Working remotely from home generally has its pros and cons. Working remotely from home with a spouse or partner also working remotely from home adds even more pros and cons. Now consider working remotely at home together when one of the pair has epilepsy. It changes the game even more.
We are getting pretty settled into our remote from home routine here. Maybe too settled because today we learned about the pros and cons of working remotely with epilepsy.
Pro: At least I was home when the severe myoclonic jerks started.
Con: I had a phone headset on while for a telephone conference so all I heard was faint yelling from the other room.
Pro: I was standing next to him ready to do what I needed to do at the point it looked like he was starting to have a major seizure it it never came.
Con: Instead of lying down and resting to stop anything worse (which to me looked like it was about to), he was frantically running around trying to clean up water he spilled from the jerk and wanting to get back to his computer to tell his supervisor he can’t work.
Pro: He was able to take his rescue med and finally agreed to let me handle notifying his work.
Con: We have both lost time from work as a result.
Pro: I would have lost more time if I had to leave an office, drive to get him from his office, and then get him home. Plus I can flex my time and make it up.
Con: The stress on both of us. But then again, we always have the stress that a seizure can come at any time.
Pro: Our son was at school and did not have to witness any of it.
Con: The rescue med makes him so tired.
Pro: He is in bed safe and resting.
When I look at it, there are more pros than cons to working from home together, epilepsy or not. We are lucky he did not have a major seizure and instead had major myoclonic jerks. We are lucky I was in the house with him and I know what to do. We are lucky the rescue med did what it’s supposed to do. We are lucky to have each other.
