That wasn't necessary, was it!

Was carted off to hospital yesterday by over-zealous paramedics. Yes, I had had an epileptic seizure in public. Yes, my speech probably did sound a bit slurry afterwards. Don't know. I was on my own so nobody who knew me could give 'evidence'.
The fact that, after the seizure, I paid for the goods that I had in my shopping basket with a card and had no problem remembering the PIN number - oh, and also remembered that I had a loyalty card and fished around for that because I didn't want to miss out on points - didn't convince the paramedics.
I told them, over and over, that there was no need for me to go to hospital and that would only achieve me being stranded in a place far from home.
So eventually...I ended up stranded in a place I didn't need to go to,  far from home.
The doctor I saw in A&E didn't even bother to examine me: just told me that the paramedics should have listened and advised me to get off as soon as I could rather than sit out the three-hour wait.
OK, epilepsy is so much more complex than, say, broken limbs - which paramedics are really, really good with.
So why don't they leave the problem, then, to the people who best know how to deal with it. (That'll be the people with the condition.) They finally persuaded me, by the way, by telling me I had dangerously low blood pressure. The doctor said I had blood pressure to envy!
I had told the paramedics I hadn't eaten much that day, was famished and had been about to go grab a bite to eat. I'll put it down to a lack of training that they think it's OK to decide to delay my next meal for hours by taking me to casualty.
Sometimes it may be necessary to take people to hospital after an epileptic seizure. That's never been the case with me. I'm not stupid. I've had the condition for 35 years. Some paramedics have, in my experience, understood loads - and when I've asked how they've become so knowledgable about epilepsy, they've said they've made it their own personal business to learn.
It was worrying when all three paramedics yesterday felt there was reason to be alarmed because I couldn't remember details of the seizure. Aren't they taught even that much? Mmmmm. There are 600,000 people with epilepsy in the UK....time for paramedic training to keep up!