Living in Fear

PLEASE bare with me and read on. I honestly do not even know where to begin so I am just going to tell you my story. Back in 2018, my husband and I were living in our new home for about a year. We were happy, working, had our then 8 year old daughter and our then 2 year old son. I was in the process of joining the USAF and trying to make a career for myself. My husband and I had some doubts on whether or not I would get in due to some previous medical issues, but the military could get me waivers. While waiting to hear anything from them (the recruiter) my husband and I had talked about more kids. "If I can not get in how would you feel about another baby?" I can remember the slight fear and anxiety in my voice when I brought it up. I was nervous and scared on how he would feel about this. Without skipping a beat though, he replied with "yea, I don't see why not." I can still picture it, I was walking down the road, with my son in his stroller, on my cell with my husband. It was warm and sunny and the sun was shining so bright in a cloudless blue sky. It was an amazing feeling. I hung up with him a few minutes later and begin to walk home. That's when I got the call that we would not be able to go through with the military, which was shitty and sucked, but I was ok with it in a sense. I gave my husband the news and even though it was kind of upsetting not going in, we had a family we were planning now.

Fast forward a couple months to Thursday May 31, 2018, when I had a doctors appointment to have my ParaGard IUD removed. It was like any other spring say, sunny warm and oh so exciting for me. I could not wait to get things started. ;) We started immediately that night to try and get pregnant. We really had no hopes in it being done quickly, because with our son it took 6 months to conceive him.

June 3, 2018: Well 3 days later is when all the "fun" starts. My husband and I were doing our normal daily activities with our children that we normally did on Sundays, except this day was a little different. I wasn't feeling good and started to breakout in this full body rash out of no where. My insides where burning and I was puffing up. My husband took me to the E.R, where they said I had an allergic reaction to "something" pumped me full of Benadryl and sent me home.

June 6, 2018: My husband had gone off to work by 6am and I was home alone with my youngest, the oldest was at school. The day was no different from any other, fed my son breakfast, cleaned and then sat down to play with him. Come lunch time I had made him his food and warmed up some corndogs for myself. ***SIDENOTE: I have a shitty memory except when it comes to tragic events such as what I am about to describe. Unfortunately I have been this way since abuse from childhood*** My son had finished his meal and we went into the Livingroom where he was playing and I sat to eat my lunch. I had Netflix on, The Stamford Experiment was playing. I had gotten about half way done with one corndog when I began to feel weird in a sense. My hands began to burn and internally itch so bad that no matter how hard I scratched or rubbed my hand it did not seem to stop. I set my plate aside and went to go to the bathroom. After a few steps, all I remember is falling to the floor to my butt. I am not sure how long I was out, but I came through to my 2 year old sitting next me asking "you k mama?" and him tugging on my pants. I shook whatever it was that happened off, stood up and went to the bathroom. Walking back to the Livingroom, I felt weird again and immediately sat down myself to prevent any possible injuries. Within seconds, I blacked out and again and not knowing how long I was out, came through sweaty and nauseas. I got up and carefully sat on the couch where I sipped on some water and watched my son play. Minutes later, the feeling came back but this time, I grabbed my sons hand and made my way to the bathroom. This is where it got really bad. As I was walking, I started to feel extremely weird, more than what was happening. I then all of a sudden lost all bodily function and defecated myself before I could reach my bathroom. I quickly grabbed the house phone while rushing into the bathroom, shut and locked the door behind me to prevent my son from going anywhere. I sat on the toilet hoping to empty out whatever was left when I blacked out again for the 3rd time. Came through within seconds, managed to strip and get into the shower to rinse off, still feeling shitty. At this point I black out again for the 4th time. I woke up to me sitting in the shower and my son was just happily playing with a little bath toy. I got out wrapped a towel around me and called my husbands job. I do remember when his job answered I could barley speak so when I asked for him it was hard for them to understand. All I can remember is hearing "Hey um Sigs (his nickname) your wife is on the phone, don't sound good" and then my husband calling my name a few times. I had blacked on for now the 5th time, while on the phone with him. He managed to race home to see me shaking on the toilet naked and wet from my shower. He got me dressed and laid me on the couch. I know I should have definitely gone to the E.R but I decided to lay down and sleep it off.

