Recently, we had the chance to travel to Mexico for a wonderful week of sun, music, friends, and fun. My spouse, Chanda, has refractory idiopathic generalized epilepsy: she was diagnosed at age 9 and over the last two+ decades, has experienced a continuum of control of her seizures. Chanda is the one living with epilepsy, but my whole family "has epilepsy:" we are all affected. Heading into our week away, her seizure control was not especially high. Traveling with epilepsy brings us a unique set of challenges.What if we need medical care while away? We mapped all the pharmacies and hospitals, worked to understand insurance – creating not only a Plan B, but a Plan C and D. Chanda is on the ketogenic diet, requiring her to travel with MCT oil, nutritional shakes, heavy cream, and more = five laminated copies of letters from her doctors, extra time at security check points where food (liquids!) is tested and she is patted down, and working with destination lodging and restaurants in advance (Will they allow food to be brought in? Will any keto-friendly food be available?). Both she and I carried a week’s worth of her medication. Travel is fun and can be tiring, so we worked hard to strike the balance of enough rest.

What we learned: Hours (weeks) of planning, patience, and family balance coupled with significant support of her health care team paid off. We can’t do things on the fly, and we need to think through trip details in ways that families without epilepsy probably don’t, but we can do it. Chanda was seizure free all week, and we had a wonderful time away. Here’s hoping your getaways are happy ones.