On Friday night Domino, the cat, scratched Nina, and she (Nina) proceeded to have a seizure. It was a bad one. I thought my baby was either going to die or end up a vegetable for the rest of her life.
Nina has a condition/disorder/disease/I-don't-even-know -what-to-call-it labelled "Reflex Anoxic Seizure." It is not epilepsy. It is not a breath-holding episode (which she has had before). It is not naughtiness. It has nothing to do with temper tantrums.
With a RAS oxygenated blood is temporarily cut off to her brain. So, actually, her heart stops beating. Her eyes roll back, and she goes white, her body goes totally rigid, her legs and arms jerk. Her jaw clenches - she seems to be grinding her teeth and she makes these unnatural grunting noises.
Its incredibly frightening for the parents, not to mention the siblings or anyone else, witnessing it. Now, normally all of this lasts just a few seconds - if that - but feels like about half an hour. The only thing to do is put her in the recovery position and wait it out. After the seizure, she slumps, and passes out.
On Friday night, the seizure - which Nick was timing - lasted one minute, two, three, four, five .... at about ten minutes, and a degree of panic in the Bekker home, we took her to hospital: she was still having the seizure.
We are not sure exactly when she came out of it, but on the way to emergency, I saw her blink - up till that point her eyes were wide open, pupils fully dilated. It was the first very faint glimmer of hope, but she was still groaning, grinding her teeth, and rigid. Once in the the emergency room, she actually started screaming. We found out later than once she could scream she was no longer having the seizure. All in all, we think the seizure lasted 15 - 20 minutes. Frightening stuff.
Once the seizure was over, my stress levels did not diminish all that much - mainly because I had no clue what was going on. She was unconscious for about an hour and although she was unconscious her body was still rigid, she was still screaming, and she had no normal reflexes.
It took her about an hour to eventually regain consciousness. She was groggy, unresponsive, and pretty much fell fast asleep for 10 hours. When she woke up, she was much better, but clumsy and very sleepy, just not quite herself. Even today, two days later, she is not 100%, but she will be soon.
(here she is about an hour before it happened, and about 10 minutes after regaining consciousness)First thing she did when she got home from hospital? Hugged Domino!!!!
Things that would have helped me cope better:
1. to know that if a seizure lasts more than 5 minutes to go to hospital;
2. to know that we were doing the best (and only) thing by putting her in the recovery position, not trying to hold or cuddle her, give her water, cool her body (she had a fever too), etc;
3. to know that being unconscious for an hour after the seizure is "normal";
4. to know that once she could scream she was no longer having a seizure;
5. to know that other people's children have this condition! And that they don't die from it!
And the one thing that DID help me was to pray wthout ceasing! Even if my prayers were unintelligible.
So, maybe this entry will help someone else.
Yes, having read what I have just written I can confidently say that I played it down, as expected.
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