My Experience of Epilepsy and Anxiety

Hello again! Today I'm talking about something really personal. Unfortunately, it's something that I think doesn't have enough recognition and so I think it's really important to raise awareness of it: that’s epilepsy and anxiety. Epilepsy can have a big impact on mental health, whether it’s your epilepsy or you have a family member with epilepsy. As I grew up and learned to deal with my epilepsy, the impact on my mental wellbeing was something that I never even really considered. At least not until suddenly, out of nowhere, it's something that I was dealing with.

My epilepsy has always been on a general upwards trajectory even if there have been dips here and there. Adjustments to my medications have meant that overall, my epilepsy has gradually improved over the years. However, it was only after the worst dip my epilepsy has ever had that anxiety came crashing into my life. My seizures went from clusters every six to seven weeks to every day, maybe every other day. Suddenly, I was spending my life just lying on my living room floor unable to really move, not really wanting to do anything for fear that something would happen. No one should be able to watch the entirety of “Friends” in as short a time as I did back then! I was worried to go out and terrified of travelling on public transport. On the few days I did go into work I was worried that I was going to have a seizure. Worried when I went out in public that I would seize in front of people.

I had grown up seizing at school, at church, and at public family events. It never bothered me before. And yet now I was becoming paralysed by my fear of it.  

And so, came the panic attacks… I only had a couple of really severe ones. The first one I had, I didn't really know what was happening to me, I just knew that I couldn't breathe and that I was terrified.  I never knew when they would come: when I was out in public and I was anxious about seizing, when I was trying to sleep and couldn't because I thought I was going to start seizing. Stress has always been a trigger for my seizures so this all played out in a vicious cycle. I'd get anxious because I was twitchy, then the twitching became worse because of the anxiety. That made the anxiety worse, which in turn made the twitching worse. This would happen repeatedly until I got to a point where I was on the brink of seizing. This was all exacerbated when my contract at my job wasn't renewed because I was taking too much time off sick. 

After my second panic attack, my amazing mum encouraged me to start going to see a psychotherapist who she worked with at the hospital. This psychotherapist was absolutely amazing and I'm so grateful my mum encouraged me to get help. She helped me with sleeping which I was having serious issues with. She also took me through a course of CBT (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy) which she catered to scenarios surrounding my seizures. She also helped me with general stress management so it was a trigger far less regularly.

This combined with the new medication I started meant that I had a significant reduction in seizures. However, when my seizures break from their usual pattern, my anxiety still sometimes comes back to haunt me, but I still have all the tools I was given and they are so unbelievably helpful.

God carried me through that really dark point in my life and I came out stronger. I believed after then, more than ever, in His providence and in his comforting power. His providence put my mum in the job she was in so she knew someone who would be able to help. And I didn't go through any of this until I had the right support system in place.

Anxiety can be really hard to manage but there are definitely ways to cope. I'm definitely a talker, and I found talking things through with people outside of the situation really beneficial. I'm so glad my mum encouraged me to get support even though I felt a bit strange initially, as it was so helpful. Relaxation techniques also really helped me to be less stressed. There are two really important lessons I had to learn when my anxiety was at it's worst. Firstly: that baby steps are ok, necessary even. And really important to get where you need to go in the end. I also had to learn it's ok to let the people closest to you know when you're not so ok. They are the people who want to help you the most. I'm forever grateful to my family, my fiancé and his family for looking after me during my lowest. For not judging me, for driving me to and from appointments with my psychotherapist, and for loving me so well. I'm so grateful to God for putting those people in my life as well as the friends who prayed for me and loved me throughout it all. I know that my journey with anxiety is probably not at its end. But I have the tools to cope so it is less of a seizure trigger, and a God who is much bigger than any worries or stresses that come my way.

One of my favourite verses from the Bible has always been Hebrews 13:5b and it is a verse I really clung to during that time. It says:

God has said, "Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you." 

I know that is true and I can rest in that promise no matter what happens with my anxiety.