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Type of Seizure and affects on education
Mon, 01/22/2007 - 20:35Topic: Parents & Caregivers
I am new here. I have 2 daughters each diagnosed with a seizure disorder. My 8 year old was diagnosed when she was 2 1/2. She did have speech and language disabilities but now is excelling in school. She took Topamax the first couple years and has now taken Lamictal since. My 13 year old was diagnosed about 2 years ago. She has learning disabilities that are not improving. She has been on Lamictal since the beginning. The Lamictal is apparently effective, from the results of their EEG. Our neurologist has told me my 8 year old has absence seizures, staring off. We have never seen one, but the Dr. says they only last a few seconds. My problem is she told me my 13 year old's seizures are the same only they are internal. They do not cause her to stare off. I can sort of understand that she can continue to function with her brain seizing, but I can't find any info anywhere that discusses this type of seizure. I have a meeting with her teacher's to discuss her IEP and I can't explain it well to them. They don't understand at all. She does not do well in most of her classes. She doesn't understand when they explain it in class. When I help her at home, I have to repeat and repeat before she understands. Does this sound familiar to anyone and does anyone have any advice? I want to be able to explain to her teacher's what is going on in her head and how it affects her learning. We need to rewrite her goals as her current goals have been the same for 3 years and she hasn't mastered a single one. I'm just not sure what goals to come up with and if the epilepsy is the main cause of her learning disability or if it actually has nothing to do with it.
Comments
Re: Hi ,& welcome, Palaab, Here
Submitted by Palaab on Sun, 2007-01-28 - 09:32
Thank you all for your input. It is all very helpful. We had our meeting and the principal and spec. ed. teacher suggested we keep her goals until she needs to write them for high school and she will be taken out of the classroom during silent reading time and her study period to get extra help. She has always had a memory problem but it's never been suggested to me that this had anything to do with the epilepsy. I don't know why I never thought of it, it all makes perfect sense now. It's just hard to explain this to teachers when she is also a typical 13 year old that likes to socialize. The blame all comes back on her for not paying attention and "that's why she doesn't remember anything, because she won't pay attention." Her neurologist had explained to me that, to her, classroom lesson is like watching TV and changing the channel every few minutes. It makes sense to me that it would be hard for her to pay attention, but to the teachers, it all reverts back to her socializing. Every time I have a meeting with them I feel like it would be more productive if I just stayed home and banged my head on the wall. It's very frustrating. But, hopefully the extra help will help her understand her work and get it done.
Thank you again.
Pam
Re: Type of Seizure and affects on education
Submitted by fastpitchfrkmom on Wed, 2007-02-14 - 12:49
i have a daughter that is now 14 she has been diagnosed with E since she was 9 she has the petit mal seizures and JME and I know now frustrating it is to help these wonderful children study. It's like one minute she knows all of it and the next it's like she's never seen it before in her life. Sometimes on things she has to memorize, she uses a tape recorder and talks into it and plays it over and over while she is looking at the material. The short term memory loss is very scary and frustrating for her, there are times she cannot remember what her locker # is or the combination to the lock, I was told it was caused by the meds and the E. we have been really lucky with the school here in Texas, but I stay in constant contact with the teachers and at the first of school every year, I explain her condition to each teacher and give them this website and encourage them to read the comments from the children and parents concerning E. and education. We also keep her very busy in sports, and the teachers know how important passing is to her so she can play basketball, softball, and volleyball. and they are willing to give her tutorials after school or before school, whatever is convient for her. She also uses her E. as subject matter for any paper she has to write for a class, such as health, all about me projects, or wherever it may apply. Clearing up any misconceptions about Epilepsy while educating teachers and the kids in her class, she says most of the time, after her presentation, everyone is really interested and she is able to give them first hand accounts about how E. and the meds effect her life.
Hi ,& welcome, Palaab, Here
Submitted by solis on Wed, 2007-01-24 - 15:08
Hi ,& welcome, Palaab, Here is some info on absence seizures. http://www.epilepsy.com/epilepsy/seizure_absence.html Epilepsy and meds, have an effect on memory which in turn affect ability to concentrate & learning ability. However, despite having E since before I started elementary school, I also graduated university (before the days when medical conditions were recognized by the institutions). For electives, I avoided courses that had exams and entrolled in term-paper courses. It might take longer to write a term paper but I just needed to do the work and that wasn't affected by my memory lack. Via my major, I was graded on everything from class work to on stage performances, but again I avoided exams. :) Even in school, your daughter needs to be able to avoid tests that are memory based. And she'll get more excited when she sees her marks improve. Her scholastic problems are likely depressing her and aren't intentional, so chances are good she'll be happy when she sees her short memory is not affecting her marks. hope that helps, ~sol