Some signs, symptoms, information, and how it has affected me...
What is Epilepsy?
Epilepsy is a disease that arises because the brain's electrical impulses are not working properly.
The normal eletrical messages that the brain sends back and forth to tell the body how to behave and react misfire in a way
that abnormal electrical activity occurs on the surface of the brain. Epilepsy is not rare, it is not contagious and is not
always disabling. Many famous people have had epilepsy including: Van Gogh, Julius Caesar, Socrates, and Peter the Great.
Do you know the signs?
It can be difficult to tell. Below are some signs that a child may exhibit if he/she
is experiencing seizures:
** Sudden falls for no reason
** Lack of response to noise or to spoken
words for brief periods
* Dazed and confused behavior
** Unusual sleepiness and irritability when
wakened in the morning
* Head nodding
* Rapid blinking and staring
** Frequent complaints
from the child that things look, sound, taste, smell, or **feel "funny"; episodes of fear that have no observable
cause
* Clusters of jack-knife movements by babies who are sitting down, accompanied by crying
* Clusters
of grabbing movements with both arms by babies lying on their backs
** Sudden stomach pain followed by confusion
and sleepiness
* A blank stare followed by chewing, picking at clothes, random movements, unresponsive to surroundings
** Sudden muscle jerks
(**= MacKenzie experiences these symptoms)
(from www.efa.org)
MacKenzie has what is called "Generalized" seizures. This means that the entire brain is affected at the onset
of the seizure. Generalized seizures always cause a change or loss of consciousness.
During a primary tonic-clonic
seizure (grand mal), a person may cry out or gasp, fall down, become rigid, and lose consicousness. Muscles may jerk, breathing
becomes shallow, and the person may lose bladder or bowel control. They may also drool, bite their tongue or lips, and their
skin may turn blue. This activity stops after a few minutes and afterwards, the person may be confused, drowsy, sleep for
a while, and have a headache.
MacKenzie also has absence seizures (petit mal); it appears as a brief loss of awareness
that may occur multiple times a day. Only sign may be that the person may blink frequently or the eyes may roll back. Happens
so quickly that they often go unnoticed and may appear as if the person is not paying attention. Children may miss hearing
information or instructions when it occurs in school.
We believe that MacKenzie has been having petit mal seizures
for a while, even before her first grand mal seizure. This could be supported by multiple unexplained falls.
I
would love to be able to tell everyone that life is "normal" in our household, but that would be sugar coating it
at the least. Scott, Sarah, and I (this is Beth by the way) live in a perpetual state of paranoia when it comes to MacKenzie.
If it is TOO quiet for TOO long, we call to her or "find" her. If we cannot hear her answer or find her quick enough,
panic sets in. If she makes the "noise" that she makes before she has a grand mal seizure (which is vitually indescribable
- you would have to hear it), immediately the heart goes to the stomach and you stop everything and watch her. Most often,
thankfully, nothing happens and it was just a fluke or possibly even a petit mal seizure. She has most recently had too pretty
significant petit mals witnessed by Beth, one sitting in the bathroom while brushing her teeth resulting in a fall off the
counter! The other happened no more than 15 minutes later in her bedroom as she was getting ready for the following day at
school and she fell hitting her rearend on her electronic keyboard resulting in a significant scrape and bruise.
Mac
does have some behavioral problems that we would like to get to the bottom of ~ it is more than just "I'm 5 and gonna
do as I please" behavioral issues. Will keep you updated on the progress here.
A very special THANK YOU to everyone who chose to sponsor our team "Marching for MacKenzie" for the Summer Stroll
for Epilepsy!