Why My Brain is an A**hole — Part 2: Living With Seizures

She recorded this episode the morning after having a seizure. That alone tells you everything you need to know about Kristen Toepfer.In Part 2 of Why My Brain is an A**hole, Kristen goes deep on seizures — what they actually are, what they feel like from the inside, and what it means to build an entire life around managing something that can show up without warning and take you out for minutes, hours, or days at a time.Kristen lives with Todd’s Paralysis seizures — focal seizures that leave half her body completely paralyzed after they hit. Sometimes for ten minutes. Sometimes for half an hour. Once for almost three days. She explains how these seizures started after a brain infection following her second brain surgery forced doctors to open her skull, wash her brain, and start over — wiping out virtually all the progress she had made in rehab and forcing her to relearn how to walk and talk from scratch. Again. She has had eight brain surgeries in total. Most of them months apart.Kristen also connects the dots between her repeated seizures, the scar tissue on her brain, and her schizoaffective disorder diagnosis — explaining how seizure activity can actually trigger schizophrenia in some patients, something most people have never been told.This episode covers what daily life with seizures actually looks like — why she can’t drive, why she uses a Life Alert device, why she avoids the stove and oven, and why the fear of having a seizure in public has made her increasingly isolated. She talks honestly about not wanting to be a burden to the people around her, the stress that triggers her seizures, and her very real goal of getting back outside, getting back social, and eventually getting back on a bike.She also shares something that stopped the conversation cold — her dog could sense when a seizure was coming by detecting changes in her heart rate. He passed away two months before this episode was recorded. She is getting another one.Practical, personal, and completely unfiltered. If you or someone you love lives with seizures, this episode was made for you.Subscribe, share, and follow Kristen’s journey at https:kristentoepfer.comJoin Kristen and cohost Billy Montana for monthly episodes filled with advocacy, education, and inspiring conversations.Together, let's raise awareness for stroke and aphasia and support each other on the journey to recovery.http://kristentoepfer.com