The Impact of Decisions Made in Times of Crisis

Amy Stone [00:00:05]:
Mike Knox. Welcome to the art of imperfect adulting.

Mike Knox [00:00:08]:
Thank you. Thanks for having me.

Amy Stone [00:00:10]:
I’m happy you’re here. Are you ready for a fun chat?

Mike Knox [00:00:12]:
I’m ready.

Amy Stone [00:00:13]:
All right, let’s do it. I start every interview pretty much by asking people what part of the world they’re from. Where are you talking to me from today?

Mike Knox [00:00:21]:
Los Angeles, California.

Amy Stone [00:00:22]:
Ah. Where are you exactly? Across the country? I’m in Miami, Florida. Oh, yeah? Yeah.

Mike Knox [00:00:27]:
I might be moving to Miami.

Amy Stone [00:00:29]:
Oh, really?

Mike Knox [00:00:30]:
Wife’s work. So we might.

Amy Stone [00:00:34]:
That’s a. It’s a. It’s similar in a lot of ways. And also Miami is its own weird little place as Los Angeles has its own culture, but we identify similarly with that. It’s coastal. Right. So everything is about the water and also the traffic sucks in both cities. So I will say. I will definitely say that. All right. So I love to learn about people’s personal backgrounds before we get started. So not talking about the topic of the day or, you know, anything about your job or stuff like that, but just pick something and tell us a little bit about yourself. Hobby, the names of your pets, anything.

Mike Knox [00:01:19]:
I am a retired parole agent and I worked in a prison for five years and I’m glad that I don’t have to do that ever again. And now I’m a full time actor and comedian and it’s much better. And I tell anybody that can do that, be broke, work in the arts. It’s much better than the daily grind of anything that has to do with government work.

Amy Stone [00:01:40]:
Oh, my goodness. I did know about the comedian, but I did not know about the parole. And in prison, I have always thought that that would be. It takes a special skill set to be able to work in the prisons. Hard stuff.

Mike Knox [00:01:55]:
Yeah. You just had more problems with the people that you worked with than the actual criminals.

Amy Stone [00:02:00]:
Oh, really? Well, that is. That is unexpected. All right, so to get to. That is not what I expected. I should say to get to the topic of the day, which is neither prisons nor coworkers. We. The topic you proposed was talking about when your young daughter had a seizure and how that changed everything for you. Are you ready to talk about that today?

Mike Knox [00:02:24]:
Yes.

Amy Stone [00:02:25]:
All right. I love that. One of the reasons I think this is a great conversation is because I’ve done a lot of interviews where we talk about the work of caregiving, and some of them are related to old, aging parents and some of them are related to family members. Almost everybody I talked to is a woman. And so I love the fact that you don’t Meet that demographic. And we’re still having the conversation because as anybody who’s been through the work of raising kids and family, the hope is that it’s all hands on deck, that everybody is pitching in. Not one or the other. So that. Not so far, I haven’t gotten to a question, but I will, I will. How about this? Can you share with us how old your daughter was when this happened?

Mike Knox [00:03:06]:
She was two.

Amy Stone [00:03:07]:
Two. Very, very small. And did you personally have any idea what was going on when this, when she had the seizure, when it was actually happening? Did you know that it was a seizure or.

Mike Knox [00:03:18]:
Oh, I had no idea. I’d never seen one before. I mean, I’d seen. I, you know, I saw different strokes, I think, or a show from the 80s where somebody had one, but that was it. And I never experienced anything, so I had no idea. I just thought, my daughter’s lifeless, she’s not responding. I have no idea what’s going on. We’re calling 91 1. It’s busy. So all the things were, you know, when you’re talking about imperfect adulting. The day before I was even thinking, oh, everything’s going great. We just moved into our house. You know, we’re getting the floors put in. We both have jobs. Our daughter is, you know. You know, our daughter had. The night before, she had her Barbie dolls and she had this routine where we would say goodnight to her Barbie dolls. And so I can remember that night before thinking, everything’s perfect. And then the next day it wasn’t.

Amy Stone [00:04:08]:
That sounds really scary. That sounds very scary. So you were there at the time this happened? You watched it. You watched it happen. And on a scale of 1 to 10, how freaked out were you during the actual event of the first. First seizure?

