Holly, 23, USA

Hi everyone! My name is Holly. I was diagnosed with epilepsy when I was 2 years old. For most of my life, my epilepsy was under control. I went six to eight years without having a seizure when I was younger. By the time I turned 17 years old, everything had changed.

At the time I was living in Chicago, Illinois and my neurologist had taken me off of my seizure medication. A few months later, I started getting these weird sensations where I would get this tingling sensation in my stomach, my heart would beat really fast, I would turn my head to the right, and I would begin to see flashing yellow lights in my right eye. At times, I would rub my fingers together and shake my head back and forth. This incident really scared me. As the days moved on, I would consistently have these feelings every week. I made the decision to do some research on this and I also thought about my medical history with seizures. From the research that I had done, all of the symptoms pointed to partial seizures. I talked to my mom about it and she felt like it wasn’t a seizure. When I was younger, I didn’t know what my seizures were like so I didn’t know anything about epilepsy. I sat my mother down again and talked to her about my symptoms, as well as showed her this article that I found online about partial seizures symptoms. She believed me. In the year of 2009, I moved back to Ohio. While there, I found a great neurologist. I talked to him about my symptoms and he reassured me that I might be suffering from complex partial seizures. Two years later, I had a six day video EEG done of my brain and it showed that my seizures were in fact partial seizures, and they were starting in my left temporal lobe. Over the years, my seizures progressively got worse. At that point, I was having seizures four or five times a week. I couldn’t take it anyone. Not to mention, my seizure medications wasn’t working. I had fourteen increases in my medications. Nothing worked. Not at all. I wasn’t able to function in my everyday life. I was always tired, I always had a headache, and my schoolwork was starting to suffer behind it. I remember walking down the hallway at my college and I felt a seizure coming on. I could feel myself getting dizzy quickly. I tried my best to walk to a nearby table. By the time I got to the table, I fell to the floor and started to have a seizure. I had to be rushed to the nearby hospital. It was so sad and plus this seizure happened on my dad’s birthday. The doctors told me my seizure was due to hypoglycemia. I think that had to be the worst one yet. Last year in June, I decided to tell my doctor I was ready to go through testing for epilepsy surgery. So, from the beginning of July 2013 to the end of November 2013, I went through extensive pre- operative epilepsy surgery testing. On December 13th, I had my left temporal lobectomy. The recovery from the surgery went well despite the excruciating headache. So far, I am happy with the outcome. I have only had two seizures after my surgery. Three months apart from one another. I hope to eventually become seizure free. The main thing that I am worried about is school and if my seizures will flare up. During that time, I am under a lot of pressure and I tend to get stressed out. That, in turn, causes me to seize. I will try my best not to be stressed out. I have only two years left to complete my BA in Speech and Hearing. I hope it goes well. My experiences with epilepsy has taught me to advocate for it and to spread more awareness. With that being said, I started my own blog called Staring In The Stars, in which I share my personal experiences living with Cerebral Palsy and Epilepsy. I also share news, products, and educate others about the medical conditions. By blogging, I have definitely learned how to think positively about myself and as a result, I have gained self-esteem. I hope that my story will inspire everyone.