It's best to educate your employer regarding your seizures so he/ she is aware of what happens and why. According to the American with Disabilities Act (ADA) you cannot be fired from a job due your epilepsy. Ask for specific accommodations through your HR department to help keep you safe on the job. Make sure it's in writing.

Just remember, that if your boss gives you any trouble about not admitting that you are epileptic or tries to fire you simply because of this, then you should call the Epilepsy Foundation at the following toll-free number and explain to the person who answers what happened and they will give you an advocate or lawyer -- if necessary. https://www.epilepsy.com/247-helpline

Also remember that your boss does not know the specifics of your epilepsy, so there still may be some minor adjustments that can be made to allow you to remain in the job. You have to go into the meeting with your boss ready to provide all of the details of your epilepsy.

Back in 2000, when I started working at Massachusetts General Hospital Treadwell Library, there were no national patient privacy laws in place (exception being for appointments with a licensed therapist or psychiatrist), thus the MGH HR department was on the phone with my neurologist to find out the limitations on me because of my epilepsy. The problem is that my boss (Assistant Directory of Treadwell Library) did not do the research on Focal Onset Impaired Awareness Seizures (complex partial seizures) and the many forms that these seizures can come and that the epileptic is unaware of these seizures happening. Thus, there was an incident about 10 years later in which while I was in one of these seizures, my subconscious insulted 2 co-workers. And if not for the fact that one of the two was my best friend at work, then I might never understood what had happened. He is a native a Haiti and fluent in both Creole (native language of Haiti) and French (required language taught at school in Haiti because Haiti was discovered and claimed by French explorers). My subconscious told him to learn better English. When he told me that, I told him: "I would never say that to you because English is your 3rd language, and you are fluent in the other 2. I am only fluent in English (or at least was back then) and can't recall the French and Spanish that I learned back in high school." (continued)...

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I’ve used the Vagus Nerve Stimulator (VNS) and now have the Neurostimulator (RNS)

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And once I knew what had happened, I explained about the seizure to the other co-worker (she was the one who went to our boss to report me for harassment), she explained that I had told her (who was sitting at the front desk) to get to work. However, I did my rotation time at the front desk and thus knew if there was no patron at the desk or on the phone or new requests from patrons to be working on the paperwork on, then there was nothing to do, but sit and wait. After we talked she understood that it was not really me who was talking to her. The problem was with my boss. Not only did she make me go to a course on Interacting and working with others where I learned that there are 4 base persona groups (Bull, Fox, Turtle and the Lamb) and that we are all in one or a combination of a pair these. I am a Bull and a Lamb. And I often cause problems for myself and others by not pausing to take a breath and think (as taught in Anxiety class) before speaking or acting. As a result, I am filled with guilt (the Lamb part of my persona) and needing to apologize for my rash action (slamming a door, or the like) or yelling or saying something to others that I should not. When I am in this form of seizure and my subconscious is the one speaking, none of what I have been taught is appropriate applies. And many times I say the strangest of things. Anyway, this was not enough for my boss because come annual evaluation day for me, I read her evaluation which includes: "Doesn't work well with others." And I refuse to sign it because she is holding something against me that was said by my subconscious while I was in the midst of a seizure. The end result is that she was probably told by someone in HR that MGH would lose a lawsuit to me if she didn't immediately remove that statement from the document.

@A MyEpilepsyTeam Member One addition to your great advice is that Kris (and anyone else who is working and thus needs to do this) is that you be as SPECIFIC as possible about the forms that your seizures can come in, if you have Focal Onset Impaired Awareness (Complex Partial) seizures AND in the proper things that anyone should and should NOT do when you are having any of your seizures. General First Aid for epileptic seizures: https://www.epilepsy.com/recognition/seizure-fi...

In the case of my boss when I was working at Massachusetts General Hospital Treadwell Library (2000 - 2014), she did not follow the probable advice that she received from the MGH Human Resources department to read and fully understand that Focal Onset Impaired Awareness Seizures (complex partial seizures) come in many forms beyond the most common ones described on any medical site (hospital site, Epilepsy Foundation site, National Library of Medicine site) and that Epilepsy is in a mutating disorder. I read this on a medical book in the stacks at Treadwell Library in 2000, and with her knowledge of advanced searching and high level access to such sources like the US National Library of Medicine site or simply reading the same book that I did at our library in 2000, she could have learned in the first chapter that Epilepsy is a mutating neurological disorder. It is the 4th most common neurological disorder. And Focal Onset Impaired Awareness Seizures (complex partial seizures) are the most common form of epileptic seizures.

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