Mike Knox [00:04:24]:
It was a 10 because I was asleep and my wife had picked her up out of the crib and then came screaming into the room to get me. And so I was just coming out of sleep. So it was just that pure kind of shock, which I still carry with me because it didn’t end from there. I mean, she continued to have seizures and it was just kind of lack of sleep, waking up, getting to the hospital, giving her rescue medication, whatever it was. But that specific first time was just pretty much just sheer terror because I didn’t know. And I was just telling myself, like, you really should have gone to some sort of medical training or something because. Because now that you have a kid and I. I reflect back on, like, how we’re. You just have kids and it’s like you’re kind of winging it so much, right? Yeah. And I didn’t, I didn’t. I had no idea where the hospital was. I mean, I really didn’t. Even though she was born in this hospital, I was like, where is this pla. How do I get. How do I get there? It was in the morning, so it was just dead stop traffic. I had to go. I had to drive on the sidewalk to get around this traffic jam because we were driving there because 911 we couldn’t get an ambulance to us. And I just knew, like, she’s not responding. I’ve got to get her to the hospital. And we had, we had made the right decision getting her to the hospital that way because she would have, she would have died if we hadn’t. I mean, she’d been seizing for probably over.

Amy Stone [00:05:44]:
So let’s break this down a little tiny bit. So you mentioned it, and it’s your story, and so it probably seems like you’re used to telling the details, but. So you dial 911, which we’ve been trained to do since we were kids, something goes wrong, you need help, you dial 91 1. And in my. I’ve done that in my own life. The first time I did it, the experience didn’t match what I expected because in my imagination, when you dial 911, they answer right away and then the people come right away and they help you. But it sounds like that is not how it worked when you guys dialed 911. No.

Mike Knox [00:06:20]:
And I’ve had more other experiences. It got to the point with my wife and I where we were just like not calling 911 and just driving to the hospital. And we had set up with the hospital. Hey, we’re going to be coming in here a lot. So we need an action plan because 911 isn’t working for us in Los Angeles County. And I had many problems with 911 in Los Angeles county to say they have never changed anything that they do. And I just, along the way, just years later, I just. Basically all I can do is laugh because of the incompetence of so many people. There are good people, but I just met so many that were horrible. And a lot of it just has to do with my expectations of what I thought from watching movies and tv, of what these people, you know, that they were going to have compassion for me and they never did.

Amy Stone [00:07:02]:
Oh, my goodness, that’s terrible. So quick question before I get too far into this. Did you guys have any sort of family history or experience with Seizure disorders before you guys, you and your wife went through this is all brand new for you.

Mike Knox [00:07:14]:
It’s all brand new. She had met, she was meeting all of her milestones. She didn’t have. There was nothing, you know, telling us that she was going to have them. There was no history of it. She had just, you know, going through all the research. She had had a fetal stroke.

Amy Stone [00:07:26]:
Okay. Oh, so. All right, so yeah, we, so I know that you are not a doctor, but for the people listening, you can give us sort of a. There are a bunch of different types of seizures. Right. So people can have. So tell us a little bit about where your daughter’s experience what type of seizure. You know, now you didn’t know then, but now you know what type of seizure she was having.

Mike Knox [00:07:48]:
She was having grand mal but also partial focal for the most part. And that means she had a brain injury on the right side of her left side of her brain and that was causing her to seize basically a lot of times paralyzing her right side. So a lot of times you could see them coming on. And for many times, like dealing with schools or dealing, you know, dealing with teachers, dealing with, in family members, they didn’t think, they just thought she was lazy. They didn’t think that she was having seizures. So nobody really wanted to believe it. And there really is this disbelief in the kind of community of epilepsy. Nobody can kind of get on the same page because of the fact that it’s not, it’s not curable. They can’t, nobody can get on the same page as if it’s a disease or medical disorder. And so there’s not really much education, there’s not a lot of laws. So like for example, they didn’t have, they refused to carry your medication at school. I had to get an attorney for that. Just to simply have her medication, her life saving medication on the campus. They would, they would carry food allergies medication, but they wouldn’t carry epilepsy because there was no laws that said they had to do that. So a lot of it was, you know, fighting for the rights of my kid.

Amy Stone [00:09:03]:
That which on the one hand, as somebody, when you’re involved in a kid’s life, your parent, your stepparent, your guardian, any of those things, you’re happy to be committed to do the things that your children need. On the other hand, it can become a full time job. It’s something. And there’s a hundred times you’ll think to yourself, it shouldn’t be so hard to advocate for the life of my kid. So walk us through now. So you have this first seizure, scares the pants off you and your wife. You were asleep. Was your wife also asleep? Was the baby asleep?

