Rose went back to our favorite hospital’s Epilepsy Monitoring Unit the last semester of her senior year in high school. Her seizures had come back with a vengeance. They were long and strong. She was getting hurt during the falls. She had gone home bound from school due to the falls and injuries.
We were hoping to get new and different set of scans this time. These two SPECT scans together would reveal what was going on in Rose’s brain during a seizure and between seizures. Then the two could be compared. We hoped this new information could help pinpoint the source of her seizures.
Rose arrived at the EMU just two weeks before the prom. We were all hoping to get the results early enough for her to get out and get ready for her prom. Rose’s brother was coaxed into taking her. He planned to come home from college that weekend to be her escort.
Her dreamy satin dress had been purchased and altered, his tuxedo had been rented. All that was needed was to be released from the hospital in time to get there. We thought that surely two weeks was enough time. We never dreamed we would cut it so close.
The story of the scans will have to wait. They deserve their own pages. Rose did get out of the EMU in time for the prom. We checked out on Thursday afternoon, the prom was on Saturday. Rose did get to go. She did get to dance. Her brother was there to watch over her. She had her emergency medications in her tiny purse. We dropped Rose and her brother off at the Civic Center and we went to wait at a restaurant across the street. Her father, my sister and I were only a phone call away. We had pulled it off in the nick of time.
She looked beautiful. Her hair had roses in it that matched her salmon-colored dress. The bodice was covered in dangling sparkles. The corsage on her arm contained roses and baby’s breath. Our Rose was a princess and a warrior. While her classmates had spent the week getting their nails done and going to tanning beds, our Rose was in a hospital with electrodes glued in her hair.
So after nine days in the hospital, Rose goes to the prom. From hospital gown to ball gown. That is how Rose rolls.
SEIZURE MAMA SPEAKS NOW
Here is an example of balancing needs and wants. Rose needed new medical tests to get information to treat these terrible seizures. We were not going to wait any longer. When the opening in the schedule came, we took it. Rose wanted to go to her school prom. We planned for it and she went. We could relax because her brother was with her and we were right across the street, ready to swoop in. The faculty and her friends knew where Rose had been the previous weeks. No crown needed, she was queen.
Seizure Mama and Rose 