Son witnessed my seizure

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Mumof4

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Hi guys, I’m new here and looking for some advice if anybody has experienced anything similar.
I was out shopping with my 5 year old and my blood sugar dropped unexpectedly and rapidly and I went into a seizure in the grocery store in front of my son. It was a full blown tonic clonic seizure and i hit my head and dislocated my shoulder as i fell.
My son is naturally traumatised by what he seen and now doesn’t want to be left alone with me and panics every time he sees me eating or drinking something that he associates with me being hypo. He constantly asks me to check my levels and he’s been having nightmares about it too.
How can I help ease his mind and feel safe when he’s alone with me again as this can’t be avoided.
Any advice or pointers on what to do would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks x
 
Mumof4 said:
Hi guys, I’m new here and looking for some advice if anybody has experienced anything similar.
I was out shopping with my 5 year old and my blood sugar dropped unexpectedly and rapidly and I went into a seizure in the grocery store in front of my son. It was a full blown tonic clonic seizure and i hit my head and dislocated my shoulder as i fell.
My son is naturally traumatised by what he seen and now doesn’t want to be left alone with me and panics every time he sees me eating or drinking something that he associates with me being hypo. He constantly asks me to check my levels and he’s been having nightmares about it too.
How can I help ease his mind and feel safe when he’s alone with me again as this can’t be avoided.
Any advice or pointers on what to do would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks x
Click to expand...
Welcome to the forum
I can imagine how scary that would be for a small child but often they are very robust once the immediate shock is a bit more distant in time.
It would help if you can talk to him about what to do in that situation, Ok that time you were somewhere with other people but if it happens again and you hope it won't, there may not be anybody so there need to be good instructions about what to do.
What you can do is make sure you have hypo treatment at all times and take action before it happens. Do you have a Libre which will give you alerts that your levels are dropping, if not then you should ask for it from your GP or clinic.
If you can work out why it happened there may be something that needs changing in your insulin dose or regime. On the other hand it may just be something you will never know why.
 
Hi @Mumof4 and welcome to the forum.

I'm so sorry for what you and your son went through. It's understandable that it has taken a toll on him and he's shaken up. It will take time and lots of conversations while steering the conversation into something proactive. Your son is naturally worried, so as Leadinglights has said - see if you could discuss with him what he could do to help mommy if this should happen again. Since he's only 5, you don't need to go into too much detail, explaining all the 'whys and hows' but simply preparing him for the fact that you could sometimes feel unwell. Reinforce such habits like 'this is how you call for help, this is what you could say about mommy' and kind of getting his mind off of that specific incident. At the same time I wouldn't avoid speaking about what he's feeling. It can be difficult for kids that age to express what they're going to, but we sometimes don't give them enough credit - ask him what would help him feel more at ease. Perhaps not continuous testing, however looking at things together, teaching him a bit about numbers - i.e. how to calculate things. The focus doesn't necessarily need to be on you and your own numbers, however rather what people living with Diabetes have to count, think about etc.
And definitely definitely see if you can get access to a regular monitoring system to make these things more manageable for yourself as I can definitely see how this entire thing would stress you out - having to manage yourself and your son's worries. Get in touch with your practice and have a conversation with them. If you're unsure as to what to ask or request - call our Helpline team and they'll be more than happy to advise <3
 
Mumof4 said:
Hi guys, I’m new here and looking for some advice if anybody has experienced anything similar.
I was out shopping with my 5 year old and my blood sugar dropped unexpectedly and rapidly and I went into a seizure in the grocery store in front of my son. It was a full blown tonic clonic seizure and i hit my head and dislocated my shoulder as i fell.
My son is naturally traumatised by what he seen and now doesn’t want to be left alone with me and panics every time he sees me eating or drinking something that he associates with me being hypo. He constantly asks me to check my levels and he’s been having nightmares about it too.
How can I help ease his mind and feel safe when he’s alone with me again as this can’t be avoided.
Any advice or pointers on what to do would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks x
Click to expand...
Hello. Welcome. Do you wear a sensor or CGM? A 5 YO will handle a situation as best they can perceive? You know your child better than anyone else. Seriously. No son likes to see his mum in a trauma. It was bad enough when I was diagnosed T1 as a kid? My mum was heart broken. Sounds like a caring kid.
 
