Annika's Story
This is not Annika's whole story. I will save her birth story for when I get all of the kids stories together. This is about her journey with epilepsy. We are actually lucky that her seizures do not interfere with her life right now. We will see what the future may hold.
Annika was born at 28 weeks gestation. She stayed in the hospital for a little over two months. She never really had a lot of complications. We took home a happy healthy little girl. We kept her out of daycare for a while. She was a bit slow to talk. Of course she was enrolled in early intervention for that concern. When she was about eighteen months old she started attending daycare on a drop in basis. When she was about three years old she started attending daycare full time. Her teachers were still worried about her communication skills but she was doing fine. She was starting to show some very interesting behaviors though. These started at home and at daycare. Always at nap time she would get off of her cot and go up to her teacher or wander around the room. She would be talking but she did not make any sense. She would pick at her clothes and make weird gestures with her hands. Her teachers thought she was sleep walking. It was actually a bit entertaining. At home she would get out of bed and wander into my room or her brother's room. Some of her behaviors at home would be a bit disturbing. This would last for about 20 to 40 minutes and if I would make her go to the bathroom she would go back to bed. She never remembered these incidents in the morning. For years we just accepted these behaviors. We thought we had a sleep walker on our hands.
During the month of May in 2007 we got a big surprise. Annika wasn't feeling well. I took her temperature. She did not have a temperature. I gave her the choice to stay at home with her baby brother and step-dad or to come with me and Lyn to look at our new rental house. She decided to come with us. She was quiet on the ride over to the house. When we got to the house the girls looked around as I talked to the landlord. My mother lives close to this house and was on the way to see the rental house. We were given the keys and took one last look around. I called Annika from the other room and she did not answer. She was sitting down breathing a little strange. She started to foam at the mouth a bit. That was a bit scary because she had just drank some cranberry juice and it was pink froth coming up. She did not respond to anything I said. I pulled her to a standing position but she did not want to stay upright. I was pregnant with Eliot at the time. I knew this was a seizure. I scooped Annika up and told Lyn to come get in the car. I placed Annika in her booster seat (she had just turned 5 earlier this month). I told Lyn to get in the van next to her and hold her head up. She was oozing pink froth everywhere and making very loud gurgling sounds. I grabbed her nap blanket of of the floor and draped it over her to catch some of the froth. I asked Lyn to climb in next to her and hold her head up. I got in the driver's seat and started to drive to the hospital. It was no more than two miles away. I figured that was quicker than call an ambulance. I called my mother who had not made it to the house yet what was happening. She said she would turn around and meet us at the hospital. Lyn was such a brave big sister. She held Annika's head up so she could breath the whole way to the hospital. She was covered in cranberry froth by the time we got there. I carried Annika propped on my pregnant belly up the stairs into the emergency room. It was obvious what was going on. The receptionist waved us on back. Annika was seen immediately. She seized at the hospital for over 45 minutes. The gave her every sedative under the sun. Eventually they just called in an ambulance to take her to Children's Hospital downtown. My mother had made it to the hospital at this time. She rode with Annika and I took Lyn to her grandfather and I followed to Children's Hospital. Annika stayed in the hospital for about four days. It took forever to get all of the sedatives out of her system. She saw a team of pediatric neurologists who determined that she has complex partial seizures and that a fever set off a febrile seziure at the same time that she had a complex partial seizure. And so our adventure began.
Annika was put on several daily anti-seizure medications with back-up sedative medication for break through seizures. Her daily medication stopped her from sweating and decreased her appetite. She was always a bit skinny and now she started loosing weight. She started kindergarten that Fall. It was interesting sending her to school with a water spray bottle to substitute for perspiration. Now we knew what her strange nap and night time behaviors were. They were seizures. She had them all through kindergarten whenever she would take a nap. Her daily medication worked some but not fully. We changed to another kind but after a few years she was weaned off. We have had ambulatory EEGs to determine just what type of electrical activity is going on. She enjoys going for visits to her Children's Hospital. Annika is seven now. She does not take any medication. She still has seizures at night about twice a week. We have to watch that she is not left alone at night but she is healthy. We loose sleep when she has an episode. She always comes straight to my room. She never remembers anything. We will see how all of this effects sleepovers, driving, and college.
We are lucky. Annika is a true joy to have as a part of our family. She definitely keeps it interesting.
