It’s not just the person with epilepsy that things can be hard, it can be daunting for friends and family too. It can be stressful of knowing what to do, reacting quickly, and helping the person. It can be quite frightening too if it’s the first time and they’ve never seen a seizure and don’t know what to do.
I asked my friend Chris Dublin his experiences of my seizures and here is what he said;
“There were two occasions where i saw him have a seizure. The first time was at our work place and we both worked on the same department. We were both by the tills when i saw him drop to the floor and started to shake. I automatically knew that he was having a seizure. It was very scary to watch and i didnt know what to do at first because I had never seen a seizure and I froze. When I evently came to I rushed to get a first aider who knew exactly what to do we took him into the office then the ambulance came and took him to the hospital.
The second time we were at a friends house and we were staying the night. Our friend and his girlfriend had gone up to bed. I heard my friend making noises and shaking. I knew what to do because I had experienced it before. I just moved stuff out of his way so that he didnt hurt himself and I just communicated with him by talking to him. Eventually he stopped having the seizure and I got him a glass of water. Then we went to sleep.”
So by my friend’s accounts, he was scared at first, but at least the second time he was more used to it because he had seen one before. He has been able to know how to deal with my seizures if we go out.
If you know someone with epilepsy, asked them questions about how you need to handle a seizure if they have one. One way is keep talking to them and then you know when they are feeling better.
Epilepsy Traveller 