About a month ago, I received a call that brought both relief and dread. I'm sure many other people have gotten such calls, but it was my first and I was not prepared for the odd mix of feelings.
Our middle son, Evan, has always been a little bit spacey (in a totally endearing way), but this school year, when he was required to do a lot more (it is first grade, after all), I started to wonder if his inattention was a little bit more than just typical childhood daydreaming. I started reading up and highly suspected absence epilepsy. We went to see the family doctor, who referred us to a pediatric neurologist. At the appointment, the doctor evaluated Evan, and although he had several "absences" in her office, she didn't seem to notice - he covered very well as he has done the entire time. She ordered an EEG to rule it out completely, but was fairly confident that the result would be no epilepsy.
Well, she called after the EEG to let me know that he did, indeed, have absence epilepsy, she estimated from his test results that he has been having about 6-10 absence seizures per hour lasting up to 7 seconds. The really good news is that most kids who have a later onset (in Evan's age group) grow out of the absences around the time they hit puberty, which is excellent news. The bad news was that he will need to be on medication to treat the seizures for a minimum of two years or until the EEG results come back clear, then we will be able to try to wean him off the meds.
Now, I will admit, I balked at the idea of medicating him. I researched and read, and the list of possible side effects was dizzying. I talked to a pharmacist friend who recommended putting the list of side effects away and giving the medication a try. I'm so glad I took his advice.
We've seen a drastic improvement in Evan already, and, while I am sure there are challenges ahead, and more tests and evaluations and things I don't even know about, I'm both happy to know how to help him and thankful that we have an answer.
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