Let’s imagine for a moment that this plasma ball is your brain. Just like this plasma ball, your
brain is full of electricity, and that electricity controls everything about you — how you move,
how you think, and how you feel. For example, if you want to make your left hand shake, the part of
your brain that controls that part of your body needs to send an electrical message down your spine,
out through the nerves in your arm, all the way out to the muscles in your hand, telling it to shake.
Now, if you want to make your left hand stop shaking, the part of your brain that controls your left hand
needs to send another electrical message down your spine, out through the nerves in your arm, all the
way out to the muscles in your hand, telling it to stop shaking.
When someone has a seizure, they have too much electricity in their brain at one time, and depending
on where in their brain that extra electricity is, that will determine what their seizure looks or feels like.
There’s nothing the person can do to make the seizure stop happening. All the person can do is
wait until the extra electricity is gone from their brain, and that’s when the seizure will be over.
Let’s say that you’re going to have a seizure in your left hand (which does happen to some
people — they have a seizure in just one part of their body, like their hand or their foot). Remember,
that means that they have too much electricity in their brain that makes them do or feel something they
can’t stop from happening. To demonstrate what this might look like, put the cursor on the plasma
ball. See how all of the “brain’s” electricity is concentrated in one area? Let’s
say that’s the part of your brain that controls your left hand. All of that extra electricity is being sent
down your spine, out through the nerves in your arm, all the way out to the muscles in your hand, telling it
to shake. There’s nothing that you can do right now to make your hand stop moving. As long as that
extra electricity is in your brain, your hand will keep on shaking and your seizure will continue. All you can
do is wait for the electricity flowing in your brain to return to normal (demonstrate this by moving the cursor
off of the plasma ball), and this is when your seizure will end.
