|
I became epileptic at the age of 41 (in August 2003 I became 50). I have never had a head injury nor
has anyone in my family ever had epilepsy or seizures.
When I 38 I went back to college part time and I had gotten excellent final grades for
my first two classes. On television I had been seeing many advertisements for fruit and
vegetable juicers and they had been saying that the average person does not eat enough fruits
and vegetables and one of the easiest ways to fix that was to juice them.
I knew I did not eat enough fruits and vegetables and found the idea of a juicer
very interesting, instead of eating one apple I could juice 7 apples or instead of eating
one carrot I could juice ten carrots and drink it. There were also some fruits and vegetables
I didn't like to eat but if I put them in a juicer and then drink the juice and
benefit myself with a better diet.
I was able to come up with enough money to buy a good juicing machine.
At the beginning I only juiced a couple times a week because I could not afford to buy a lot of fruits and vegetables. After I started juicing and drinking the fruits and vegetables I noticed I would break out with poison ivy like symptoms on my hands and, at times, around my mouth and I did not know why. I also started to have panic attacks and I thought it might have something to do with me going to college at my age even though I didn't seem to worry about it. My parents wanted to help me and they said they wanted me to move in with them until I finished college and then I could move out on my own and find a job in the field I was studying. My parents did not mind helping me and I was enjoying college. I packed everything up and moved and I did pack my juicer. It must have been a year since I used my juicer and during this time I had no panic attacks and none of the poison ivy symptoms I described. I got to thinking about the juicer I had bought and the benefits of fruits and vegetables and I started using it again but this time I had a little more money so I bought all different kinds and types of fruits and vegetables and would juice and drink 3-5 large glasses every morning.I really do mean every morning!It seems like you hear the human person never has enough fruits and vegetables and I wanted a healthy body. I always drank the juice in the morning on an empty stomach thinking that would be the correct way to get the most benefits. After a short time I noticed I had more trouble studying and learning and I also started to break out with poison ivy like symptoms around my mouth and on my hands. All the time I was drinking the fruit and vegetable juice theses poison ivy symptoms would break out and start to heal up and break out again and sometimes they would not even heal up they would just get worse. My grades dropped and I had more and more trouble studying. I was also feeling more nervous and there also felt like there was a band around my head!! I kept thinking that fruits and vegetables are good for you so I continued to drink 3-5 large glasses of fruit and vegetable juice every morning. I tried eating and eliminating things from my diet to see if that had an effect and I did not notice any so I thought the only thing I have done differently in my life at my age was juicing fruits and vegetables and drinking it. Now at this time I was feeling so nervous and that feeling of a band around my head and the poison ivy symptoms and having so much trouble studying that I thought I would stop juicing and see how I felt. When I woke the next morning I was feeling nervous and I did not see a change that day. Two days after I quit juicing I came home from a late class and was getting ready for bed and my whole body shook like convulsions than stopped, that scared me! I had never felt anything like that before and I was not sure what to do. I did not know if I was having a heart attack?I did not know if I should call 911 or should I drive to the hospital? Then about a minute later my body shook again and stopped and I thought what do I do? About a minute later my body shook again and stopped and I was scared because I didn't know what was happening. I thought I would try and go to sleep and try and not to think about it and try to relax but while I was in bed I must have had about 30 more of those episodes where my body would shake and stop and about a minute later it would happen again, but I was finally able to fall asleep. When I woke the following morning I was feeling nervous and scared thinking about what happened to me and that feeling of a band was still around my head. If I went to the hospital how would I describe what happened to me?I never heard of anything like this, would they say I was just nervous and send me on my way or what? I thought maybe in time I would feel like my old self and I would not have to describe what happened to me to anyone. I noticed that I stopped having dreams when I slept and often when I closed my eyes to rest or sleep my body from the neck down felt like it was ballooned up to five times its regular size sometimes. As time went on I noticed that I had no more of the poison ivy like symptoms around my mouth and on my hands and that band feeling around my head was feeling better even. In time I kept hoping I would feel like my old self. A while later I woke one morning and my whole body felt very stiff and sore and I had some trouble walking. I had no idea why. A couple of weeks later the same thing happened when I woke up. About two weeks later I was going to the store and I just parked my truck and got out and the next thing I knew I was coming to in an ambulance. I had passed out in the parking lot and someone had called for medical help. The medical persons wanted to take me to the hospital but I said no and they said I should see my doctor which I did and he referred me to a neurologist. I went to a neurologist and had some testing done and it turns out I had been having seizures! He has no reason how I became epileptic at the age of 41.I am on medication(dilantin) and I have tried a couple of other medications but he put me back on dilatin and the side effects I have to say I don't even want to talk about. I never had the poison ivy symptoms since I quit juicing and the band feeling around my head did go away in time. I talked to three neurologist about how all this happened after I began drinking 3-5 large amounts of fruit and vegetable every morning for 8 months on a empty stomach and they say they have never heard of that. They have told me diet can not