Bonding with My Brother

or Reason #827 That Dude's a Rockstar!

 Think about how strange it is to recall a dream. You have the ability to remember specific events and feeling, but they don’t quite connect. There are gaps in the logic. Now imagine you had access to someone who saw everything that happened in your dream and could fill in all the missing pieces.

That is what happened to me last week.

My younger brother and I were both climbing the walls a little, so this past Wednesday, I convinced him to go on a hike with me. It was a nice outing. We grabbed lunch beforehand and the hike itself was short and pleasant. Leaving the trail, the route home goes through downtown Hot Springs. While driving past all the tourist shops and bathhouses, I started feeling really weird and nauseated. I pulled over, and crouched behind the car. My brother turn on the hazard lights because we were in a no parking zone. I remember not wanting to get sick on my shoes or in my muffler.

After that, my recollections get really vague. For example, I remember cheerfully telling the stranger who offered me water, “No, thank you!” The stranger was my brother.

I also remember wanting my brother to look at the pattern in the pavement (there was a face in the white paint). He reports that I became fixated on all kinds of patterns, particularly the lights in the jewelry store and the dirt on my car window. I even wanted paper towels to clean it off. I don’t remember any of this.

I also don’t remember going into my trunk to get my sodium tablets out of my box of useful things. My brother says I first grabbed a travel bottle of contact lens solution and insisted it was sodium. He was smart enough to know that wasn’t correct and found the right bottle. I don’t remember getting into the passenger seat and fastening my own seat belt either. But I did.

My brother says the whole thing outside the car lasted maybe 10 minutes. I was cheerful and talking, but was clearly “circling Mars” until the drive home, when I fell asleep. I didn’t start regaining awareness until we arrived in Malvern. I slept for at least another hour once home. Since then, I have been extra tired and fuzzy, but otherwise fine. I’ve actually been a bit more productive.

So, what happened?

I think it was a TLE seizure, or a focal seizure that only affects the temporal lobe. Reading the description, and it sounds like what I experienced. My brother agrees that it fits what he saw on his end. My chattiness was a little strange, but not unheard of. There’s no way to officially confirm it without an EEG and/or having more, and nobody wants that. It most likely is because I’ve been having trouble with my medication. The kind I’m on has a side effect of lowering sodium. Late last spring, it was confirmed mine had become chronically low, so my dosage was reduced. Evidently, that solved one problem while creating another. I have some blood work scheduled for today. I’m 99.9% positive my medication will be changed.

Meanwhile, all is well. Honestly, the event itself is borderline hilarious. My brother was definitely concerned and handled it brilliantly, yes/and-ing me to safety. However, we both agree, all of the humor quickly disappears when thinking about what might’ve happened if he wasn’t there…

Moral of the Episode: Scary things become fun when my brother is around!

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