Mumof4 said:
How can I help ease his mind and feel safe when he’s alone with me again as this can’t be avoided.
Click to expand...

I’m sorry this happened to you. If the following seems cold I’m just being practical - you need to reduce this risk and reassure your son that you’ve improved things where you can so it won’t happen again.

Why can’t it be avoided? I know with diabetes we can’t completely control it and things happen, but you should be able to put things in place to pretty much avoid it happening again.

What is your cgm alarm set to? Can you set it to a higher bg?

If you know you drop fast whilst shopping and it isn’t reflected on cgm then are you fingerpricking before / during shopping?

Do you know what bg you need to be at before / during shopping and how many carbs you need to have to prevent hypos?

How’s your hypo awareness? Can you run higher to improve your hypo awareness so you feel hypos sooner?

What hypo treatments are you using? Are there faster acting ones you could change to? What bg are you having carbs at - both when shopping or during exercise and otherwise?

Don’t forget if you have hypo unawareness that’s reportable to the DVLA and you’ll lose your licence. If you’ve had any other severe hypos in the last 12 months then you need to report this as your second and also stop driving as will lose licence.
 
What you can do is make sure you have hypo treatment at all times and take action before it happens.

If only it was that easy!! If it was, nobody would have hypoglycaemic seizures! Sometimes, as @Mumof4 says, blood sugar just drops very quickly and very fiercely - too fast for hypo treatments to prevent the seizure, and sometimes also too fast for the Libre to warn you in time. This fierce and sudden drop can be because you’ve caught a muscle or for any number of reasons. Please don’t blame yourself @Mumof4 x

Your son is understandably distressed, and I think you should use your judgement to time when to explain to him and how. The first thing I’d stress was this was a rare thing (try to think of other rare things he knows of to get that idea across). Then I’d probably downplay the seizure a bit - because they’re scary to watch for anyone. Again, with your injuries, downplay them a bit - acknowledge they hurt but ‘you’re feeling much better now’ (even if you’re not).

Are you saying he panics when he sees you having hypo treatments? If so, change what you use, eg use a 150ml can of Appletiser or Coke instead of glucose tablets. It could be the hypo items themselves that are stressing him because they’re a reminder. If you have a partner or relative who could talk to him that might help too because it would provide some distance from the event and also allow him to explain his feelings if he can. If family or friends can also talk to him about accidents and injuries in a matter of fact way that might help, eg when they broke their arm by falling off a ladder, and it was a bit of a shock and a bit scary going to hospital, but everyone was really nice and they’re fine now.

Describing the seizure as rare, as an accident, should help, along with a very matter of fact voice. You might find it’s particular aspects of the event that scared him - maybe things you wouldn’t think of or weren’t aware of, eg sounds, somebody trying to hold his hand (if they did), your confusion afterwards, etc.

Seizures are traumatic. I hope you’re able to take the time to look after yourself as well as your son. Talking to your DSN might help as they can help you rationalise it and talk it through.

It sounds like you’re in the US @Mumof4 - is that right?
 
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Hi and welcome to the forum @Mumof4

I feel for you both, but as others have said "children are resilient" but they do need to have things explained to them in a rational and calm manner, with lots of reassurance.

Many, many years ago my wife was rushed into hospital in the middle of the night, the following day I took the children to see her, what I didn't know was just how many tube and bits of monitoring equipment there would be and my son had a complete melt down to the point where he couldn't speak and when he did it was just a stammer.

Fortunately a friend of ours was in child care and had studied child psychology and would spend hours just talking to him, he slowly recovered as did his Mum, but talking was the key.

I guess what I'm saying, is talking is good, just be honest with him and maybe include the rest of the family.

Take care

Alan 😉
 
What a shocking thing for both of you. It will take time for him to recover from the event. And talking to him about it in ways he can understand is good. It’s worth contacting your local young carers if you’re in the UK who can at least put him on their books. They can help support him although funding varies in different parts of the uk. It might be worth speaking to your GP and seeing if they can talk to him or asking your local paeds diabetes team for advice on how to talk to him - they may make their psychologist available to him (just call the paeds team in your local trust and have a chat, they may not be able to do anything because you are the diabetic but they will do what they can).
 
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