cause epilepsy. I am convinced juicing caused my epilepsy. When this first happened to me years ago I trusted the neurologist opinion on treatment and he said I would probably be ok after five years and I could get off all type of medication. I have been able to drive about half the time in the past eight years and things are not better but they are worse. In October 2001 I was driving and had a seizure and went off the road. I have not driven since. I do not want to ever harm anyone driving! I had never had a accident before in my life! In 1994 I did not have a computer but I did write a couple of letters by hand to epilepsy foundations and research centers asking about the fruit and vegetable juice and epilepsy and I got pamphlets from EPA but no help. I have a computer now and I have written many many many letters and e-mail to organizations, foundations, research centers, neurologists and even allergic specialists who say they care and are dedicated to epileptics and I have gotten just a couple of responses back and some of them were rude responses with no help. The few answers back say they have never heard of drinking fruit and vegetable juice causing epilepsy. I am not a neurologist or expert but with what I have learned from the computer and talking to other epileptics this field of neurology needs some real help! I have written to my local epilepsy foundation for help and they say write to main EFA so I write to them and they say write to my local epilepsy foundation. There is no help from them for the questions I ask! I have talked to persons on the computer with epilepsy and they don't know what to do anymore. I know a doctor can only do so much but with epilepsy and talking to a neurologist and the unfeeling way they deal with you is saddening. The advice you hear mostly from other persons is if you don't like your doctor than go to another, that is so easy to say but the persons who say it should try it with no money, unable to drive, no friends, and numerous other problems. I think of the story of the actress Fran Drescher when she knew something was wrong and she went to a number of doctors and it took her two years before a doctor would listen and they finally found out she had cancer. I can't even travel city to city or have the money to try and find a doctor that does care. I have asked about the ketogenic diet and I'm told that is for children but that is another one of the things that made me wonder more about diet and epilepsy. The ketogenic diet has helped and even eliminated epilepsy/seizures in some persons but if diet has no cause or relation to epilepsy/seizures how can that be as I am told diet can not cause epilepsy? I have read that 50-75% of the time the neurologist do not know the cause of an individuals epilepsy but I am told diet does not cause epilepsy, I do not understand that? The real help for epilepsy is where to be found? I am positive the over fruit and vegetable juicing caused my epilepsy! I have read on the computer that a person over the age of forty to come down with epilepsy is 4% those are slim odds and most of that 4% are persons over 50 who have a reason and a known cause of there epilepsy like heart problems or known injuries. I have learned by my own research about hypoglycemia. I've read that imbalance of sugar can cause seizures. I drank up to 5 large glasses of fruit and vegetable juice on an empty stomach for eight months and even though the sugars were natural the body doesn't know the difference between natural and other sugars. What I read about the test for hypoglycemia it takes a certain diet for three days and then it takes a six hour test. I talked to my mother about having a test for hypoglycemia and without me knowing it she called the doctors office to ask if they test for hypoglycemia. The test they gave me was not for hypoglycemia but for diabetes and not what I asked for. For eight years my life has been so hard to describe! I have talked to three neurologists who say diet does not cause epilepsy and I am finding that diet can cause epilepsy. I have been misdiagnosed and where does one find true medical help? I have tried to talk with my neurologists about diet and epilepsy and they continue to say diet can't cause epilepsy. You are probably thinking go to more neurologists and I don't have the money and the capability to but I truely wish I was able to. The EFA tell me they can not find anything on diet causing epilepsy and I write back and tell them to look at places where I have found information on it and they won't answer me back. Where is the dedicated help to persons with epilepsy? I want to known did I damage my pancreas?I s there something I can do to try and straighten my health out from this horrible mistake of drinking so much fruit and vegetable juice? Did I damage my brain? What can a person do to find real medical help? I have written to many foundations, research centers, neurologists hoping to find some hope but I receive no replies. I have written to professors of medical schools and received no replies. I have written to epileptologists and gotten no replies back. I have written to epilepsy organizations in europe and received no reply. I am not saying that what I am talking about is the cause of all epilepsy and I want that clearly known. I know that a medical diagnosis can't be made over a phone or computer but if there is knowledge and a starting point it would help. I have to stop this letter somewhere even though there is still so much to say and I know I'm always going to wish later I would not have forgot to say another important fact but writing is not my specialty and with what I've said I hope I got my point across? Is there a helpful and caring person in the medical field? If this was your life I described what would you do?? The few responses I have gotten back always refer me to somewhere else, but I wish I could find the place that says I'm going to help this person! Is there a place? I just keep thinking and hoping that if the reason why epilepsy and seizures is found it can be treated better. I have lost everything in my life because of epilepsy. There is so much more to say. I have been told diet can not cause epilepsy but ketogenic diet can help or cure epilepsy in some persons but they say it mostly works in children. All the facts I have stated that happened to me and I'm told diet can not cause epilepsy but up to 75% of the time they don't know what causes epilepsy in persons. Where is the help and support for epileptic persons? |