April 30th 2023. 749 days after the first seizure event.
My good progress continues
At T + 749 days (t=onset) I remain at the magic number of 0, null points, zip – all types of seizure for > 125 days.
- last physical seizure > 425 days ago
- last drop attack > 125 days ago
- last absence seizure > 131 days ago
- last tonic seizure > 174 days ago
Much has been written about the four natural chemicals we produce which are are within our own gift.
These being dopamine, oxycotin, serotonin and last by not least endorphins. Some call the four ‘THE ‘DOSE’, and suggest to take the ‘Dose’ daily.
Anyway, let us here concentrate upon the impact of endorphins. These are generated by walking which for some is a challenge yet, if you can start to walk even a small amount and gradually increase, it all adds up.
So the context, above is my 25 month chart showing reduction of physical seizures mainly and then reducing my absence seizures. What you can see is a correlation between high levels of endorphins measured by km walked and the reduction in seizure activity.
Granted this is only one element of how to reduce seizures and I do not say that this is the sole way to achieve reduction but this regime showed me one way to reduce my seizures. It certainly contributed.
The endorphins line on the graph is grey and its measure is in kilometres (km) walked each month. The spikes in grey correlate to a reduction in my seizure activity.
It further suggests that the optimum for reduction purposes is achieving c. 100 km/month walking. Not from day one but to raise gradually up to a peak which you are comfortable with.
Any distance above 100 km in a month being a ‘Brucie bonus’.
All I can say it worked for me – 5KM a day – not that far.
I have updated the Seizure Analysis page with the more data but for me these are the key metrics I am using now. This includes a specific example of how REM Sleep can be shown to be a prodrome for my types of absence seizures.
You can see the full data on the Seizure Analysis page. This has data up to and including 30th April 2023.
Thank you for reading my story. I find my functional seizures fascinating and for me they continue to be a great science project for me to get my teeth into. As ever I remain very positive.
To experience is to live, and that is our purpose, whilst we await for our telomeres to finally unravel, and we depart this oasis which sits in the vastness of the universe.