Personal Talk

Yesterday I did a scary thing. I was asked to speak to a group of researchers at the University of Utah. I thought okay I can handle a talk about epilepsy. I have done them before. Although I have a few board members that take care of that for the most part but I can handle talking about epilepsy. The doctor/professor that asked me said he was interested in sharing personal stories of epilepsy to show the researchers that what they do makes a difference in the life of real people. I first thought, personal story I have a lot of those about seizures. I can handle telling a story or two. The doctor sent me the format of the class and how long he wanted me to talk 15 minutes. That is a talk not just a few stories. So I started on my journey to write a talk about me and my experiences as a wife and mother of individuals with epilepsy. Someone once told me I needed to write a book about epilepsy. After my experience in the last three weeks preparing for this I don't think I could do that. I put together some photos and put it in a PowerPoint presentation. I wrote everything down and shared my speech with Erik. I had a total of nine minutes. I thought I am going to be scared and talk too fast I will be done with this in 5 minutes tops. So I add things to my talk hopeful to make my talk about 10 minutes. I had trouble putting everything together in the first place because it was all personal. Seeing the bad days Kimmie has had and putting them on the big screen is scary and emotionally hard.

I walked into work yesterday I thought I was already to leave for my speech. I though I can handle this. I went into Mom's office and she said, "do you know you have a stain on your jacket?" I thought no I look cute! I tried fixing it although to no success. It was only about penny size so I thought I don't care no one will see it any ways. I figured that I must not have looked cute or the stain must have been worse that I thought, because Mom handed me her JcPenney's card and coupons and she told me to go buy something to wear. The condition was that I threw away the outfit I was in (it was a hand me down from her). So now I have a complex, I thought I had it all together and now I look retarded and need to buy new clothes because I don't have time to go home and change. Great this is starting out really well.

With my new shopping trip I arrived a few minutes late (as usual) I had agreed to met another gal from my board 45 minutes before we spoke. I was glad for the extra few minutes. We still ended up sitting for 20 or so minutes before the class started. It was only the perfect amount of extra time I needed to completely freak myself out. I learned that not only researchers, but staff and neurologists attend this class. So there went a class from 20 max to 45, plus people that are a lot smarter than I am. The doctor that asked me to help told me not to speak on anything like our bill or need for research or anything like that because these people know that they just need a personal story behind it. So I scratched through my extra stuff. I am grateful that Margo went first. I really appreciated the extra time to calm down. I thought as I stood up to talk well at least I have a new outfit and I look really cute.

I started and something fun happened. I ended up not really using my notes I just talked. I ended up talking for 20 minutes. Then students started asking me questions. I didn't know my life was interesting. I have a bunch of new volunteers and people that are really interested in what we are doing! I can't believe I have survived. I think I did okay. I started to get teary when I talked about Kimmie's six hour seizure. I saw three ladies in the room crying. I think that is a good sign that things went well. I have been asked back for other speaking things. I didn't plan on this being a thing although I think it was good for me to tell my story I think it also helped me emotionally deal with some of the things that have happened over the years.

Regardless I survived my first major public speaking event!