Story Priscilla Rodarte
News Editor
I’m a month or so from being 18 years old, but I don’t have my driver’s license. People accuse me of being lazy since I don’t drive, but I stay silent about the whole situation.
What I don’t want to tell them is that I have epilepsy and I’m scared I’ll have a seizure when I’m behind the wheel.
My first seizure came out of nowhere at the end of freshmen year. I went from having a simple conversation in my grandma’s living room to ending up on the floor with paramedics over me, half-unconscious and delirious.
My second seizure happened at school in my math class, when I was about to take my math final. This was probably one of my scariest seizures because I heard I went in and out of my seizure three times, which is really dangerous.
Doctors said, “epilepsy.” They said I suffered from grand mal seizures, the worst type.
In fact, the whole experience has been a struggle, a dark time. However, two years and 15 seizures later, I’m coming to accept that this is something I’m going to have to live with, not hide from.
For several months after my diagnosis, I felt confused and scared.
But I also felt embarrassed because I had a couple of seizures at school. Obviously, people were going to talk.
Doctors put me on medication, but I continued to have the episodes. I became frustrated. I switched to two more doctors and throughout this time I was put on different dosages of medicines to try to figure out the perfect amount.
The medicine affected my liver at that time, so my doctor decided to lower my dosage a little too fast. However, as soon as it was lowered, the seizures came back.
Everything went downhill.
My grades dropped. My straight A’s went as low as C’s. At this point, I started stressing out and convinced myself I would fail in life. A good college would not accept me.
Everything I worked hard for all my life would go to rot.
Worst of all, I felt everything, the seizures, the bad grades, the pessimistic attitude, were all my fault. My doctors and my parents said to blame the medication.
I didn’t want to believe them. I didn’t want it to be an excuse.
I just recently learned about the grief process in my vocations class and every one of the five steps–denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance–sounded familiar to me because I’m pretty sure at one point or another I went through each one. What they don’t tell you is that after you’ve accepted something, the anger and depression can creep back in.
During junior year I had some bad days where I would just start thinking about my grades and start crying. One day, while watching the Monday announcements, I became overwhelmed and ran out of class.
I really reached my low point around this time.
In mid-October few of my close friends and family participated in the Epilepsy Freedom Walk in Pasadena.
I learned that there have been babies born with epilepsy and have to go through brain surgery. I felt bad because I noticed that some had it worse than me.
At times I might get a little sensitive about the issue, but I have learned to accept it for who I am.
At this time I’ve been stable for more than a year. Right now, I have the perfect dosage, but it is slowly being lowered. This is somewhat scary, but I’ll just see how the dosage reduction goes.
I’m not writing this for sympathy or to get people to feel bad for me. So don’t come give me a hug.
I hope I can comfort those who have come across some health and emotional challenges, not necessarily epilepsy, that they might have encountered. Because although I struggled, I know that my life is not over and am more determined than ever to succeed and accomplish my goals and go to college and just live my life.
In fact, I’m going to be 18 in a month and might just try to get my license.
