I’m new to this whole seizures thing and so I’m not sure what to do. Gavin is still having absent seizures, even on the depakote.
Lizze walked into Gavin’s room this afternoon and he was sitting in bed, holding the remote for his NetFlix box and staring at a blank screen. When she tried to get his attention, he wouldn’t respond.
After the 5th or 6th attempt to get his attention he startled because to him, it was like Lizze had come out of nowhere.
The time it took for Lizze to get him to respond was maybe 30 seconds. However, we have no idea how long it lasted prior to that. It was long enough that whatever show he had been watching had ended and timed out.
Are absent seizures as dangerous as other seizures? I don’t know what we are supposed to do. I mean I know how to respond to someone having a seizures but when it’s your own child, it’s different. Also, I’m more familiar with treating the more obvious seizures in the back of an ambulance.
Until we hear back from the neurologist I guess we have to just keep an eye on him.
Did I ever say how helpless it can feel at times to be a special needs parent? Right now I have two boys suffering and I have nothing to help them with.
**Thanks for reading**
-Lost and Tired
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Posted from WordPress for Android so please forgive any typos as auto-correct and I don’t see eye to eye. 🙂
I've lived my entire life with seizures (diagnosed with absent and temporal lobe epilepsy) , and in my experience 30 seconds seems like a long time for an absent seizure. For me though, they do happen… not necessarily the seizure itself, but it takes me some time after to recover enough to respond. I know in my experience most people watching would probably assume the entire spell as a seizure, but in my own thinking the response time/awareness after can be somewhat delayed.
As far as dangerous, they might not have the same physical danger of a grand mal but they still can cause long term damage to the brain if they aren't controlled.
These days I usually only have spells when I'm stressed, overtired, and/or forgot my medication. If the Depakote isn't helping enough, maybe the neurologist can adjust his medications.
Thanks Amy. Part of what makes this so frustrating is that Gavin kinda zones out anyway and it\’s hard to get his attention. It\’s difficult to tell the difference a lot of the time. He goes back in pretty soon. We are also calling in on Monday.
My 18 year old started having tonic-clonic (grand mal) seizures when he was 13. Prior to that we thought he might be having absence seizures, but we could not ever see anything on an EEG. We have never seen anything on the EEG, even though he has had about 10 of them, and has been hospitalized twice after large long seizures. It is such a helpless feeling when your kid is seizing and you just have to wait, look at the clock, and wonder if you will have to use his rescue medication this time or if you will have to call 911 again. Joe had good seizure control on Topamax for a number of years, but it stopped being effective for him and we are on the hunt for another medication right now. It is not going well, we have tried a couple that did not control them, and are now on Vimpat and hoping it will do the trick. It is unnerving and scary when he has a seizure, and it is hard to live watching him like a hawk.
The only seizure meds my daughter can take is Topamax. she takes almost 400 mg a day. Everything else either altered her mood or did not control the seizures. She has gran mal, febrile and absent seizures. If she don't come out of one in 5 min we have to give her diastat. I hope you find some peace with dealing with all the issues. Seizures are a scary thing even more so when it's a child and your child at that. You feel so helpless and want to help them so bad. She is 13 and non verbal, severly autistic. 911 knows us all to well. Keeping you in my thoughts and wishing you luck.
I think all seizures can be harmful in some way. They medicated my daughter when she was just having the absence seizures with keppra. They may have used depakote in the beginning, but I don't remember why they switched. She started having the grand mal-maybe that's why they switched… I'm sorry this is going on with everything else. Seizures suck!