My 1st ever seizure last month, in airport waiting area
Kindly leave comments or any thoughts you might have on my case.
I'm an old guy (just 10 months away from leaving behind me the last of my 70s) living in one part of the US and traveled alone last month by plane to a distant part of the US where I don't know anyone. The plane was supposed to land ~ 12:40 PM Pacific Time but I've written to the airlines to find out the actual time of landing. I had a number of things to carry-- I got all of my stuff off the plane and vaguely recall sitting in a waiting area, sitting to use my smartphone to figure out how to use the city's public transit system in order to reach my hotel. I might have only been sitting a minute or two when I was stricken with my 1st ever seizure in life. Though I was unconscious when the seizure struck, two people - a young female acupuncturist and her boyfriend - did a great deal to help me even though I had no idea what was going on. She found my name, address, email address and 2 phone numbers on my luggage tags and soon wrote to me to find out what had happened to me after she or someone called an ambulance crew to take me to the ER in a local hospital. We wrote back and forth to each other over several days: she told me she was in an airport bathroom when my seizure started but her boyfriend was present for the start. The boyfriend told her that I suddenly yelled out or cried out at the start. Due to breathing in some odd way, he massaged my chest and both used my 1st name since they knew it from the luggage tags. She told me that as soon as I heard my name being uttered by one or both of them, I began to greatly improve in my breathing. They were being called to get on their plane but they told the airline that they weren't leaving me 'til an ambulance crew arrived. They also watched all my stuff which of course could have vanished if they weren't there to help me. I asked her if I was violently thrashing about and she said "Yes, you were violently moving and shaking". Maybe ~ 9:30 PM or later I awoke in front of a young MD who didn't say too much to me except something I thought was humorous: he said "We're all allowed to have (or maybe said "we're all entitled to have...") one seizure in life." While alert and awake, I saw someone remove an IV line from each of my forearms. The discharge report handed to me had the MD's diagnosis as "seizure-like activity" but remember, I don't know what the ambulance crew learned from my 2 helpers in the airport and I don't know what the ambulance crew told the MD in the hospital ER. The hospital ER discharge report told me 2 drugs were administered (I suppose one drug in one forearm IV port and the other in the other forearm's IV port): ondansetron (ZOFRAN) "last given at 2:33 PM", and midazolam (VERSED) "last given at 2:56 PM. Sodium chloride stopped at 3:14 PM". Studies done by the hospital ER: 12 leads attached to my chest to study my heart, CT scan of my brain/head without IV contrast, and 1 view chest X-ray. With all my stuff now inside a Lyft or Uber, I checked into my hotel maybe 10:30 PM or so. I turned on my tablet, went to Mayo Clinic webpage on seizures and noticed an important thing for my case in the section on Causes of Seizures. One reason Mayo states for a seizure is NO SLEEP. In the hours before my very early morning flight from the airport in my home city - hours when I should have been sleeping - I never went to bed because I was fiddling with packing, I was looking up sights/sites to visit in the West Coast city I went to (and where the seizure occurred), and due to my usual anticipation before important travel or an important meeting. Of course I hope that young ER MD is right: "We're all entitled to have one seizure in life" but I wonder if I'm at some maybe slight risk for another. Factors you should know: 1) 2 yrs ago I had a TIA which was a visual one that was very brief, and 2) every night I use a CPAP machine PLUS require an additional 2 liters/minute of oxygen from an oxygen concentrator (a tube from it feeds the oxygen into the fat CPAP tube going to my nose).
Yesterday my MD called me by phone. I told her I've been OK since that seizure last month but want to know more so she's sending me to a neurologist who might have an idea what kind of seizure I had. Today the epilepsy clinic called me to say I'll first have an EEG done before I suppose I meet with a neurologist. [I don't know yet when the EEG will be done but it might be weeks from today.]
Kindly leave comments or any thoughts you might have on my case.
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Hi,
You mentioned you are currently using a CPAP machine every night. Are you very reliant? Since you spent the evening before the night packing, it seemed it’s unlikely you would have the chance to use it.
I guessed traveling to a place where you don’t know anyone might have subconsciously caused some stress and you were alone, carrying a handful of stuff.
And it’s great now you are fine! I’m not sure why it will take months before you can have the EEG done. It’s either the clinic/hospital is super busy, or the neurologist thinks you need more observation and it’s not life threatening at this point.
Just my thoughts. Take care!
Cheers,
Louis
You were extremely lucky. I had my first seizure at 73. It was over by the time I got to the emergency room. After various tests it was misdiagnosed as a panic attack. (Understandably because I was the chief caretaker for my husband who had Alzheimer’s.) And later I had another one, which I assumed was another panic attack. Finally the meningioma which was causing the seizures bled and almost killed me. (It was removed during emergency surgery.)
My heart-felt advice from my experience: something in addition to the lack of sleep caused the seizure. Something has changed for you, but for it to be fixed, it has to be found. Be aggressive in finding it.