June 8, 2018: It had been 3 days after whatever it was that happened to me. I was still feeling shitty but no other issues throughout the day. It wasn't until later that night when the major scare happened. We had put the kids to bed, and was getting ready to shower and bed ourselves. My stomach began to hurt so I told my husband that I was going to use the bathroom real quick and they we could shower *yes we shower together lol more fun ;)*. I recall sitting down on the toilet, started to feel off, put my face into my hands and out. It was like one of those scenes in a movie when a victim is coming thru and its all blurry and muffled sounding. I was on the floor and could hear my husband saying "she was shaking but is coming through now" I sat up and somehow managed to get on the toilet again. My husband brought me clothes while the paramedics where on their way. With in minutes, 911 was at our door. At this point, I had laid myself in my bed but had major pains in my lower abdomen. I was brought to the E.R where I had a CAT scan done and sat there for hours only to get "we need you to follow up with a neurologist" and sent me home.

Days and weeks of appointments, testing, EEG, MRI,CAT scans were all done. After my EEG had come back with inconclusive, I had to wear one at home for 48 hours. Wires and sticky glue all over my head. After the 2 days had gone by and they received the data, they called me with the results. "Mrs. Consiglio, after carefully reviewing the data from your tests, we have concluded you have epilepsy and seizures." I was speechless. WHAT?? HOW?? I have been fine, never any issues like this, never had issues when watching lights or anything, how is this possible?? Well come to find out, my medical issue is due to HEAD TRAMUA FROM CHILDHOOD. Due to the multiple medications I was on throughout my childhood into adulthood ( I suffered depression and more from my mothers death), they had prevented the seizures. I later found out that half the meds I was on for depression where also anti seizure medication. I was off those medications for years, so why now the change?? Well come to find out, the night I had my IUD taken out, was the same exact night we got pregnant. Because of this, the amount of hormones that were immediately released ended up causing such a chemical imbalance that on June 8, 2018 it sent me into a Gran-Mal Seizure. Now I had many challenges to face. I was pregnant, epileptic and had multiple seizures a day. My pregnancy was closely monitored, I was very careful with everything and anything I did from there out. My pregnancy was scary because of this new medical issues. Thank goodness though she was born on time and perfectly healthy.

It has been over 2 years now since diagnosed with epilepsy and seizures. I have tried different medication as well as mediation and yoga. I have multiple types of seizures, from absent to tonic-clonic. I have also learned that I suffer from Migraines with Aura. These seizures are not to be taken lightly. It is scary to think that any one of those seizures that I have could be my last. Its scary to think that I could be happily playing with my kids, or cuddling with my husband watching a movie and a seizure could hit and kill me. I take whatever proper precautions I need to to ensure the safety of myself an family.

What hurts me is when I am sitting there and can feel them about to happen, which yes in some cases is possible. What kills me is knowing that my children witness me have them and it is possible that it could be the last time I see them or talk to them. Living day to day with epilepsy and seizures is very tiring. I have to watch everything I do, no ladders, no baths alone, no locking myself in a room. I have to cook on the back burner only(if I do cook), cannot drive until I am seizure free for a year. Not driving can put a damper on so much.

Living in fear with daily seizures and the all the complications that come with it, my body, and medication I can honestly say, that I have looked at things a lot different. **I know there are people out there with worse conditions and worse off, and I feel so horribly bad for them.** I try to act as if it were my last moment at times, but I know the living in fear is not going to do anything for me but make me miss on things that really matter.

Thank you for taking the time to read about me. I hope that if you know anyone dealing with the same issues or similar, you take the time to study on the condition to be able to help better and have a better understanding of what they could be going through.