Skies opened up and I awoke. Rain beat down. I could hear my boy slap the wall between our rooms. We'd gone to sleep just before noon. What I had thought was a mere blink had actually been two hours. I dragged myself from bed with little strength, the days' exhaustion still lurking in my muscles and bones.
My boy had seized three days ago after having suffered an unsettling weekend and not long after a previous fit. Then, on the new moon, he slept all day at school. I analyzed the hell out of it all, wondering what to do.
Did he suffer a concussion when he fell out of bed on the nurse's watch, landing on his head? Is the extra magnesium causing a problem? Is he suffering a bout of benzo withdrawal? Might he be outgrowing his Keppra? Is he going through a growth spurt? Is he getting sick? Is his epilepsy progressing like I heard it can do?
As the deluge swept pollen into opaque yellow streams, I went to him and he smiled at hearing me. Seemed happy as a clam. The night before he'd seized again just after he went to sleep, his nighttime meds not having had a chance to kick in yet. Still, an unusual time for him. I'd been at dinner with a friend. I'd jumped when the phone rang. I resisted the urge to go home, knew Michael could handle whatever went down.
When I arrived home, my body still buzzing from moving to a live theater performance of the earliest songs of rock and roll, it was quarter past ten. I crept upstairs, pulled back the netting on our son's bed and squirted a dose of THCA cannabis oil between his lips. He stirred but did not wake. I repeated the task at two a.m., but at four he nonetheless woke to a partial complex seizure, heart pounding in his chest, Michael next to him. I gave Calvin another dose of oil and went back to bed.
Twice in a new moon my son seized. Thrice this week, making eight grand mals in a months' time, when one is one too many.
The skies, having gone blue for a spell, are darkening again. Bark is black. Grass is wet. My kid is eating and drinking again. I'm waiting to hear back from his Primary Care who fields my many queries about anything. I'm tempted to discontinue his magnesium; perhaps less is best. For now, anyway, we seem to have our son back—our drooly, animated, restless, affectionate boy who keeps us up at night when we should be sound asleep in bed.
My boy had seized three days ago after having suffered an unsettling weekend and not long after a previous fit. Then, on the new moon, he slept all day at school. I analyzed the hell out of it all, wondering what to do.
Did he suffer a concussion when he fell out of bed on the nurse's watch, landing on his head? Is the extra magnesium causing a problem? Is he suffering a bout of benzo withdrawal? Might he be outgrowing his Keppra? Is he going through a growth spurt? Is he getting sick? Is his epilepsy progressing like I heard it can do?
As the deluge swept pollen into opaque yellow streams, I went to him and he smiled at hearing me. Seemed happy as a clam. The night before he'd seized again just after he went to sleep, his nighttime meds not having had a chance to kick in yet. Still, an unusual time for him. I'd been at dinner with a friend. I'd jumped when the phone rang. I resisted the urge to go home, knew Michael could handle whatever went down.
When I arrived home, my body still buzzing from moving to a live theater performance of the earliest songs of rock and roll, it was quarter past ten. I crept upstairs, pulled back the netting on our son's bed and squirted a dose of THCA cannabis oil between his lips. He stirred but did not wake. I repeated the task at two a.m., but at four he nonetheless woke to a partial complex seizure, heart pounding in his chest, Michael next to him. I gave Calvin another dose of oil and went back to bed.
Twice in a new moon my son seized. Thrice this week, making eight grand mals in a months' time, when one is one too many.
The skies, having gone blue for a spell, are darkening again. Bark is black. Grass is wet. My kid is eating and drinking again. I'm waiting to hear back from his Primary Care who fields my many queries about anything. I'm tempted to discontinue his magnesium; perhaps less is best. For now, anyway, we seem to have our son back—our drooly, animated, restless, affectionate boy who keeps us up at night when we should be sound asleep in bed.
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| Photo by Michael Kolster |
Sometimes I just want to scream out into the ether: WHAT IS GOING ON WITH OUR KIDS?
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