Category: Epilepsy Awareness Month

Welcome to EFMN’s Spotlight Series!  It’s National Epilepsy Awareness Month and the Epilepsy Foundation of Minnesota (EFMN) is taking this time to shine the spotlight on our Regional Outreach Managers who live out our mission every day, connecting individuals and families to real resources in our communities, ensuring no one

Welcome to EFMN’s Spotlight Series!  It’s National Epilepsy Awareness Month and the Epilepsy Foundation of Minnesota (EFMN) is taking this time to shine the spotlight on our Regional Outreach Managers who live out our mission every day, connecting individuals and families to real resources in our communities, ensuring no one

Welcome to EFMN’s Spotlight Series!  It’s National Epilepsy Awareness Month and the Epilepsy Foundation of Minnesota (EFMN) is taking this time to shine the spotlight on our Regional Outreach Managers who live out our mission every day, connecting individuals and families to real resources in our communities, ensuring no one

Welcome to EFMN’s Spotlight Series!  It’s National Epilepsy Awareness Month and the Epilepsy Foundation of Minnesota (EFMN) is taking this time to shine the spotlight on our Regional Outreach Managers who live out our mission every day, connecting individuals and families to real resources in our communities, ensuring no one

Welcome to EFMN’s Spotlight Series!  It’s National Epilepsy Awareness Month and the Epilepsy Foundation of Minnesota (EFMN) is taking this time to shine the spotlight on our Regional Outreach Managers who live out our mission every day, connecting individuals and families to real resources in our communities, ensuring no one

As the parents of a young son with epilepsy, we are humbled by the individuals and organizations who have become a part of our lives and have had a hand in helping raise our child. Our son, Jack, now ten years old, was diagnosed with Lennox-Gastaut Syndrome, a severe form of epilepsy, at the age of four.

Our journey with epilepsy began about 35 years ago when Marcia had a grand mal seizure.  

That journey has been difficult many times, when promising medications suddenly lose their effectiveness and break-through seizures occur.  The journey begins anew whenever a change in medication is warranted.  

When I graduated as a Registered Nurse 15 years ago, the online resources like nursing apps for your phone, epilepsy websites, and Facebook groups weren’t quite as easy to come by as they are now.

Seizures were scary to me. There were medications that needed to be given daily, certain diets to help with seizures and then there were the medications to give if my client was having a seizure! And that may have been their only diagnosis or only just one of them.

I had my first seizure in January of 2020 and was formally diagnosed with epilepsy in April of the same year. In my twenty years of life, I have had 23 surgeries on my brain, heart, stomach, and lungs- all of which are attributed to an underlying condition called hydrocephalus.

This is really important information to know because what to try or not try can make seizures last longer and possibly worse. Because if they’re ever with a person with epilepsy and they start to see them have a seizure, they need to know what makes them safer and what does not.