed back the pain to hold my tears, as I pretended that I was okay. As the falls
kept happening, my laughing turned to fear, tears and wonderment of what was
causing what I knew was not clumsiness.
My last fall was my breaking point. I fell on a sidewalk in
front of family and friends. Immediately my husband was asking me if I was okay
as my children waited for my reply too. Once again, I said I was okay, but my
hands burned as breaking my fall had skid the skin on my palms and I knew my
foot was scraped again. I got into the car and as we sat later in the booth of
a fast food restaurant, I recoiled in my thoughts, replayed every fall I had
encountered and knew that this was not clumsiness, this was wrong. A few days
later I told my chiropractor that I had fallen again and he referred me to a
neurologist. The neurologist ordered the normal workup for someone having
balance issues: MRI and EEG with what is apparently the normal waiting time for
any test that can tell you if you have something wrong with your brain, 2 weeks
and another 2 weeks to wait for your result appointment. A month after my
initial appointment, I sit across from my neurologist in his stereotypical monotone
voice and listen as he tells me that my MRI was normal, but my EEG is abnormal.
He goes onto say the EEG reading shows an “underlying seizure disorder” and
basically it’s these misfirings, these mini seizures that are causing my
balance issues and the falls while I am walking. I will have to slow down,
start anti-seizure medications and try some physical therapy to see if it will
help my balance issues. I leave his office with medication samples, a
prescription, my EEG report and a phrase that will not escape my thoughts “underlying
seizure disorder.”
I go to work, go about my day with “underlying seizure
disorder” repeating in my head…and then the questions come: Will this progress?
What if I’m driving? What if I’m alone? What if I’m alone with my kids? What IF…what
IF…what IF? It’s amazing how big of a word “if” really is. Amazing how we can
let it take over a situation. What if I turn it around? What if I start the
protocol my doctor gave me? What if I start the medicine, go to therapy? What
if I take it step-by-step?
What a heavy load Nica. I'm sorry you are going through it. It's good that you are trying to look at the bright side of "what if". As simple as it is, I've never, ever, tried to do that. I torture myself with ifs. Sometimes it seems totally out of my control, but maybe, next time, I'll try to flip it around.
ReplyDeleteA month is entirely too long to wait on these tests! Dang doctors.
Thanks Hayley. I think you have had a load yourself. We can put way too much power in "if". Like many of my posts, part of writing it out is my own way or recording the reminder for myself. This may become a series of reminders! Hope you are doing well and can't wait to see upcoming pictures of Bo!
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