They can't drive, well not in Australian anyway. Which sucks if you live in a car centric hellhole with few options. Better to move to France or somewhere with decent PT
this post was submitted on 26 Nov 2025
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Legally? They can’t drive.
Anyone with an episode is barred from driving for 6 months, and if you have frequent episodes, well you don’t drive.
Driving is a privilege, not a right, if you can’t drive, you don’t get to. End of discussion.
This is in Canada, and would be shocked if it was much different elsewhere.
Yeah in the US epileptics have similar restrictions. And much like up there, this makes them second class citizens in most places. I don't want them driving, buy I won't pretend that that isn't a major disability in most of our continent (majority by population, not even just area).
It's easy to say driving is a privilege when we think of the consequences of people like epileptics and alcoholics driving, but we do need to remember that it is structural and policy decisions that make it so that those who lack the privilege of operating this heavy machinery will struggle to maintain employment.
Not to mention you are often hated for being a pedestrian. The idea that you don’t use a car makes people angry.
That is actually pretty debilitating now that I know this.
Yeah I see pro car people use disabled people as a rhetorical position somewhat regularly, but there are a fair number of disabilities that make it so you can't or shouldn't drive. It's one thing if that means "too bad you have to move to a medium sized city and use a reasonably good public transit network" but in North America, that's not what it means. It means you move to one of the most expensive cities in your country (Ciudad Mexico, Vancouver, New York, Washington DC, Toronto, Seattle, anywhere in the metropolitan US northeast) or you move to a medium sized city (not its suburbs) and catch the hourly bus when it's operating. The alternative, which i know people who do, is to bum a ride everywhere if you're able, drive anyways if you're able, or basically be housebound.
Like, it really is remarkable the difference in experience between people who don't have a car but have a metro/light rail and the people who have neither. These are policy decisions and they can be changed.
Plus, the car is insanely expensive.
It's a great goal to have getting around be cheap, easy, safe, and fun.
It's the same in the US, or at least around me. Had a manager that had a seizure (thankfully just once) but they essentially had to take 6 months off because he lived far away and couldn't commute anymore.
It’s state by state. Some states don’t make physicians report, so there’s not necessarily enforcement. I waited the six months my state requires after my seizures, but there wasn’t really any mechanism by which a cop would have known if I hadn’t.
If you were to get an epileptic seizure while driving, would it strike like lightning, leaving you zero seconds to react, or would you still have enough time to pull over safely?
When I had them, they were very sudden. I didn’t have auras or anything.
It was very odd. The first one I had I didn’t realize was a seizure - I was out working on a farm and woke up very confused and missing my glasses. It wasn’t until I had one in front of my ex husband, and woke up fighting firefighters, that I figured out what was going on.
So yeah, wouldn’t have warnings if I was driving. I’d honestly be happy to never drive again if I didn’t live in a place where that was impossible - I haven’t had one in years and think I figured out why I was having them, but it is scary knowing that there is some trigger that could hit me out of nowhere.
That is a bit terrifying actually. Even if you know one trigger and manage to avoid it, there could still be another one, a stealth trigger, just lurking somewhere. What if you’re mowing the lawn one day, and BOOM! Horrible things can happen before you wake up.
It depends from person to person. Some don't get much warning if any. They just drop. Others can tell when it's coming and/or have warning signs they can learn. A book I read as a kid had a character who heard a train horn getting louder as the seizure came on.
Just because you can tell it's coming doesn't mean it's a good idea to drive, though. Maybe you won't get a warning next time. Maybe you'll get stuck in traffic where you can't pull over safely. Your faculties are already starting to go when a seizure starts to come on, maybe you'll have poor judgement about how far you can make it before you have to stop. Maybe you'll stop, but you won't be good to drive when you wake up again.
Those warnings are called auras, and you can have visual or auditory auras warning you of a seizure.
I knew somebody who had a dog that could sense when they were about to have a seizure. I'm not sure that science knows how it works.
Happened to my son-n-law, had a seizure couldn't drive for a year.
The same is true in the US. When we have seizures we are reported to the dmv and get our licenses suspended for 6 months the.
Australia is the same.
The wife of a coworker of mine had her license revoked because she started having seizures after having a kid.
The time span differs. My mentor’s husband in Missouri is barred from driving for a year after a seizure; my partner mention that it’s five years in North Carolina.
I haven’t looked up any of the rules, but those are just examples of what I’ve heard.
Five years feels like an excessively long time especially if someone had a one off due to illness, or a condition that is well managed medically. I wonder if there is an appeals process.
I dont have it, but my cousin does. The answer is he doesn't. Its too dangerous for him to drive on his own most of the time. Now he does have medication that helps but he still doesnt own a car or travel by himself.
From what I understand, the lights need to flash at certain frequencies. Everything in the other comments still apply, but it wouldn't trigger an episode in everybody.
I don't have epilepsy, but I do get migraines, and what you described is a perfect trigger for me.
Best way to avoid it is don't drive when the sun is low in the sky or on roads lined with very tall trees. If for some reason I was trapped in such a situation, which is not really likely since it's very predictable if it's something you're interested in avoiding, I would probably slow down, find somewhere to pull over, and just wait it out. But yeah, it is bad. I don't do it if I can at all help it, because I avoid getting into that situation like the plague.
I have a cousin who experiences this. He can drive, but he chooses when he’ll drive. Otherwise, the migraines are excruciating, and it appears to worsen his mood, despite him being a naturally passive person.
Thanks for your answer. That makes a lot of sense.
I think I heard someone on a podcast with seizures triggered by lights and she said wearing sunglasses and in extreme cases closing one eye helped reduce the effects on her a lot.
They don't, unless it is sufficiently controlled by medication. A doctor has to sign off that they think you can drive safely. Regulations vary by jurisdiction. Here in Ohio, USA you get a two-part license that says you need a doctor's permit every time you renew your license to say you can continue to drive. Then you carry a piece of the paper (the second part) with your DL.
For the doctor (neurologist) to be confident that you aren't going to have seizure while driving, you have to have been seizure free for some time, plus maybe have regular EEG scans to confirm that you are not susceptible to seizures while being exposed to blinking lights. The blinking lights are part of the EEG scan. You basically hyperventilate (on purpose) while they flash lights at different frequencies and measure your brain waves. If the response is too severe, you fail.
Like any condition, epilepsy comes in many forms and many levels of severity. Some epileptics can barely function and can have brain damage from too many seizures. Some people have no effects at all as long as they are on medication.
Slowly or very fast but not reasonably.
And at night