Video EEG Day 6 and No Seizures

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cp611

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I am currently undergoing a Video EEG at UCLA. While the staff is nice, nurses helpful, and my Dr - a genius - I still feel defeated...

Today is the 6th Day. I came in Monday April 1, my Dr. Took me down to 450 mg the first and second day (from 1200 mg). Wednesday at night they took me off completely. I was on Trileptal.

I've also been sleep deprived 24 hours on Tuesday and Thursday, and again tonight. I feel defeated not having seizures...at home I try to sleep on time, and take meds perfectly - I do everything backwards here and no seizures! I'm frustrated because my family is starting to think I should just leave. I don't want to give up though..

Is there any way to induce a seizure? Any advice? My Dr. and nurses say "you will have one"...
 
Is there anything that you know of that will cause a seizure to come on? Like caffiene? Sleep deprived? Stresses? For me, its being sleep deprived and not taking my medications on time. Hang in there, I know its tough. Were here for you!
 
Isn't that always the way. You don't want something to happen, never fails, it does. But when you want it to... :dontknow: Good luck, I hope they start coming soon so you can get some recorded!
 
Usually stress and sleep deprivation. But it's hard to mimic stress when you can't get out of bed to walk 2 ft to the bathroom and your being waited on hand and foot.

My Dr said the PET scan shows damage areas in the left temporal lobe and he saw spikes the first night I was sleeping but hasn't seen since which he said isn't abnormal - but he did say spikes happen with epilepsy.

I'm just frustrated because now my family is like maybe you don't have epilepsy and I want to have a seizure so bad.
 
It's gonna take time for the AED to be completely out of your system.

For me excessive heat & stress are big triggers. You could try having the heat in your room turned up. If you could get in a argument with someone, that may help to cause a stress related seizure. Even a argument between other people in your room could also work.

Good luck in your session. :)
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I've also been in for a Video EEG a few years back. The whole time I was there I never had
any of my usual seizures. I had seizure activity showing on the machines. But all I suffered during that activity was headaches. It wasn't until the last day when I had a few grand mals seizures. I was put back on my AED, and was able to leave later that day.
 
I saw my Dr. tonight and he claims I wasn't really sleep deprived since the nurses let me fall asleep. He said he's going to sleep deprive me the next 3 nights in a row. Don't know if this is going to make me have a seizure or go crazy? Well, I hope it brings on the seizures.
 
Sometimes this is the way, when we don't want a seizure we have one & when we are in for VEEG & really want a seizure nothing happens.

For me sleep deprivation & stress seemed to be my 2 main seizure triggers. When I had my VEEG in 2010 I had my meds lowered & from the 2nd night I sleep deprived myself, only sleeping 2 -3 hours a night. It wasn't until the day after I was released from hospital that I had a complex partial.

Cp611- Has the neurologist/epitiologist said how much longer they want you to stay in for the monitoring. I'm hoping that you will have a seizure soon.
 
No he didn't say except that he needs 3 seizures recorded on the EEG.
 
cp611, just finished a 5-day video EEG with no seizures. Just found your thread here. Wondering what the final outcome of your video EEG was? Did you ever have your 3 seizures? And...?
 
Well I would say that 3+ days without meds and no seizures is awesome, but that would be the wrong thing to say! :)

As long as you are in there, any suggestions beyond the usual? I'm going in at the Mayo next week.
 
Matthew, I've needed/still need a lot of body work after getting out yesterday because my body got so out of alignment from just having to be in bed for 5 days: lower back, pelvis, neck, cranial base. If you're not post-ictal, try to find some way to keep your body from cracking up.
 
I had back surgery at the beginning of March. My biggest worry is hurting it if I have a TC (quite possible). My second biggest worry is that my sciatica will come back or get bad from being off my feet. I know why they want you in bed, but that sounds almost as bad as having seizures. I need to walk, stand, and sit up straight. The last time I was in they were trying to stop my seizures, so I was doped up and slept a lot. This time I'm going to go nuts.
 
Can you not get up at all? I had leads which let me go about 5 metres from the bed when I went in. If you can't get out of bed at all, have a google for chair exercises (usually you can do them in bed too) at the very least you can keep your upper half mobile, and this sounds stupid but if you lie down and put your legs up and move them as if you were riding a bike it helps to give your legs a bit of a flex but I guess you may not be able to do that this soon after back surgery.
 
A video EEG is the E equivalent of being watched while you go to the bathroom. You just can't do it sometimes!

Humor aside, it is really hard to induce a seizure when you're just lying in bed. During my last one, I was sleep deprived for three days, and off my meds for four days and they didn't catch the "white whale". Even though it didn't induce a full-on TC, hyperventilating did the trick for me, as I began to have plenty of auras.

I felt really disappointed as well, but my doctor told me there was nothing to feel bad about because any and all activity had is helpful, even if it's just a few blips here and there.
 
I had back surgery at the beginning of March. My biggest worry is hurting it if I have a TC (quite possible). My second biggest worry is that my sciatica will come back or get bad from being off my feet. I know why they want you in bed, but that sounds almost as bad as having seizures. I need to walk, stand, and sit up straight. The last time I was in they were trying to stop my seizures, so I was doped up and slept a lot. This time I'm going to go nuts.
Mathew, I had two back surgeries, too, but they were a long time ago--1992, 1999. Even though that was a long time ago, there are still things I do daily to maintain a level of comfort, strength, and functionality. I hear you about your concerns about constraining bed rest. I don't have (or maybe I should say, haven't yet) tonic clinics so I didn't have that complication to factor in.

One thought might be seeing if you can make arrangements to have your PT, or Cranial Sacral Therapist come in to the hospital to work on you in the bed. If I ever have to do another veeg, I will definitely have my body worker(s) come in while I'm there.
 
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