Larkin’s Story

Larkin is a typical five-year-old boy, he attends kindergarten, loves adventures, exploring, playing, and spending time outside, riding four wheelers and fishing with his dad. In November 2020, Larkin became 1 of 470,000 children across the country to be diagnosed with epilepsy. Shortly after, Larkin, his mom, Lindsey, and his family were connected to different support systems, other parents of children with epilepsy through social media and the Epilepsy Foundation. Despite his diagnosis and with an army of support, there’s nothing Larkin can’t do.

Being diagnosed with epilepsy, especially at such a young age presents many challenges, but the biggest challenge is the unpredictability of epilepsy. This makes Larkin’s safety top priority in everything he does. Larkin’s family and teachers have been given training provided by the Epilepsy Foundation to be able to watch and monitor him better and there is always someone with him one-on-one to keep an eye on him at school. With the help of his ‘safety shadow’ Larkin is able to live his life as normally as possible.

Epilepsy is unique for everybody and affects each person in a different way and there is no one solution to helping people with epilepsy. Through Larkin’s journey, he and his family have discovered a village of people that are willing to stand up and fight alongside him. Aside from Larkin’s friends, classmates, and community members, Lindsey has found support from other mothers of children with epilepsy through social media. Through social media, Lindsey is able to chat with parents from across the country, discuss successes and failures, share recipes for Larkin’s Ketogenic diet, and use each other for support. The Epilepsy Foundation has also been a great source of support to Larkin’s family, answering any and all questions and providing resources to help Larkin with the challenges of his diagnosis and navigate life to find solutions to any problems.

Even with all the support of the community, Lindsey credits Larkin as being the strongest five-year-old and a true warrior in his fight to end epilepsy.