Katelyn Lewis was diagnosed with epilepsy when she was only 1 year old. Katie had several generalized seizures a day and was, for most of her life, on three different anti-convulsants in an attempt to control her epilepsy. Medication never made any improvements in her condition. From the ages of 8-12 Katie followed the ketogenic diet, and although she had reduced seizures while following this diet
she was never seizure free. Her seizures were so severe that she was unable to participate in sports, couldn't safely ride a bike and was largely uncoordinated in all she attempted to do. Katie had started a paper route, but was told by her doctor that she had to give it up for safety reasons. On September 18 2008 Katie entered into a state of status epilepticus, a life threatening condition of non-stop seizures which lasted for approximately 4 hours. The doctors didn't know if she would live through the night as she was being kept alive by life support machines in the intensive care unit. Katie lived through the night and was actually released from hospital not long after resuming breathing. Katie's seizures continued. In November 2009 Katie was admitted to the epilepsy unit at the London Health Sciences Centre in London Ontario. While there it was discovered that Katie was a candidate for brain surgery, and on December 3 2009 she had a right temporal lobectomy. Since then Katie has had no further seizures or auras and is currently in the process of weaning off her medication! After watching her father, who also has epilepsy, run a half-marathon in 2010 Katie decided that she would do the same to raise epilepsy awareness and also to raise much needed financial support for the epilepsy unit in London Ontario who literally changed her life. On September 18 2011( three years TO THE DAY from when she almost died from her status epilepticus) Katie and her dad ran a half-marathon - 13.1 miles - in the Thunder Bay Marathon - Miles with the Giant. Her triumph has motivated an annual run in Thunder Bay, Ontario to continue raising both epilepsy awareness as well as additional funds for Epilepsy Ontario. This run, appropriately named Run for Epilepsy, took place for the first time on Sunday September 19, 2012. The second annual Run for Epilepsy took place on Sunday August 19, 2013 and we were thrilled to have the attendance and support of Robbie Weldon, a Canadian Gold Medalist from the 2010 London Paralympics. The second annual Run for Epilepsy also grew to included a 10k road race. Katie become friends with another person who had Epilepsy, Cody Maunula. They were to run together in the first Run for Epilepsy event. Unfortunately, Cody passed in his sleep from SUDEP(Sudden Unexplained Death in Epilepsy Patients)
This page is dedicated to Cody's memory and all those who live with epilepsy on a daily basis, as well as TO CHALLENGE YOU to run/walk/roll etc to raise epilepsy awareness in your community while at the same time raising funds for epilepsy research, awareness or anything else directly related to epilepsy.
