Her and Me

TW: Cancer, severe burns, mental illness, and death

In November 2013, my grandma was diagnosed with stage four pancreatic cancer. The only symptom she had before this diagnosis was itching. They scheduled her for surgery to be done on December 26, 2013. By the time they had cut her open, the cancerous cells had spread to too many other organs for them to remove it. They gave her up to a year to live (with chemotherapy) but she was definitely a fighter.

On February 15, 2014, I had a seizure. At the time, I had no idea what a seizure even was. I didn't know what happened until I woke up in the hospital after sleeping for a couple hours. I was in the emergency room for about six hours after waking up. February 22, 2014, I had my second seizure ever. This time, I was alone on a walk. I woke up in the hospital again, just like a week prior. On March 4, I had my first neurology appointment, where I was told that I have epilepsy. After that interaction, I began my research because I was unsure of what epilepsy even is. How much would it change my life? That is the one question I never thought would have such a drastic answer. (That's to come later though.) I had my third seizure on March 26, 2014 when I was in the shower. I woke up to blisters on my right shoulder and arm with redness from my elbow to about half an inch lower than my eye. April 4 is when they did a skin graft, taking a thin layer of skin off my thigh to surgically place it on my right shoulder. I was out of school for a month.

By the end of 2014, my anxiety and depression about knowing the end was coming for my grandma were both absolutely terrible. However, she was a fighter and survived longer than the doctors predicted.

Not too much happened until May 2015, when I began to see a psychotherapist. She quickly diagnosed me with both generalized anxiety disorder and major depressive disorder. I continued to see her every week, crying during many sessions, while appearing numb during others. My grandma continued to fight in her battle with cancer, everyone was always worried about her.

Nothing of major importance happened in 2016 but my grandma kept up her fight.

My life began to get eventful in 2017, more specifically beginning in August, when I started to see a psychiatrist who put me on medicine for my depression. I was beginning to think this diagnosis was wrong, I began to think it was bipolar disorder. I spent a lot of time doing research on bipolar disorder, learning about the different types. I brought up my theory at my first appointment with her but she said, "You're too young to be officially diagnosed with bipolar disorder." I still didn't believe her.

About a month later, my dad got into a motorcycle accident, where he was run off the road by someone who turned out to be a close friend's uncle. He suffered major injuries, the most severe being that he had a brain aneurysm. He spent one or two days in the intensive care unit, then was admitted to the hospital and put on an anti epileptic medicine for a week, while they worked on stabilizing him. It became known to him, a month after that, that he has ADHD. He didn't know until he was an adult, which is very uncommon.

Because of his brain injury and broken clavicle, he did something that got him in trouble in December. So much trouble that he was put in jail. After a few days, bail was reduced by a lot and my grandma was able to bail him out. Because of what the news said, my dad almost lost his job but the news also said his motorcycle accident was minor injuries. His coworker reminded their boss that the news twists the story, at least a little and that saved my dad's job.

In April 2018, I was seeing Hamilton on a school trip with my mom and all of a sudden, I felt weird. It was an indescribable feeling, so I tapped my friend, since I was next to her and not my mom. She then got a teacher, who went into the hall with me. Of course my friend came too, to keep an eye on me while the teacher went to find my mom in the theater. After I stopped shaking from the seizure, I began crying. I was scared and confused. My mom, a different teacher, and I went to the lobby to watch the musical on a small TV with less people around but I spent most of act two having seizures.

Two months after those "weird" seizures, my grandma passed away only a week before my high school graduation ceremony. I wore her dress, so she was there with me when I walked the stage.

Just a couple weeks later, I began having those different seizures every day. I was living in constant fear. When I saw my neurologist in July, I told her about them and I was diagnosed with having psychogenic non-epileptic seizures (PNES).

In May 2019, I began to see a psychologist that specializes in people with PNES.

Where am I in life now?

Although I still struggle with my bipolar, anxiety, loss, and PNES, they have gotten a little better. Some days are harder than others, which is to be expected.

*The one thing I always remind myself of is recovery not being linear.*

**I did not go into detail about PNES because I plan on doing an article about it, with research from psychologists and neurologists.**

If you made it all the way to the end, thank you so much.

Although it isn't required, tips and sharing of stories are both always appreciated.