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One child with epilepsy and one with PS?

Fri, 01/19/2007 - 17:27
I am new to the forum, so here's a little background. My daughter (who is now 28) was diagnosed with JME when she was 17, although the seizures started at 13. She has been on multiple AEDs and has partial control. Now then, my 24 year old son began having what we thought were grand mal seizures. While searching the internet, I feel like his seizures may be psychogenic in nature. I have seen my share of grand mal seizures in my daughter and his are not like her's. He has been to a couple different neurologists who have put him on Depakote and Keppra, yet he still has these "episodes" as often as every three days! There is a lot of stress in his life right now, so I feel that may be contributing to the problem. My biggest complaint is that both doctors want to call it epilepsy because his sister has epilepsy. He has had at least 3 MRIs since October, 4 EEGs and 2 CT scans. All of these came back normal except for one EEG, which was read as "some abnormal spikes". He just had a sleep deprivation EEG, but we haven't heard the results. They have done an EKG as well, which was normal. We have yet to get the video EEG done as the waiting list here is 3-4 months long! I guess I was just wondering if anyone else has gone through this with a family member and, if so, what did they do for the person with PS? I guess I just wanted to vent for a bit. My daughter also just had a baby in September and experienced many complications due to her medications during pregnancy, but that's another story. I have a lot of experience with this (about 15 years) regarding different meds, tests, etc. so if you have any questions, just ask or if you have any advice, I am all ears.

Comments

I have limited understanding

Submitted by wldhrt13 on Sat, 2007-01-20 - 09:39
I have limited understanding of most types of Epilepsy as I am only a lay person. However, from what I've gleaned from veterans on this forum and medical websites, psychogenic seizures look, smell, and feel like Epileptic seizures except that they, "do not result from an abnormal electrical discharge from the brain; they are a physical manifestation of a psychological disturbance." The fact that your son showed an abnormal EEG with "abnormal spikes" would lead me to believe that it is possible he does have some type of Epilepsy. Whatever his diagnosis, he will still need the same amount of support, validation, love, and attention that you give to his sister. (I am sure you already well know this) That's just my 2 cents~ Here is a pretty in-depth article about Psychogenic Non-Epileptic Seizures (PNES): http://www.emedicine.com/neuro/topic403.htm

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