Maria

In the last post, I mentioned my youngest sister. Maria was born December of 2000 just shortly before Christmas. Watching the home movies of that Christmas pretty entertaining to me. Maria is just brand new and we were trying to keep it quiet. You can see Alyssa getting frustrated having to say "Mom" and "Dad" multiple times for their attention. In the background you can see me focused on opening those presents. I already went through this new baby drill.

Maria's post is going to be lengthy and is going to bounce around a bit covering various years, so bear with me.

I went to college. I was a junior stepping in to the grown up world of having an apartment. I lived just a little less than two hours away. I got a call. Maria was 7. Can you guess what happened?

Here's a more detailed version of the phone call from my mom:

My mom was waiting for the bus, it was running late and she had this feeling that something had happened. The bus pulled up and all the kids were waving to my mom and the driver stopped the bus and met her at the door. She told my mom that something happened to her. She got on the bus and the driver said "I think she had a seizure or something, I found her in her seat not talking but awake and not aware of what happened."

Maria had lost her bladder and had bit her tongue. Mom got her in the car, took her home, and called Dr. Bean (ya a real doctor) the pediatrician. My mom told her that it looks like Maria had a grand mal seizure and they scheduled her EEG right away because of the family history (Our body count now included my Aunt Marg, some distant cousin, Me, Alyssa, and our cousin Olivia).

Maria was wiped out. She had a massive headache and stayed in bed the rest of the day. Everything hurt. When mom told our dad, his response was "F**k."

All of Maria's friends from the bus and their moms started asking if she was okay. Her friends thought she had died. People knew about my epilepsy (I don't know how I didn't talk to these people). My mom told them more about what happened and when Maria woke up the kids came over to see her and see that she wasn't dead.

She stayed home from school for about a week. She just hurt. Her head hurt, her tongue hurt, and the EEG was coming up.

When I got the call I was so upset I just cried and kept saying "No! No!! NO!!!" It was all I could say. I was sick to my stomach the whole night just picturing what would lie ahead for her. Then I decided I should be optimistic and repeated in my head "it's just gonna be this one and then she'll be fine." That was her first.

Another day. The second call came.

She had another one at school. She remembered being in choir class and the next thing she knew her friend was walking with her down to the office. Paramedics checked her over in the nurses' office to make sure she was okay. My mom picked her up and took her home. Another call to the doctor and after that one she was diagnosed with epilepsy. They started her on Depakote.


This call did it. It broke me. I knew there was only one more thing I could do. It was time for a conversation with the big guy upstairs. We hadn't talked for a while but for that little girl I love so damn much, you go knock on that door. I  got down on my knees bawling. I looked up and had a talk. I told God that every seizure she would have to put them on me. Not just a few put them ALL on me. I just want her to have a normal life possible. I didn't want anything to happen to her. Let the inconvenience of having to take medication the worse part of having epilepsy for her.

Surprisingly, my prayer was answered (don't worry I'm not going all religious on ya) and that was the beginning of the change in my epilepsy. I wouldn't take it back or change it. She is fully controlled and has not had another grandmal and has only had absent seizures when the doctor tried taking her off of her medicine.

So now we're up to three kids. Three have had a seizure of some sort. What in the world could be next?

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Beware Of Scissors

After winter break in 8th grade I was into basketball season. My Depakote schedule was the same: morning dose, school dose, and evening dose. Like I mentioned, I just didn't care. My mom would bring my pills to the office every week. My Junior High had bigger issues then making sure I was taking my medicine at lunch every day. It was my responsibility.


I was still incredibly depressed and I wasn't going to the office regularly. I was dealing with Grandpa's anniversary, playing basketball, and missing my doses at school. Sounds like a recipe for disaster! Well it was...

OMG a thug pose in a freakin palm tree shirt. This should cause depression on its own! Tomboy.

Moving on. I was sitting at our kitchen table doing homework, cutting some paper....KABAM! Seizure face plant! Years later, I would find out my effing nose was effing broke from this effing face plant and my effing nose grew back all effing effed up!! I'm not mad or anything.

Scissors. Seizure. Face plant. My mom was in the other room nursing my new baby sister Maria (I'll get to her next). She hears the KABAM!! My mother pulls some Wonder Woman shit and jumps up with Maria in one arm and does a karate kid kick to the table while grabbing me with the other arm. I mean holy shit! What I wouldn't give to have seen that combination! She yells for my dad who was in the basement. He grabs me and gets me on the floor. My mom gets Maria in some safe location while she's calling 911. She's a great multi-tasker.

I came to. I saw a white light. Thought I was dead. It was just the kitchen light over me. There were paramedics all around me and I focused on one of them walking towards me and thought it was our priest. Last rights??? Nope. Just there to load me up in the ambulance.

My dad had a few of those tears that you see just on the side of the eyes. He went to the hospital and they checked my levels. They were soooooooo low. I was in trouble. After this, Dr. Savia increased my Depakote dose so I could just take it in the morning and at night.

So now I was on take your medicine lock down.

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So This Is How It Feels

I know, you would think that the first worse day would have been being diagnosed with epilepsy. It wasn't. I was 13, and hadn't experienced the loss of a loved one. This first one, was one of the biggest part of my heart.

December of 1999, my Grandpa passed away. He had been in the hospital over Christmas Eve with pneumonia. The Italian kind of Christmas Eve is loud, with lasagna, sausage, and all sorts of goodies. It had never been so quiet. That Christmas Eve, my cousin Brian, took me with him to go see our Grandpa at the hospital. That was the last time I saw him alive.


My Grandpa served in WWII he was a B-17 bomber and was shot down and was a POW through the rest of the war. In the morning he would say, "Sarge, straighten up those shoes" with a big grin.

I couldn't have asked for a better Grandpa. All my memories with him were happy. I was spoiled more than any grand-kid I knew. I'm sure you're thinking, that's sad but what does it have to do with epilepsy? Well, let me tell you. How these two relate is exactly how hard I took this loss.

What I didn't know back then, makes plenty of sense now. I was already moody from the Depakote. I projected a lot of hostility, especially in sports. I carried it with me in school and at home. After my Grandpa passed it was so much worse.

There's a whole package of B.S. that comes along with having epilepsy and the medications. Depression, mood swings, anxiety, to name a few.

I became incredibly depressed and angry. My emotions were all over the place. I hardly wanted to see anyone and didn't talk much. My aggression spiked at least to a 10. During my softball games, I didn't give a damn if I hurt someone in the game. I was a catcher and when someone would try to steal home I would drop all of my body weight as hard as I could just to hurt them like I was hurting. I broke a pitcher's hand with a line drive after being hit a few times by her pitches. It drove me to be a damn good player and feared in the league.

My parents were concerned by my withdraw. They wanted me to get out more, so they had me go to a friend's house for New Year's Eve. I spent most of the time outside in the cold just looking at the stars and just bawling. I didn't care about things anymore. I didn't care about my health especially. The only reason I was still taking my pills was because my mom made sure I did. I didn't care how many absence seizures I was having. I just didn't give a shit. 

The first anniversary of his passing was just another trigger for the next episode.   

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