Mike Knox [00:09:37]:
Yeah. So the baby was in her crib and my wife went to get a cup of coffee in the morning, it was 7:00, got her a cup of coffee, went to go check on my daughter. And my daughter was having a seizure in her crib. So. And my wife didn’t know what it was. She just picked her up and ran into the room to get me. I didn’t know what it was. And so it was going to the hospital. We got there. That was another thing, is the way that the system is for the hospital is an emergency is only when an ambulance is called and you arrive to the hospital in the ambulance. Because otherwise, when my daughter would have a seizure, they would just stick us in the waiting room while she’s having a seizure. That particular time, we just didn’t know. And by chance, we went through the emergency doors of the ER and there had been a doctor standing there, and that was his last week. He was getting ready to leave. He just happened to be there. All these kind of chances, and he knew exactly what it was. There was a fireman that was there also, and he was like, oh, that’s a seizure. And so they rushed her into a room that just happened to be. Because it was, you know, a shift change. You have all this other stuff going on. So I was very lucky that he knew what it was, he knew how to identify it. He knew the medication to give her because she flatlined that day. So she became very close to losing her life. So there were all these kind of things and all these. I just call it luck. A lot of it was, yeah, there’s.

Amy Stone [00:10:58]:
A couple, like, backing all the way up to the fact that your wife checked. You know, just by chance, your wife was getting coffee, she checked, which set them things in motion. And it is counterintuitive to look back and say, these are the things that lined up. So this worked out well. But there’s that the. I. I have been the person who pulls up to the emergency room, not in an ambulance. And they’re like, hey, you’re not. This is not how you get to come in here. This is ambulance. I’m like, it’s like, I’m sorry, this is an emergency coming in. Which I was also surprised. I was like, well, seems to me that shouldn’t be the rule. And then to have a doctor ready and a fireman who identified it. That’s a lot of luck. That’s a lot of luck and a lot of stuff to be grateful for. So they identify. Thankfully, you come across somebody who immediately says, this is a seizure. And then tell us a little bit about if you don’t mind, the prognosis and the treatment and how this worked into how it changed your daily life. Because this is not a single event that happened, happened. But first you get, you know, okay, it’s a seizure. What does that even mean? Is probably your first question. And then tell us about how it unfolded and how you realized this was going to be an ongoing thing for your life.

Mike Knox [00:12:14]:
So at that day, we didn’t. Everybody was saying, it’s a fever seizure. Don’t even worry about it. Even though the first doctor had given her a CAT scan and said, hey, no, there’s a. There’s a malformation on her brain. You need to get this checked out. Everybody ignored that. We were transferred to Children’s Hospital thinking, oh, children’s Hospital is going to be great. And it really wasn’t. But it was the only hospital that was close to us, you know, and figuring out like, oh, I didn’t even. I didn’t even realize, oh, this is a children’s hospital just specifically for children. We stayed the night there. They ran all these tests on her. Everything came back fine, except for the fact that they didn’t give her an MRI at that time to look. And they could have seen at that time that her brain hadn’t formed correctly. That took them five years. And. And other doctors also. We went to a. We went to another doctor who just misdiagnosed her for the entire time, and he was the top doctor. Everybody bragged about him, and he was absolutely horrible.

Amy Stone [00:13:09]:
And then he just gave you the wrong diagnosis. What did he. What did he. What. Which. What did he say? Think it was he.

Mike Knox [00:13:16]:
He. In the beginning, that guy wouldn’t tell us what it was. So it was my wife and I googling and bringing the information and saying, this sounds like epilepsy. Well, it could be. It couldn’t be. And she’s still having seizures, and he’s just giving her medication and switching medication. And that’ way that the system is set up for epilepsy at least, is just constantly what medication is going to work and fail. When you’re trying to look at other options and you’re. A lot of times different hospitals and different doctors, they don’t. They don’t. They’re. You’re running up against this paradigm where they don’t want to talk to you about it as a parent, they, they’re, I’m right, you’re wrong, and you’re up a lot, a lot of ego. But in the beginning, when my daughter was two, they said everything’s fine. So she went home for a whole year, not on medication, nothing. I mean, there’s so much that could have happened in that year. We went on living our life, thinking everything’s great until a year later, then she had another one. So for, you know, two to three, she was fine. And we were thinking, this is all behind us, no big deal. Everybody was telling. All these professionals were telling us, it’s no big deal, it’s just a fever seizure, and you just kind of go on living your life. And then so at the age of three, then she started having more. And then we realized this isn’t the case at all. Then we were going in and out of hospitals, doctors getting testing. We recommended this one doctor, and that was the doctor who we finally just got so frustrated that we left and went to another doctor. Then that doctor. We had to do all that testing over again. So a lot of it is these EEGs, a lot of it’s outdated stuff, and nobody’s kind of figured out how to do something better. And it’s hospital stays. We were in there twice for seven days, whether seven or eight days, whether monitoring her brain, just trying to catch.

Amy Stone [00:14:58]:
A seizure in action, right?

