All the Ophidian Games crew wishes Andrew William Powers a speedy recovery!
For the ones that do not know Andrew William Powers, he is one of the volunteer of our writing staff, he developed for Ophidian, Inc. amazing stories, such as Fallen From Grace, Grakkan Union Revised, the upcoming novel Meredine Hope and various Gladiators biographies and Ophidian League Matches.
A few days ago Andrew released the following post on his facebook page:
“To make a short story long, from the time I was a teenager, I’ve been getting seizures. They start off with a familiar smell that doesn’t have a source. That’s followed by a series of flashes, that feel like memories, sort of like dreaming, except that I can’t remember them after. When I first got this, around the age of 15, I thought I was developing psychic powers or something. Doesn’t appear to be the case, though. I’ve gotten these around many of you, either at school, going out with the group in college, or at work, and no one seemed to notice they were going on. Originally, I just got them once or twice a year (when I got them, I had several over the course of a couple days), and would go six months or a year without them. Once they went away, there was nothing else.
For a long time I had no idea what they were, and the internet was too new to provide answers. I just kept it to myself because I thought it was odd, and it didn’t seem to bother anything. About ten years ago, when I would get them, it would sometimes follow with a piercing headache and/or a cloudy feeling in my head, like it was hard to pay attention to the world around me. As I only got the seizures about once or twice a year, I was only getting the headache once every year or two. As bad as it was, I could deal with it. Somewhere around this time, I looked it up online, and determined they were temporal lobe seizures. I figured there was nothing wrong with this, and just kept going.
Then in late May of 2013, when the seizures started, they didn’t stop. I went three full weeks with them, then they tapered off for about a week, and started up again. They’ve followed this four-week pattern ever since (though lately the “off time” isn’t completely off). Since I was getting them daily, I was getting the headache two to four times a week. I managed to put up with it from May to August before finally deciding it was time to see a doctor. My primary physician at the time said it was Tension headaches, the “flashes” had nothing to do with it. Gave me some tension headache pills that did nothing. He’s no longer my primary.
My wife, Jackie, had also noted, long before this, a personality change in me. While you all know me as calm and passive all the time, I’ve actually developed much more of a temper, and can yell at my kids, sometimes over nothing. I asked each doctor if this could be related, and they all said no, one even said, “all wives say that about their husbands.” After the tension diagnosis, she suggested I go see her doctor. Her doctor said it was migraines, the flashes were auras related to the migraines. She sent me to a neurologist. The neurologist was the first person to say it might be seizures, but probably migraines with aura. Her MO is to send me out for tests and try different drugs to see what happens. Can’t say I care for the drugs she prescribed (except for imatrex, which helps with the headaches), but it’s a good thing she sent me out for several tests. The MRI discovered the tumor. From there, I was sent to a neurosurgeon at Stanford. He said it’s nothing, the headaches and auras have nothing to do with the tumor, and it was so small it wasn’t worth worrying about.
At a friend’s recommendation, I went to see a neurosurgeon at UCSF. He looked at the MRI, confirmed there was a tumor in the temporal lobe, and said that it would cause seizures (I had the answer from the internet in less time than it took to drive to any of the doctors, and they couldn’t get that answer). He also confirmed that it would cause the temper/personality changes that Jackie noticed. And from there comes the date of the surgery, February 24.
I figured people would ask questions like how I knew I had it, or for how long. Hopefully this answers most of what you were wondering. Other than seizures and headaches treatable with medicine, I’m doing fine.”
For the ones that do not know Andrew William Powers, he is one of the volunteer of our writing staff, he developed for Ophidian, Inc. amazing stories, such as Fallen From Grace, Grakkan Union Revised, the upcoming novel Meredine Hope and various Gladiators biographies and Ophidian League Matches.
A few days ago Andrew released the following post on his facebook page:
“To make a short story long, from the time I was a teenager, I’ve been getting seizures. They start off with a familiar smell that doesn’t have a source. That’s followed by a series of flashes, that feel like memories, sort of like dreaming, except that I can’t remember them after. When I first got this, around the age of 15, I thought I was developing psychic powers or something. Doesn’t appear to be the case, though. I’ve gotten these around many of you, either at school, going out with the group in college, or at work, and no one seemed to notice they were going on. Originally, I just got them once or twice a year (when I got them, I had several over the course of a couple days), and would go six months or a year without them. Once they went away, there was nothing else.
For a long time I had no idea what they were, and the internet was too new to provide answers. I just kept it to myself because I thought it was odd, and it didn’t seem to bother anything. About ten years ago, when I would get them, it would sometimes follow with a piercing headache and/or a cloudy feeling in my head, like it was hard to pay attention to the world around me. As I only got the seizures about once or twice a year, I was only getting the headache once every year or two. As bad as it was, I could deal with it. Somewhere around this time, I looked it up online, and determined they were temporal lobe seizures. I figured there was nothing wrong with this, and just kept going.
Then in late May of 2013, when the seizures started, they didn’t stop. I went three full weeks with them, then they tapered off for about a week, and started up again. They’ve followed this four-week pattern ever since (though lately the “off time” isn’t completely off). Since I was getting them daily, I was getting the headache two to four times a week. I managed to put up with it from May to August before finally deciding it was time to see a doctor. My primary physician at the time said it was Tension headaches, the “flashes” had nothing to do with it. Gave me some tension headache pills that did nothing. He’s no longer my primary.
My wife, Jackie, had also noted, long before this, a personality change in me. While you all know me as calm and passive all the time, I’ve actually developed much more of a temper, and can yell at my kids, sometimes over nothing. I asked each doctor if this could be related, and they all said no, one even said, “all wives say that about their husbands.” After the tension diagnosis, she suggested I go see her doctor. Her doctor said it was migraines, the flashes were auras related to the migraines. She sent me to a neurologist. The neurologist was the first person to say it might be seizures, but probably migraines with aura. Her MO is to send me out for tests and try different drugs to see what happens. Can’t say I care for the drugs she prescribed (except for imatrex, which helps with the headaches), but it’s a good thing she sent me out for several tests. The MRI discovered the tumor. From there, I was sent to a neurosurgeon at Stanford. He said it’s nothing, the headaches and auras have nothing to do with the tumor, and it was so small it wasn’t worth worrying about.
At a friend’s recommendation, I went to see a neurosurgeon at UCSF. He looked at the MRI, confirmed there was a tumor in the temporal lobe, and said that it would cause seizures (I had the answer from the internet in less time than it took to drive to any of the doctors, and they couldn’t get that answer). He also confirmed that it would cause the temper/personality changes that Jackie noticed. And from there comes the date of the surgery, February 24.
I figured people would ask questions like how I knew I had it, or for how long. Hopefully this answers most of what you were wondering. Other than seizures and headaches treatable with medicine, I’m doing fine.”
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