Free My Brain

Around the time I started having seizures on TV eight years ago, my new friend Andrea was driving to the dry cleaners. A seizure caused her to crash her car through the front window and destroy the building. Luckily no one was hurt, not even her lap dog passenger. I say “only in my world” a lot because I swear only in my world do I manage to meet people who lead parallel lives to mine. Working in the epilepsy community has given me a new perspective on my own condition too.

Andrea, now 70, had a partial seizure that caused her to mix up the brake from the gas and drive her car into her favorite local cleaners. Six months before she and I met at the pool Memorial Day weekend, I drove my SUV into my neighbor’s house. Ever since, I’ve been wanting to write about it and free my mind – my brain – of the story. Andrea was the sign I should. Some recent updated EEG testing gave me the time to write. Not to mention the day shift nurse named Andrea.

Pool side Andrea and I were chatting like old friends five minutes after meeting, reassuring a grandpa who took his screaming grandkids to the pool that day that loud kids are no big deal. I got the important details when the subject changed to weather small talk. Andrea wanted to get rid of old winter clothes so I suggested she head to the local Savers since they donate to the Epilepsy Foundation where I serve on the board: Learn how to help us here. I quickly learned we are seizure sisters. I prefer to keep the details of my accident private but like Andrea, I feel lucky and thank God every day that no one was hurt.

I always wish the community had a better understanding of epilepsy, from my friends and neighbors to the nurses and firefighters who see it every day. I think it’s my job to help. Epilepsy is like a long, unpredictable meal and I’m the vegetarian who has learned to carefully pick through meat courses. The good news is that there are almost always pleasant surprises.  

I turned 40 without a license but I am lucky to have amazing loved ones who get me and my children where we need to go every day. I don’t enjoy feeling 15 again but it’s not the first time I stopped driving since being diagnosed in 2008. I fear I’m the exception. Many people who live with uncontrolled epilepsy and don’t drive risk a lot both personally and professionally. It’s one reason the Epilepsy Foundation is so critical and why I run 26.2 this October at the Chicago Marathon. Please donate

I usually hate wearing sunglasses but I used them to hide my tears at the pool Memorial Day weekend with Andrea. I don’t know if it was because watching other kids made me miss my own – the bossy older sister chasing her little brother – or if sharing the details of my life history was a shock to my system. It hit me harder than ever that morning that life is all about luck. Our health, jobs, marriages or the EEG monitoring where I spend almost a week hoping for the same kind of seizures I usually pray will go away.

For some reason, I was bummed that I couldn’t offer to help Andrea by driving her somewhere. Then it dawned on me that meeting someone with the same survival story and talking about it is the greatest gift. I can only hope she feels the same. I don’t think it was a coincidence that we ended up next to each other at the pool that day. Her story reminded me what the effort to survive and thrive is all about. In her case it was after the same crash, not only at an older age but after a battle with cancer.  

Whether I see Andrea or not by the pool again this summer, I hope I remember to thank her. For never settling. Not on anything in life, especially not on seizures.