She hated being watched. She said it made her feel like a bomb, ticking quietly, waiting to go off. So I tried not to hover. I tried not to flinch when she paused mid-sentence or rubbed her temples a little too long. I failed more often than I admitted. You cannot love someone with epilepsy and not become part of the equation—their witness, their protector, their clock-watcher.

But she still lived. God, she lived. She danced barefoot in the kitchen, even when the meds made her dizzy. She laughed too hard at jokes and sang with the windows down. Some days were hard, yes—filled with side effects and fear—but others were radiant. She did not let the seizures define her. She just adjusted around them, like setting place settings around a broken leg of the table, careful, but never absent.

I stopped fearing the seizures as much as I learned to count. Thirty seconds. Forty-five. A minute. She always came back. Her eyes would find mine again, a little dazed, a little unsure…but there. Present. Herself. Each return felt like a small resurrection.

I know this is heavy, and I understand that the road ahead may feel like a tangle of loss and unanswered questions. But please hear this: you are not broken because you are hurting; you are not weak because you are afraid. You are living through something real, and survival itself is a kind of grace. You are allowed to struggle, you are allowed to hope, and you are allowed to not have all the answers today. Whatever comes next, you do not face it empty-handed; you carry every moment of love that shaped you, and that will always be enough to keep going.