Seizure Susceptible? Could Light-Sensitivity Be The Culprit?

I have hormonally aggravated epilepsy, otherwise known as catamenial, and in spite of taking 2,303 milligrams per day of anti-seizure medications; I still seize. A drop in progesterone that has anti-seizure properties causes this. My personal information is only relevant because no matter what our seizure frequency, we each have our own ways of coping. For me, predictably each month I will have up to three complex partial seizures and an innumerable amount of status simple partial seizures. Most of the time I can combat them, using biofeedback, imagery and progressive relaxation to abort my "unconscious type-complex partial seizures". I can also avoid strobe-like effects due to photosensitivity and increase certain anticonvulsants by recommendation of my neurologist. We all have coping techniques that must take over when our medicine fails. We learn them through life experience. We can compare these to "ammunition" to combat the part of our brains that "has a mind of its own" that plays its own personal human war.

Since my menstrual cycle is irregular, I only know I am approaching seizure-susceptibility when I feel like I am losing my faculties.

This month a complex partial came with barely any warning leaving me on the bathroom floor in a rather undignified position. Another seizure rudely interrupted a favorite TV program the same evening. My "arsenal" was poised and ready and my coping techniques had to save my sanity. The following two days brought status simple partials, increasing in severity to nearly drop attacks.

Does this situation get better and what does this have to do with the title of this piece? You shall find out shortly in this next seizure saga. A new seizure coping technique was born when my husband and I were trying to complete our grocery shopping. A simple partial pounced on me, invading my space. I was concerned I'd hit the floor like a lead weight. (Recalling a similar experience of a peculiar drop attack I had, partially conscious, hearing my head make the sound of a bowling ball making a strike, but instead it was the ground! This is a memory not worth repeating!)

I was photosensitive but it didn't occur to me that I could be "light sensitive" when having a nonstop string of simple partial activity. On this humid, sweltering day, my polarized sunglasses were conveniently perched on top of my head. I put them on to see if they would minimize the glare from the fluorescent lights. Magically, to my amazement, the simple partial began to subside! I was happy to be the "guinea pig" in this experiment.

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