Love Languages

My husband and I have very different ideas of romance and attitudes towards PDAs (mine on the effusive side of things, his more reserved). I'm right, obviously, and incidentally resist ever conceding that I'm in the wrong, but I respect his objectively superior approach to relationships. I recently took a quiz based on a somewhat … Continue reading Love Languages →

Academic Update

Just in case you were wondering, I didn't meet my self-imposed end-of-January thesis goal. Not that I'm surprised, really. I used to be the kind of person who never missed deadlines, but things are, of course, different now, and that's OK. Really. I've spent from the middle of January up to now scraping by instead of … Continue reading Academic Update →

A Field Guide to Embarrassment

When I was a kid, my mom liked to remind my brothers and me that as our mother, it was her job to embarrass us. She excelled at this self-appointed vocation. I'm pretty good at embarrassing myself now. Beyond seizure-related incidents, even. I have a tendency to fall in public in a dramatic, banana-peel fashion; … Continue reading A Field Guide to Embarrassment →

Epilepsy Dreaming

I’ve never been much of a dreamer. I don’t mean that in the life-ambitions-metaphorical sense, but rather in the literal I-wake-up-with-a-blank-and-refreshed-mind one. Which is kind of funny, since I come from a family in which dream telling, arguably among the most annoying of pursuits, is a thing. Indeed, in contrast with the vast majority of … Continue reading Epilepsy Dreaming →

PhDetour

(Props to my husband for the title. He suggested it for a book that will never come to fruition, so I’m requisitioning it for use here.) I realize that this ostensibly epilepsy-and-academics blog has been heavy on the epilepsy side of things. It’s thus time, I guess, to include a little about school. Ah, PhD. … Continue reading PhDetour →

Kepprage

I was prescribed Keppra by a neurologist in Victoria during my latest sojourn in hospital. As I swallowed the first pills, I clearly recalled my Toronto epileptologist mentioning Keppra, specifically how he wasn’t going to put me on it because of the potentially severe emotional side effects. Curious about what separated this from the many … Continue reading Kepprage →

Christmas

It’s been a while. I was working on another post about seizures and injuries and pain, but I kept having seizures and hurting myself and wallowing in physical and emotional discomfort. Then I thought I’d write about the sense of emotional isolation—often only perceived and/or self-afflicted— that I’ve experienced since I started having seizures and … Continue reading Christmas →

Sleep and Why I Want It

A few nights ago—coincidentally, the night of the first day I took Alertec—I couldn't sleep. In contrast with the periodic bouts of insomnia I've experienced since childhood (topic for a future blog post?), this was a why-would-anyone-ever-want-to-sleep-when-they-could-spend-the-night-reading-back-issues-of-the-New-Yorker kind of sleeplessness. The next morning was pretty OK, considering the two or so hours of actual repose … Continue reading Sleep and Why I Want It →

Status

I indulged in some good old-fashioned sulking on Wednesday. My (truly lovely) in-laws were visiting from North Carolina, and we drove to Muskoka for a few nights, staying in a delightfully kitschy motel, exploring the surrounding area, and spending a day in Algonquin Park. The plan was to go canoeing. As we approached the portage … Continue reading Status →

Two Steps Forward

My default emotion for the last while has been a frustrating melding of sadness and anger. Maybe I can blame it on a recent concussion, on simultaneous medication changes, on anxiety, on the major depressive episode from which I can’t seem to emerge, on the headache that almost never eases, on seizures. Maybe it’s the … Continue reading Two Steps Forward →