Susan,
i have had epilepsy since I was eight. I am allergic to tegrotol. I took a phenobarbitol/depakote combo for years. I still take phenobarbitol but with dilantin now. I had a gran mal siezure when they were inucing labor with my second born. Emergency c-section. Unfortunately, memory is a casualty of epilepsy. Its like holding a handful of sand and each grain is a memory. And suddenly you sneeze and there go some more memories. I have gotten depressed over this. For me it is the phenobarbitol. Unfortunately, I don't respond to much else. My experience with petite mal siezure is, sometimes my vision over emphasizes reapeating patterns. (i.E. The shadow of a moving cieling fan, the creases in drapes and it is doing this because my med levels are low. Have you gained weight? If so, have your medication requirements re-evaluated. Also hormones play a big part in this. Doctors won't admit this. Are you going through menopause? Think, what could possibly be different about me that is causing all of this? Epilepsy like any medical condition is controlled by balance. Could there be anything about your biology that may have tipped the balance in the slightest?

Hello everyone, does anyone out there take keppra to control their seizures???? And does anyone when they have a seizure start shivering, feel sick to the stomach, feel like throwing up and their teeth start chattering and stare..........Does this sound familiar to anyone? What do you do?..........Help

Sorry never heard of that one before! I got tired of taking both dilantin and phenabarbotol right after my first child was born and ask for just one pill. I can't remember what it was, but I had horrible hallucinations and became very parrinoid of everyone includding my husband! We were in guam and there were no nero.At all! They finally found a man who was visiting guam and he was retired but agreed to see me. When he found out what I was taking, he winged me off it and back on my other meds. I felt like I was waking from a nightmare. It was very weird! I wouldn't take any new meds without checking them out throually! Sometimes it takes awhile to find what works. When you do stick with it. Changing around alot can do more harm than good.

Take care,sharon

I take lamictal and currently it is helping me really good with no side effects. (thank god, touch wood).

I had taken depakote for a year, and it made me put on weight big time. After that I changed to lamictal.

My episodes are usually something that I can track till I become unconscious. First my eyes start fluttering, then I have a slurry speech and the final result is unconsciousness. All this does not happen simultaneously. There are gaps of a couple of hours before I get to the final stage. So as a result, I can control it when I start feeling the symptoms.

For the sake of emergency, my doctor has given me lorazepam. This is just to control your episodes from coming to a fruition. I started my medication on lamictal for about 3.5 years now and have had to take lorazepam about twice in the beginning of my doses. Now I don't need it at all.

One of the things that I had realized in my case was my emotion, lack of sleep, very high stress levels and heavy weakness. My emotional outbursts are at extremes be it anger, joy, sorrow whatever. So having realized this, I have calmed myself a lot, which has also helped me control my episodes.

My medication in the blood level is fine and normal as it should be. Usually the doctors always ask to check the medication level in the blood and the liver as this could possibly detect the amount of medication required.

Feelgood- I've read your post and can relate. I've taken dilantin, depakote, tegretol, mysoline, neurontin, lamictal, klonopin and Keppra. usually in a daily cocktail consisting of multiple AED's. Anywhere from 9 to 26 pills a day over the last 28 yrs I now take;
Lamictal 450mg @ day
Tegretol 800mg @ day
Keppra 750mg @ day
Klonipin 3.5mg @ day
While I've tolerated most of the AED's, they do come w/some long term side effects. If you take enough of any AED for too long, common sense tells you that it's gonna cause some kind of chemical imbalance, and I hope it doesn't happen to you. Don't mean to scare you, just giving you and everybody else a "heads up" in case you run into more neurological problems later on.