Good morning (or evening depending on where you are),
I was diagnosed with epilepsy in high school and it truly made high school more of a hell than it usually is for students. Anyway it’s been almost 8 years since my last seizure and I take medication every single day.
I have been referred to as ‘handicapped’ because of this in the past. My question is, how would you respond to someone calling your epilepsy a handicap?
Hi, sorry for the late reply, I tend to answer asks on PC only, and I had some technical issues these past weeks. I am honestly not sure how I'd respond to this, because I feel like there's a language issue lying in the term handicapped, that I may miss in my answer. In my head i equate or at least put "handicap" into a similar range as the word "disability". And I generally say: "yes, epilepsy is a disability". From what I also understand is, that handicap is used to point out the disadvantage aspect of a disability, rather than just pointing out that it is a disability? I am not sure if it has a negative/discriminative connotation though, so I'd be happy if someone with native english would explain. Anyways, at the moment I think it depends on the situation.
Is my epilepsy an actual handicap / giving me a disadvantage in this situation/context or is this term right now used to downplay my achievements or chances in achieving something? I would say though, if you feel iffy or weird about being referred to as handicapped, and if the situation allows it, let the person saying so know, that you don't like the term, and that you prefer another. (give them an alternative to use if possible and needed).
I disagree with you, I would not consider my epilepsy a disability. Maybe other epileptic’s do, but I do not.
It could be different because mine had absolutely no rhyme or reason for them and I only had the grand maul seizures for a few years. Now I just take medication every morning.
It has not disabled me in the least. I still live alone, drive, travel alone, have a full time career, own my house.
Even when I first started having them in high school. Sure, I missed a lot of school, but I still graduated with a 3.0 gpa-the only thing it held me back with was driving and that was only for a few years.
















