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Epilepsy/Infertility?
Sat, 10/28/2006 - 23:21Topic: Women With Epilepsy
I was wondering if there is anyone that has Epilepsy that is or has suffered from infertility? I am 26 yrs. old and have been seizure free for close to 10 years. I have suffered with Epilepsy since I was 5 yrs. old. I was on depakote, but have been med free for 4 years. My husband and I have been trying to conceive from 3 years now. My periods are crazy. I have 2 periods a month. I have been getting help from my GYNO for over a year. I've been through test and fertility drugs. I still have been unable to conceive, without a reason of why I have been unsuccessful. I was just wondering if there was anyone that might be going through the same thing or have heard of anything. I would appreciate any advice I can get at this point. Thank you!
Comments
Re: Epilepsy/Infertility?
Submitted by craigory8 on Mon, 2006-12-11 - 17:15
I don't know if this helps or not.
Fortunately my wife and I had two children before I developed epilepsy. They put me on 1500 mg of Depakote ER. This was approximately when my youngest was 1. After a lot of discussions with my wife and neurologist, we decided to try for a third. The first two only took 2 months. The third took 4 months. The third then miscarried 2 months into the pregnancy. Two months later we decided to try again. One month after that I had another seizure and they increased my medication to 2000 mg. We continued to try for three months and I had another seizure increasing my medication to 2500 mg. We then tried 3 more months and were unable to conceive.
At this time we decided to give up. We have two happy, healthy boys and didn't want to deal with the emotional aspect of the whole thing. We do think the medicine played a large deal with our troubles with the third. Especially since we had so little in the beginning. I have found very little studies that support this. Maybe it wasn't in our hands to have another.
I just figured I would share my findings.
Craig M.
Re: Epilepsy/Infertility?
Submitted by staciem on Thu, 2006-12-14 - 12:27
I have infertility issues, but they came before my seizures. My seizures didn't start until a head injury in 2004. Anyway, I have PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome), which causes weight gain, ovarian cysts, irregular menses, infertility, and on and on. It can cause acne, hair loss, facial hair, etc. Of course, not everyone with PCOS has all of the symptoms. AND, you don't have to have ovarian cysts to have PCOS.
I know that Depakote can actually cause PCOS. If you have any of the symptoms, it would probably not hurt to be checked out. PCOS is an endocrine disorder, so an endocrinologist or reproductive endocrinologist are usually the best at diagnosing it. Also, reproductive endos are good at both, the hormone/period problems and the fertility aspect of it.
Good luck! I hope it works out well for you. I know how emotionally draining infertility is!
StacieM
Re: Epilepsy/Infertility?
Submitted by Anie on Mon, 2006-12-11 - 13:14
Hello. I don't know if you have already visited these webpages. Just in case if you have not... http://professionals.epilepsy.com/page/hormones_endowomen.html http://professionals.epilepsy.com/page/hormones_antiepwomen.html Smile :)