Lhanly (and others with epilepsy)

MsNessa

I saw your post and thought I'd make a new one instead of responding there in hopes more people would join in if it was on the first page.

Lhanly:

Anyone else been on epilepsy drugs such as Lamictal or Topamax during their pregnancy? This is my first baby and I'm on both of them. I'm a little concerned because Lamictal is known for cleft lip and palate.

I'm only 10 1/2 wks along but I'm concerned that I will have seizures during my pregnancy and I've already m/c once.

 

I have epilepsy and I'm on Lamictal.  The best advice I can give is to keep up with your meds (way more dangerous to NOT take them) and make sure your neuro is checking your levels frequently.  I was having mine checked once a month but had breakthrough seizures and now I go every two weeks.

I was worried about cleft lip/palate also, but thank goodness our baby has been perfectly healthy so far--no problems whatsoever.  I asked about the cleft lip/palate specifically at our 28 week U/S but the tech said they could even tell at the 20 week U/S.

I've had 3 seizures since getting pregnant (previously seizure-free for 7 years).  You just never how how your body will react to the pregnancy.  Some women experience less seizure activity while pregnant.  Even with the 3 I've had I feel incredibly lucky--the range of epilepsy is so broad and I've read about so many other women who had awful experiences while pregnant.

Have you checked out the forums on epilepsy.com?  The "Women with Epilepsy" section isn't very active, but it helped me to read all the stories of women who had perfectly healthy pregnancies and babies.

Good luck and stay positive--the majority of women with epilepsy have successful pregnancies.

ada0716

MsNessa:

 The best advice I can give is to keep up with your meds (way more dangerous to NOT take them) and make sure your neuro is checking your levels frequently.  

Totally agree!!   

 

Lhanly

Thank you so much for replying and being honest with me. I'm trying to not be too concerned but yet be realistic too. Do you tend to have grand-mal seizures? May I ask what stages in your pregnancy did you have your breakthrough seizures? Week wise?

 

MsNessa

Lhanly:

Do you tend to have grand-mal seizures? May I ask what stages in your pregnancy did you have your breakthrough seizures? Week wise?

Yes, mine have always been grand-mal.  I had them at 9 weeks, 14 weeks, and 25 weeks.

I think the second one was the worst for me, just because of when it happened.  My seizures have ALWAYS been early, early in the morning while I'm sleeping.  But the one at 14 weeks happened in the evening when I was watching TV.  Really scary because I had no warning.  I just think about how it could have happened a few hours earlier while I was driving home from work.  After that I stopped driving and had to quit my job because of it.  Which has been tough and definitely a hard decision to make, but I just couldn't take the chance of something happening and harming myself (and baby) or someone else.

Have yours been well controlled with the Lamictal and Topamax?