Bruno Fiacco

STAYING HEALTHY, THE EPILEPTIC WAY

I have been battling seizures for many years. I want to share my story and help others live better everyday.

Filtering by Tag: Sister-In-Law

SOMETHINGS ARE MEANT FOR A REASON, EVEN IF YOU DON’T THINK SO!

Somethings indeed are meant for a reason and should truly be thought about or over or something bad may come of it. Again nobody knows when, why, where or what, but if you are smart you will learn that somethings may need to be thought over deeply when we find ourselves down on the ground, smashed face first with which could have been the end of our days alive!

For me this all occurred on October 29th when my wife was desperately wanting to leave at 9p.m. to a pumpkin festival in Old Westbury Gardens, LI, to see The Rise of The Jack O’Lanterns. Lets cut back three weeks to October 8th, the night my brothers Michael, his wife Despina and Anthony were supposed to meet us out at the park together as a group when situations started to occur. Apparently Despina was feeling sick, Michael wasn't feeling up to it, and Michelle and Anthony were the only ones wanting to go anyway. I refused myself on going that weekend as well, or at all, but she didn't give in to her temptation to go. But then and there just before we left I asked for a protein shake to make myself, something I always ask Michelle to make for me, but on that day, at that very moment before drinking it, I plastered myself from head to toe, and it was like pouring glue on myself. My arms, hands, and jeans where locked shut, and I was confused. Although my confusion turned bad when I heard the yelling. My wife stayed in the kitchen, my parents and brothers were called over to find out what the problem was, and found me soaked and quite angry, I removed my clothes in our bedroom and found myself hysterically crying in my corner bedroom leather chair. Everyone went home that day trying to figure me out; not an easy thing to do to for an epileptic. 

And this is the Point of the story, if I had given it a better thought this may not have happened, and if I was the size of my two younger brothers, Michael or Anthony, I for sure would have been killed off many times already. My other brother Chris as well, even though we are very close in size and shape, he would not be able to control these problems the way I do, for sure. But on Saturday, October 29th, was my first fall face down - I hit my chin, jaw, nose, forehead and knees. There were families - Good Samaritans - all around making sure that I was safe, yet bleeding from my almost broken chin and jaw, battered teeth  and nose. Before I was helped up I was worried about if any children or parents had been hurt by me. No one was, but Michelle had a slight cut on her left  knee from trying to grab me from behind.

I was was helped up with one of the guards walking on my right leg and limping on my left back to get attended to by a medical technician who said himself that “All these lights here and flashing phones and cameras for pictures is a seizure waiting to happen”. Michelle and I had told him that we had been here for three years now, but this time all the lights were way brighter then in the past. 

My chin was swollen, my inner bottom lip as well, my teeth, my jawline, my right arm and left knee hurting so bad that I couldn't tell for the life of me what was possibly  A. Broken  B. Smashed in (teeth) C. A bit off tongue and lip and D. A broken leg.

All things that are possible after a seizure like this happens and I remember being asked if we wanted to go back out there. Michelle and I yelled out, “Are you Crazy”!! Well Michelle did the talking, I did the look of, ‘Can we get the hell out of here now’, rolling my eyes of remorse to her. I was rolled out of the park to our car in a wheelchair with a medic holding an oxygen tank and a mask strapped over my face to breath through.  

 I was able to get into our car, with help by the medic, and there was only one thing going off in my mind, which was, ‘Why didn't I listen to the one who was trying to keep me home that day, why was I so foolish in making such wrong decisions, when the one that was trying to keep me safe that day was God’! This was not my idea, but I agreed to for my wife, even though I was tired already, would it of been such terrible idea to say no. NO, but she already spent money from a few weeks prior, I didn’t want her to waste money again, but is money ever a waste? It was nothing other then wasting a life away on a $30 pumpkin field trip!

All in all, when starting a new medication on top of the five already that I’m on, there is no stupider idea of doing something out of the ordinary when you know that horrible things may, and will happen by not trusting yourself in understanding that for epileptics and others of conditions, fighting away death is an everyday, every hour, every minute to second war!

You mustn't let the problem you suffer from beat you, especially when it has anything to do with your brain, which no doctor will ever understand the meaning of, besides God! 

And you can trust me mostly when I tell you that the Lord is on my side, and yours, because death could have come to me in so many different ways already, but I am here today, and will be tomorrow, with ways to keep you safe and away from trouble with stupid ideas of foolish for nothing activities. And if you are wondering still if I am in one piece, face included, I can tell you absolutely Yes, but I will never do something like that ever again, so be smart about your future decisions in life because Somethings Do Happen For A Reason, Even If You Don't Think So! 

 

Possibly The Greatest Day of My Life

On Monday, August 31st, the day after my website went live and on Michelle’s sister Nicole’s birthday, it turned out to be one of the Possibly Greatest Days of my life. To start Michelle and I had contacted Nicole to wish her a happy birthday much earlier in the day and I had told Nicole to check out my new yet unfinished website. It’s because of this that at night Michelle and I got a very exciting late phone call. I was in the living room on the floor reading when Michelle walks in telling me that she had Nikki, her fiancé Chris and his brother from Colorado on the phone and wanted to speak to us. I said sure, what’s up? Nikki said that she had met a guy in a bar and that he wanted to speak to us so we said okay put him on, wondering what it could be. So he started to speak, said that he had just seen and read my new website and was asking if I was interested in working on a project for epilepsy awareness. I said okay, go on. He said that he was from Colorado and that his brother had invented the Charlotte’s Web medication for children and that he needed an adult living with Epilepsy, a bad case, to work with.

Michelle and I were both excited about it, she emailed him the next day and we planned to meet him that week since he was leaving back to Colorado on Saturday. When the phone conversation had ended, we received a text message from Nicole that read, meeting him had made her day. Now I never made anyone’s day before that I can recall, told Nikki that she was the first person to of ever made their day, not to mention on their birthday! So that made my heart stop and put tears in Michelle’s eyes.

Thursday came along, it was Labor Day weekend and Michelle had a half day off from work, came home and we had spent the next few hours in the city and awaited his appearance not knowing anything about this guy. We called Nikki and she said that he was a tall, white, blonde, well-built man and around our age. Her words! He arrived with his girlfriend as excited to see us as we him and well Nikki was right about his figure. So we got right into conversation about how he met Nicole, about our families, our backgrounds and mainly about epilepsy and his ideas on fighting against it and putting it to sleep forever!

We knew about Charlotte, the first child to have her epilepsy controlled. He and his girlfriend had said that something similar may help you after all of your years of suffering. Not my neurologist but his partner at NYU was already in with him, all he needed was my doctor’s approval before he could begin, but I told him that I was sure he would be all for it after all these years of trying to find me the right combination of meds. This test although would take a month of weening me off of one of my current meds and onto this… I said fine whatever you need me to do, I’ve been through enough already as well as falling off of my own couch just before getting picked up by a cab, showing him the mark on my forehead. So he said he will need to configure a medication for someone of your size and it may take up to a month. Michelle and I said we have no problem with that, get the dosage ready and when the time is right it’s a go.

I shook his hand during and after our conversation telling him that I didn’t think anybody cared this much about us epileptics. That you don’t see anything anywhere about it and that just got all four of us even more angry! We all smiled with the new found hope that we are all sure for it being a success.

So from one website and short story and one very special birthday girl, we may have found a solution!       

My Sister-In-Law Nicole and her fiancé Chris

My Sister-In-Law Nicole and her fiancé Chris