After my doctor recommended a watch and wait strategy I went home happy and excited to live more fully. Unfortunately my relief did not last long. At this point I was taking anti-seizure medications and had been on a ketogenic diet for almost two months. I did not have a seizure for eight weeks. That was an improvement, about fifty percent fewer seizures than before. After the eight week I was on a run in my neighborhood when I started to feel strange. I noticed myself forgetting words as I got back to my street. I walked into the house expecting a short seizure with trouble with word finding. I called to our au pair, Laura, to come sit with me. She came over to the stairs where I had sat down, and very quickly my brain function started to degrade. I couldn’t talk at all so I squeezed her hand to communicate. Then I was gone, unconscious.

According to Laura I started turning to look around as if there was a ghost. Then I started shaking with convulsions. She took video footage and called my husband and 911. Eventually I went tonic, frozen in a fully body muscle spasm. I stopped breathing and started foaming at the mouth. She gave me mouth to mouth and the paramedics came. At this point it had been at least ten minutes since I started feeling ill. Then I came out of it. I was groggy, but I saw all the people around me and I was surprised. I went to the bathroom and came back.

The EMTs took me in an ambulance to the UW hospital emergency room. At this point I was fine and I waited there until my husband came and sat with me. They did some blood tests and ultimately let me go. Since I had a previously planned appointment with my neurologist soon. They told me to follow up with him.

I slept deeply that night, but I started to fear seizures. I knew that a convulsive seizure like that could kill me, and a long one could damage my brain. I thought about seizures while I was asleep. Would I even wake up?