Irondad and Spideyson One-shots

Epilepsy

      Peter never outright lied about his condition. Usually, he ever so skillfully avoided the conversation altogether. It was a complicated thing to discuss, and a topic that most people didn’t really understand or know much about. And it didn’t help that any time Peter truly thought about it, it make it difficult to keep up his relentless optimism. 

     Unfortunantely the thoughts irritate him now as he reaches up to the top shelf of the cabinet, taking down to bottles of pills. His daily dose of Lamotragine, followed by the smaller dose of his anxiety medication. He hated taking them both. The lamotragine was given to him to treat the non-convulsive epilepsy, that he’d had since he was a child. Unfortunately, in recent years, severe anxiety became a side effect of the medication. So in order to keep that in check, he was given klonopin in order to keep the anxiety at bay. 

     He’d hoped for a little while after the spider bite that the problem would solve itself and go away, so he’d stopped taking his seizure meds. Unfortunately, it was followed by several seizures in one day. Thankfully, Peter’s epilepsy was non-convulsive, meaning that after he’s had a seizure a hospital trip was never neccessarry. Usually he could take an ibuprofin for the headache and a nap afterward, and he’d be just fine the next day. 

     He had what was called Absence Seizures. And, as the name implies, the seizure was almost like he was absent from the current situation. For example, if he was in the middle of a conversation with someone, and he had an episode in the middle of the conversation, he would just check out. To other people, it looked as if he was being rude and wasn’t paying attention to what the person was saying. What Peter saw, however, was as if a movie was being skipped. He wouldn’t know he’d had one until it was over, when he realizes he’s missed at least a minute of time and a good portion of what was going on around him. When the seizure was over, he was left feeling absolutely exhausted with a horrible headache.

     While this kind of epilepsy was defintely a better alternative to convulsions, it still had it’s downsides. If he missed a dose of his medication, he avoided doing lab work or going out as spider-man, fearing an ill timed seizure could have dire consequences. He couldn’t drive until he’d gone 6 months seizure free, which had yet to be the case. And last school year Peter had to drop out of the School play, as he had a time period where he’d have at least one seizure a day despite taking his medication. Plus the anxiety really was no fun. 

     He tried to look on the bright side. It could truly be worse. But sometimes that was difficult, like today.

     “Kid, be careful.” Tony warns, not looking up from his project. Peter chuckles. All it was, was a piece of scrap metal. Dangerous? Yes. The edges were sharp and jagged and could easily cut someone if they weren’t careful. But Peter had handled scrap metal hundred of times. He knew to be careful. “You should be wearing gloves if your going to handle it.”

     “Mr. Stark I’m just moving it away from my work space. I’m sure-” 

     One minute, he was carrying the metal to a small discard pile on the otherside of the workshop. The next, Tony was gently shaking him by the shoulders, trying to bring him back to reality. Peter blinks a few times, trying to refocus his vision. Tony’s voice is muffled at first, but soon enough his words become clear.

     “-an you hear me? Peter?! Peter answer me.” 

     “Y-Yeah, I can hear you. I’m fine.” The boy stutters, his voice shaking. The headache has already started to set in, and his body feels as if he’s fought every villian at once. He’s exhausted. The pain in his hand stands out the most, and he lifts it to find a concerning cut right across his palm. Blood pours from the wound, and for some reason the sight of it makes Peter nausous.