My name is Lisa, and I am now eighteen. I live in a small country town in Queensland. I was eleven when I had my first seizure. I suddenly felt strange and giddy inside myself. I was told later that I asked for a drink, my eyes rolled back and I fell, almost getting run over by a car. I was vomiting, and mum took me to our GP who diagnosed epilepsy.

I went then to a neurologist, and after I had an EEG done, he said the problem was coming from my left temporal lobe- apparently this is quite a common place for seizures to come from.

Finally I arrived here in the Royal Brisbane Hospital, in a neurology ward, and have just had an MRI done- this is a new machine that takes pictures inside your brain. It doesn’t hurt, but it does make a big noise. So now I am under twenty four hour observation, with EEG plugs on my head, and a video camera watching me, to record any seizures I may have.

I am lying here in bed with 21 wires of different colors connected to my head. The different colors represent the different parts of my brain. The wires are connected to a box and I take this with me wherever I go. This machine works like a video, and it monitors my brain waves.

I had a seizure this morning and it has shown that I have a cyst in my left temporal lobe, which is causing the seizures. This is really good news, because I am going to be able to have an operation to remove it.

This is what will happen. A small 5cm square will be opened in my brain, and the cyst will be sucked out with a special needle. I probably will never need medication again.