it’s epilepsy awareness day, so here’s a lil epilepsy 101 thread for you from an epileptic!! i have so much more i want to say than all of this but i know people won’t read that much lol

to start: first aid for someone having a tonic clonic (grand mal) seizure! another really helpful thing to do on top of all this is clear out any crowds—regaining consciousness with a huge group of people staring at you can be really scary

a few quick things:
-there are ~a dozen types of epilepsy, some genetic, some not
-no types are curable, but a lot of epileptics have “controlled “ epilepsy (vs uncontrolled)
-only about 3% of epileptics are photosensitive (set off by strobes)

-meds can get EXPENSIVE! without insurance mine would be ~2000/month (this epidemic has hit many of us HARD)
-fun fact: tonic clonics used to be called grand mals but the medical community changed it bc it means “big evil” from when they thought epilepsy was caused by the devil

next: there are lots of different types of seizures, and people can experience many of them. the two most common are petit mals (absence seizures) and grand mals/tonic clonics (shown above). absence seizures are where the person loses consciousness for usually ~10-15 seconds—

it looks like they are staring into space. they don’t drop but they won’t be responsive or (very often) know they had one unless there’s a very clear time lapse. they’re most common in kids but can still happen to older folks.

there are multiple of seizures most people haven’t heard of, and they’re all broken down into two categories: generalized (caused by the whole brain) and partial (caused by an area of the brain)

the (most common) generalized types are tonic clonic, tonic, clonic, myoclonic, absence, and atonic
the partial types are simple, complex, and partial with secondary generalization.
here’s some pictures if you want to learn about some types really briefly!

some really common triggers for seizures are stress, lack of sleep, fatigue, being over-stimulated, hangovers (lots avoid alcohol altogether), dehydration, etc. with stress, lack of sleep, and fatigue being the most common triggers, things like school and work can be really hard

seizures (especially tonic clonics) can leave a person feeling horrible and nearly non-functional/incapacitated for DAYS. often you can barely think/speak coherently or generally move, which again, makes things like work and school really difficult

testing out different meds can be a long and painstaking process. some cause more seizures, make people extremely angry/sad, extremely physically ill, extremely fatigued, etc. and it can be a years long process of cycling through meds that do all these things.

often epileptics are depressed, suicidal, and anxious. testing (EEGs, MRIs, etc) can be really expensive. many can’t drive. a lot are stuck in abusive situations/relationships because of it. it makes life a lot tougher than i think a lot of people realize

all of that being said, seizures are most common in kids and a lot of epileptics can control their epilepsy with time and lead a seizure free life! thank you if you read this far, i hope y’all learned something!!