MissingRay

Hello everybody. I am new here. My name is Bridgette. I'm 26 years old. I have a seven year old daughter. Unfortunately my boyfriend of eight years passed away on January 31, 2002. He was only 23 years old. When he had turned 21 he had his first grand mal seizure. We never knew that he had epilepsy but when I think back to our teenage years he always used to black out due to certain lights and he also complained of headaches. We never thought much of it until he had his grand mal seizure. He was tested numerous times but nobody knew why Ray was having seizures. They called it idiopathic, no known cause. When he was 21 up until he died, he would have atleast seven grand mals a week and ended up in the hospital after each one because they were so severe. His seizures were like a pattern. He would always have them in the morning. They would first start out with myoclonic seizures for about an hour or so and then he would go right into a grand mal seizure. He was taking Tegretrol, Neurontin and Diazepam and took a number of medications before that but nothing seemed to stop his seizures. We had asked his neuro. what the risks of having epilepsy were but we just got a shrug and the response of "You don't have to worry about that." I was taking care of Ray for the past two years while he was going through the seizures and they got progressivly worse after time. One day when nobody was around Ray had a grand mal seizure and suffocated in his pillow. I had talked to him on the phone that day about an hour before his death. He told me to come right away because he was having seizures all morning. Any other day I would have went. But, for some reason on that day, I didn't go. I have alot of guilt. I wish I could erase that day from my mind completely. But the pain will always be there and I know that it will never go away. If I could prevent something like this from happening to somebody else I would do it in a minute. That's why I am posting this. I have already posted in a couple different websites. People with epilepsy need to know the risks involved and doctors' won't tell their patients or their families about this. It's not right. Ray's family, our daughter and I had to learn the hard way.

Please talk to your doctor about the risks of epilepsy. And don't let shrug it off, like Ray's doctor did.

Thanks.
Take care,
Bridgette

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Grieving over my boyfriend, Ray, who passed away from epilepsy on January 31, 2002 at the age of 23.

Ray suffered from myoclonic and grand mal seizures.

Loving father to our seven year old daughter.

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Grieving over my boyfriend, Ray, who passed away from epilepsy on January 31, 2002 at the age of 23.

Ray suffered from myoclonic and grand mal seizures.

Loving father to our daughter, Colleen Rae.