One of my husband's big worries about having children is that he/she will inherit his terrible allergies and epilepsy. The allergies, I have a suspicion, are the result of his mother bleaching the walls of their home when he and his brother were toddlers, limiting their exposure to environmental factors that later in life triggered allergic reactions. The epilepsy was a bigger worry, so I did a bit of research.
From epilepsy.com:
Q. If I have epilepsy, will my children also have it?
A. Less than 2 people out of every 100 (2%) develop epilepsy at some pointduring their lifetime. The risk for children whose father has epilepsy isonly slightly higher. If the mother has epilepsy and the father does not,the risk is still less than 5%. If both parents have epilepsy, the risk is abit higher. Most children will not inherit epilepsy from a parent, but thechance of inheriting epilepsy is higher for some types.
If you have epilepsy, it is normal for you to be afraid that your childrenwill have epilepsy too. However, a fear that your children will haveepilepsy is not enough reason to decide against having any. The risk is low,most children outgrow epilepsy, and most people who have it are able tocontrol their seizures by taking one medicine.
Topic Editor: Steven C. Schachter, M.D.
Well, 2% hardly seems like much cause to worry, so that takes a load off my
mind, and hopefully off of his, too.
Met with the midwife today. The practice is friendly and there's no
confusion as to where to go next and no standing around at the checkout
station waiting to be acknowledged. The nurse who checked me in did a
thorough job with my history and was friendly and not awkward. At my last
GYN practice, the nurse who checked me in and took my history was a bit
snobby and I want to say incredulous when I answered the history questions.
I kept feeling like she didn't believe me and was trying to catch me in a
lie when she would ask the same question in a different manner later on in
the process. In any event, I didn't much like it there. And I just
realized that my friend who's delivered two babies with them was more scared
than she needed to be during labor with her first because she wasn't sure
what was going to happen next. The midwife I met with (who's from the same
county that I grew up in) assured me that we would talk it through and set
up a plan and backup plans long before entering the delivery room. She said
she was involved in a labor the night before that took two hours of pushing
and she and the mother avoided cesarean intervention three times over the
course of her delivery, so that gives me a lot of confidence that she'll be
an advocate for me and support my decisions. I really liked her and talking
with her was very easy and low key. I explained to her that I'm a
"researcher" and like to be well-informed ahead of time, so she gave me some
printed materials that her practice has developed even though I didn't
really need it yet. I think I'm going to be very pleased with the practice
and the midwife when the time comes for me to engage their services.
The plan, as it stands now, is to go off of birth control in August and use
alternate contraception methods until after my first "natural" cycle, then
we'll ditch the contraceptives altogether in September and see what happens.
And between now and then, the plan is to finish my various house projects
and try to drop some weight.
Well, the big news is that about a week ago my husband has decided that we should start trying in September!! He says next summer is the soonest he feels like we'd be ready for a baby since we have a lot of house projects still pending completion. He's not entirely wrong and that would still put us trying before I hit 30, so I'm pretty pleased with his decision. I have gotten a new scrip for birth control, but haven't gone back on my statin yet even though I found a pack in the medicine chest I'd forgotten I had.
