My Toddler had a Febrile (Fever-Induced) Seizure...Have You Experienced This?

I previously wrote on May 4,2009 about how our son had seizures, like febrile seizures, but without the fever. Since that time we went into our neurologist and his medicine was decreased after two weeks due to how well he had been doing. Three weeks later he had another one right in the middle of playing at chickfila. Again, same symptons, stop, stare, smacking lips, lips turned blue and pass out - NO FEVER. However, we have learned that if you catch them going into one, you can prevent them from passing out completely by rubbing arms and legs, to stimulate circulation. We have increased his medicine back to the 15mg, sprinkle capsules twice a day. As of one month since the increase of medicine, he has not had another one. He is 16months now. We are told he should grown out of this. As mentioned above on May 4, 2009, he had all the tests you could possibly have with this and everything checked out perfect. They have called this a new onset type of seizure. It is the same exact symptons as having a febrile seizure but without the fever. Thought I would give out our latest update, in case anyone experiences the same. AGAIN, because he had so many at one time, if you can catch your child going into one you might be able to prevent them from completely passing out with gently but vigoursly rubbing arms and legs.

I used to have them as a child (maybe between the ages of 4 & 5) I'm 29 now and don't really recall anything that happened to me during those episodes. My mom and dad used to get so scared because they used to happen all of the time and the doc never really knew what the heck was going on.

I guess I knew it was coming because I would always walk to my mom and put my arms up. From there she told me I would pass out, turn blue, start shaking, vomit all over myself and then urinate on myself. Great, right? It happened once on the neighbor’s front yard. The neighbor was freaking out and by this point, my mother was a pro. :-) She told the neighbor to just leave me there and that she would be over. My mom scooped me up and took me home.

We honestly think it had to do with my teeth coming in. My fever would spike and send me right over the edge. Once my teeth were in (by age 5), everything stopped. Thank goodness I was a child when it all happened because I would be terrified to go through it as an adult...not to mention embarrassed. Those damn things would happen whenever and wherever they wanted to.

After all is said and done, I turned out okay - though some say the jury is still out on that one. :-)

~ Jennifer

My son had a febrile seizure a year ago...I sympathize with how scary it was. He was blue and laboring to breath, after the seizure. The police officer who arrived first had oxygen but not the proper tubes for an infant; all he could do was hold the oxygen in front of him.

Anyways, I found your posting because once again he has a fever, so I'm in hyper-alert mode. No more seizures since that one, but my wife and I have practically become experts in managing fevers (alternating tylenol/motrin every 3 hours, baths seem to bring fevers down, but make it spike once they're out, cool washcloths, or in a crisis, ice, under the armpits and groin...whew). He gets fevers pretty frequently, but the level of stress has never diminished. It was the scariest day of my life; no question.

The worst thing is people who know of them and say, "oh, they're common," or "they're harmless." Let them witness one and then say that. I get that they're most often harmless, but nonetheless....they're horrifying.

I just experienced the same thing. Our 14month old son was going through a slight stomach flu - BUT NO FEVER - EVER. His lips turned blue, eyes rolled back and he went limp for about 30 seconds. Called 911, same thing, by the time they got here he was fine. HOwever, two days later we had the same thing happen and he passed out, took him to ER - was happening every 30 to 45 min, 30 sec ea, while he was hooked up to the monitors. We found that right before he would go into them he would start smacking his mouth, like his lips were going numb. Followed by the blue lips and glassy eyes, limp body. The monitors showed that he was still breatheing but his oxygen level was low - would drop to 70 and even went down to 40 at one time (scary). Heart rate was fine. As soon as he went into one we would just move him around a bit and get everything going again. (Talk about scary each time cause you never know if they are going to come back to ya) This happened about 6 or 7 times while we were in the ER. Once at ICU we has a spinal tap, blood work, EEG, MRI -----all check out wonderful. As soon as we checked in after the spinal they put him on seizure medicine which has worked for us so far. He is currently on, after three days, Topamax 15mg. Twice a day. He has never had a cold or temperature his whole life and now all of a sudden this. Maybe a fluke, definitly related to stomach flu. Can't say. He will be on this medicine for at least 6months. He is on medicine because it wasn't just one day we had this experience but as mentioned before he had this happend two days later several times. I hate him taking anything but once you experience seeing your child look as if he was dying you'll do anything to make sure that never happnes again. Hope this helps someone. This is still new to us............

As I read your story, I felt it was me telling it. I went through the exact same thing with my 14 month old daughter. It took 10 rings for 911 to answer and when the ambulance arrived, my daughter was crying. I was at the emergency room several hours before I was told it was a febrile seizure.
The whole experience was very frightening and I don't care how common they say it is, I don't want to ever go through that again with my daughter.

I experienced this a few times, according to my parents, when I was younger. I've always been a "fainter" whenever I'm sick with a nasty virus or have a high fever, even as an adult. But the last time I actually had a seizure caused by fever, I was about 12 years old.

I'm so thankful that I haven't had my kids experience this -- don't know what I'd do. I'm sure I'd be out of my mind. Please let me know how your son is doing (and you too!).

I'm so happy to hear your son came out of the seizure! Our older son had a number of high fevers when he was a toddler, that came on without warning, and we made a few trips to the emergency room to have him iced down. To this day, even though he had a few repeats during adolescence, we still don't know what triggered the spikes.

It's very scary when your child is going through something traumatic and you feel totally helpless. That helpless feeling doesn't go away any time soon, either!

I hope all in your family are resting well, now.

I know of two people who had this happen to them. Similar stories to your. Very scary! I am so glad he is doing better now.