Creativity and Epilepsy

Epilepsy is a brain disorder, and the brain is very creative. A seizure can prove that point.

I'm a "creative" person, after all, I excelled in art and music in high school, and I ended up choosing an art school for my college studies; graphic design. People always describe themselves as being creative or non-creative. You'll hear it everyday, somewhere. The truth is, we're all very creative inside.

I say this over and over to my wife and doctors. An aura (seizure warning) is where the brain presents itself to the host.

I've had five seizures in five days. Last night, I was laying down in our room just before bed when I felt this warm feeling in the pit of my stomach. Soon I started to see the objects around me as if through a child's eyes; they were all foreign and confusing. As the warm feeling crept up my neck to my head, I felt like I had just finished crying... you know the feeling after a good cry.

Just then the world opened up to me and I saw every color and heard sounds and familiar voices from my past. I can never quite make out what they're saying, but it's so familiar and there is so much love in the air, it's all so beautiful.

Of course, my muscle memory grabs my hand to find my VNS magnet in my pocket and while I'm seeing all of these beautiful things, I swipe the magnet over the device to activate it.

The aura comes to an end and the seizure starts. I've explained this before; sinking into myself, sometimes waking up minutes later, confused, unable to speak.

But the aura is something that I wish all of you could experience. It's something that people would pay to feel, to see. It's what makes me believe that the brain is creative... every brain, everyone.

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I have a Neuro appointment at NW next Monday, along with my eye test that goes along with the drug Sabril. We're going to talk a lot about Sabril's side effects, and whether or not the risks are worth the reward.

I'm going to talk to him about my weight gain. All of my meds note that this could be a side effect, but it seems like I'm a sucker when it comes to side effects. I was turned on to the idea of diet being able to help slow the frequency or severity of seizures as well as control my weight. That's going to be a strong bullet point on my list.