effects of eating, sleeping and dehydration

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epilepsy21

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How much of a difference will health eating, being hydrated and getting 8 hours of sleep have on complex partials. I eat a TON of junk food, have bad sleep habits e.g 5 hours one night, 8 another then 6 hours a different night and also am not hydrated often. Does this limit the*effectivness *of my meds? I take 1500mg of epilim and 50mg of lamitcal in the morning and do the same at night.
 
Generally speaking, things that benefit your overall health can potentially benefit your brain health. However, everyone's different when it comes to triggers and metabolism, so what works for one person may not have any effect on someone else.

If your seizures aren't currently controlled by your medications, it's probably worth keeping a seizure/symptom diary and considering proactive changes in your diet or habits that might help reduce seizure frequency. Good info about being proactive found here:http://www.coping-with-epilepsy.com/forums/f22/proactive-prescription-epilepsy-1254/
 
epilepsy21

Nakamova is quite correct in what is said, even at that if you never had seizures it is important to be hydrated and get regular amounts of sleep. This is even truer when you have seizures and your diet has a part to play in it as well.

It is worth keeping yourself hydrated, getting regular sleep and having a proper diet.
 
Foods to help control complex partials

Thanks for the info!

What are some good foods to eat to help control complex partials and how spaced out should the meals be? Thanks
 
epilepsy21

You could try the ketogenic diet but you need to be aware incase one is a trigger for you, I cannot drink orange it brings on a seizure a couple of hours later. Its little things like this and remember what suits me may not suit you.

Your meals stay as normal, well I presume you are eating your meals at the normal times or do you skip meals, not a good idea skipping meals.
 
I have really bad eating habits. I eat what I want and when I want. Is the key to eat healthy and try to find the foods that trigger it ?
 
Fedup said:
epilepsy21

You could try the ketogenic diet but you need to be aware incase one is a trigger for you, I cannot drink orange it brings on a seizure a couple of hours later. Its little things like this and remember what suits me may not suit you.

Your meals stay as normal, well I presume you are eating your meals at the normal times or do you skip meals, not a good idea skipping meals.
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How did you find out that orange was in relation to causing seizures?
 
Cause and effect I guess. Once a trigger happens a few times it's not hard to see the patterns, looking back, when you're trying to assess what might have caused it..

Keeping a seizure diary is very useful in this regard. It's also a very good idea so you can provide your doctors with detailed info surrounding every event.

As well recording time, and what you experience, I'd also include things like a bad night's sleep/missed meals/gallon of mountain dew 1 minute before seizure etc.

Having it recorded like that makes it even easier to find patterns and work out potential triggers.

You may find that there are no food types that trigger your seizures, but being generally unhealthy and not eating/sleeping/drinking correctly will.

Sleeplessness/stress/being run down/ill are the main 'generic' triggers for most of us, whether we're photosensitive or not, or whether food A triggers seizure X..
 
I think for some people, it's not a single trigger but a combination of triggers that can push them "over the threshold". Fatigue + stress + low blood sugar, for example. So as Slim says you may not be able to pin down a single trigger, but it can't hurt to try a bit of moderation and see how you feel...
 
Sleep is my biggest determining factor, followed by sugar (junk food), emotional stability, then BREATH. I would have partial seizures every morning my college girlfriend would sleep over because I had asthma and spent most of the night awake and out of breath (heh heh). With an inhaler & a plant based diet my chief concern is staying level-headed and getting 8 hours of sleep while working 10 a day
 
epilepsy21

SlimBlue said it Cause and effect, SlimBlue has some good advice. I always had a glass of orange with dinner on a Sunday and I started getting headaches then the seizures started to happened. So what was different, I started by keeping the dinner the same every Sunday and eliminating one thing at a time starting with one veg until there was nothing left but the orange, the next Sunday I had dinner without the orange and there was no headache or seizure that day or the next week. So it was a process of elimination.
 
For me, I've found hydration to be really important. I'm on a med that messes with that, but generally whether you are dehydrated or not has a lot to do with your sodium/potassium balance--electrolytes, which control the electrical signals in your nerves and brain. Dehydration for me is a big seizure trigger, and part of why drinking alcohol can be a seizure trigger for so many (among other reasons). If I get an illness that makes me dehydrated, like a stomach bug, my seizure threshold takes a major nosedive.
 
epilepsy21 said:
I have really bad eating habits. I eat what I want and when.
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This is the same with me and I think it's been due to the meds that I've been on. I was on one where all I did was eat. Another I was on I didn't eat a thing. Both of these meds have been changed.

Right now I pretty much eat when I'm hungry. I always eat a big lunch but never a dinner unless I'm hungry. If I get hungry during the day I'll eat a little bit of a snack. The snacks I eat are pretty much healthy foods, not a bag of chips or things like that.

I drink a ton because I'm always thirsty. I stay away from things with caffeine in them and alcohol. It's usually mostly water I dink. I drink so much that my husband complains how much toilet paper we go through because I'm always going to the bathroom!
 
epilepsy21 said:
I have really bad eating habits. I eat what I want and when I want. Is the key to eat healthy and try to find the foods that trigger it ?
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Eating like that would make anyone sick so since you have epilepsy it's even more risky
 
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