Thank you! When I first started having problems officially at 5 years old. From then on, I started to get different diagnoses, and then the big one hit the diagnosis of epilepsy at 8 years old! I was dealing with anxiety, asthma, and severe allergies, eczema before epilepsy. I can't forget learning disabilities started to really show in 2nd grade. The last diagnosis crushed me as a kid. When third grade hit, I really started to get "sick" my asthma. My epilepsy really got bad, especially with all the symptoms, with my body having to adjust to the anti-epilepsy medication and other types of medication. My life was turned upside down when I got diagnosed with epilepsy. I do have to say asthma and anxiety were hard as well. The things that epilepsy causes and the life long effects are so incomprehensible. I started to really struggle to be a kid! You could really see that I was struggling big time! I knew at a very young age that I would most likely not be able to drive! When I had my brain surgery, My life changed even more! I am only touching the surface with this information. I could no longer play sports, so many things were touched or taken out of my life. I lost so many friends and I had to learn how to live with a new diagnosis all the time! I lost interest in cars earlier on in my life! I knew driving would not be in the books for me so why should I care?! Throughout my years of life, I have seen how blessed I am for having a disability so early in life and chronic illnesses at a very early age in life. You may be saying well how would dealing with all of this so young would be a blessing. Well, when I was a kid I did not think it was and I was very heartbroken and a lost little girl. I have seen a different view of life and I had to grow up so young! My life changed early in life and I have had to deal with the facts of what I could do and things I was not able to do. I have seen people my age and younger like in their teenage years what happens when they got sick or injured. When a 16-year-old and older get sick they may not be able to drive and so that gets taken away from them. I have never been able to drive so I have not had to go through the pain of getting my license and having that freedom and bam it was taken away. My independence has been up and down my whole life! Seeing so many different people of different ages have so much independence and then slowly and quickly taken away. I went through this in a way but not with so many big things that really give you freedom and independence in life! I am grateful I have had my whole life to adjust and experience life being chronically ill and having disabilities. I dont know how I would deal with being allowed to be a kid and be a teenager and being an adult. Have all this independence and learn how to live a different life. My life changes with new diagnosis frequently and with new disabilities. I have to learn to adapt to living with a new illness. When I had my stroke I had to learn to walk again and I still work on that. I had to learn how to do everything with just my right side. Piano was taken away from me and riding my bike and for me, my bike was my freedom and my independence. When this first happened I was devastated! I have learned that I can do so much more than I thought with just using my right side of my body. I may lose more independence all the time but I didn't have a bunch of independence in the first place. I am blessed in this fact and I'm grateful for that fact! never give up and find the bright side!
As always keep pressing forward!