Mike Knox [00:15:01]:
So that this new doctor that we found, she was somebody that said, hey, her brain didn’t form, right? You can see on the right side of her brain. It basically looks like a broken butterfly. And, you know, it’s right there in front of us this entire time for five years. And I had no idea what it was that I’m looking at until this other doctor was like, this is. I found what it is we need to do this other eeg. When we captured another seizure, there were four seizures coming from four different areas of brain. Because we were looking at brain surgery that was going to fix it, and we weren’t opted for it. So it was just. It’s this exhausting kind of time. And then she had introduced the vagus nerve stimulator, which is like a. You’re not supposed to say it’s a pacemaker for your brain, but that’s kind of the easiest way to explain it. But it’s an implant that is in your chest. It attaches to your vagus nerve and is sending impulses to your brain. And that’s what my daughter got. And that’s basically what saved her life. And that was finding a new doctor that wanted to help us, you know, really did want to help us.

Amy Stone [00:16:01]:
It’s amazing. All right, so let’s back this up. So you have a. First, they tell you it’s a febrile seizure, which is a thing that babies and little kids do, get seizures from high fevers, and they send you home, and you have no reason to worry about it because nothing else happens. This is like the. You were. You know, you’re just living your life like you said. So then she’s three, and your life turns upside down. She begins to have more seizures than you need. Medical. Medical intervention, which is such a funny collection of words. Right. And people will also say people who deal with chronic, like, illnesses. They’re like, you’re putting together your medical team. And these sound like wonderful collaborative efforts. However, I’ve never had anybody positively talk about the experience. I got to tell you, whether you’re talking about diabetes or a chronic illness or lupus, people are like, yeah, building the medical team sounds like it’s a nice thing. Send somebody a greeting card. But it’s really years of chronic stress and banging your head against a wall. Tell us. I do want to. And then this is very interesting, because the vagus nerve, I think of that, like, as something like, almost that’s on a new age spectrum. Like, the people I know who talk about the vagus nerve, they’re talking about things like stress relief and cortisol face and stuff like that. But this is stimulating the vagus nerve, and it’s like a medical procedure, and it’s been very helpful for you. That’s amazing. Yeah.

Mike Knox [00:17:34]:
And there’s a vagus nerve that goes to your brain, and there’s one that goes to your stomach. So a lot of times we hear ones about our gut health, but it really is. You know, everything’s kind of connected, and. And it really was. You know, for my wife and I, it was changing our entire life to the need of our daughter. Because one of the. One of the main things that we did and we were told not to do this was when she was three and she had another. Another seizure. And I was like, this is ridiculous. I’m not leaving this kid’s side. So we would take turns watching her all night long, because for the most part, her. At night, they were nocturnal. They’re in a part of her brain that she would slip into these seizures when she was, like, in REM sleep. So we’ve kind of written everything down and nailed you know, nailed it down to, of a time window of it’s usually happening, you know, 12:00 to 6 in the morning. So we would just take turns watching her all night long. And all these medical people were saying, oh no, don’t do that. And they’re, you know, telling us all these other things to do. And that was the best thing that we did to save her life, was just to watch her all night long waiting for these seizures. She’d have the seizure, we give the rescue medication or we go to the hospital. And it was just my wife working in a team and taking what we could from medical professionals because I’m not a doctor. But it was just trial and error and figuring what, what works for you because the, some medications work, some don’t. The vagus nerve stimulator worked for my daughter, it might not work for other people.

Amy Stone [00:19:00]:
What was the rescue medication? Was it like an anti seizure medication or was it.

Mike Knox [00:19:05]:
Yes, it was. Can’t remember the name of it now.

Amy Stone [00:19:11]:
Like, so it’s. When you say rescue, I think, I think almost like an asthma inhaler. They call those the rescue inhalers.

Mike Knox [00:19:16]:
They have one now that’s a, a nasal one. But I actually, we bypassed medical to get a syringe and we went and got trained to actually administer. What we were doing was Ativan. That’s what it is.

Amy Stone [00:19:30]:
So, okay.

Mike Knox [00:19:31]:
The hospital would lock up the Ativan. So we went there one time and they’re like, oh, yeah, it’s locked. We can’t give it to you. Why? My daughter’s having a seizure in a hospital for an hour.

Amy Stone [00:19:39]:
Oh my goodness.

Mike Knox [00:19:41]:
And everybody kind of said, oh, it’s no big deal. No, it’s a huge deal because it’s deteriorating her brain. Because along with the seizures, it was all this other stuff she was digressing. She wasn’t learning anything. She was having massive memory loss, brain fog, anxiety, depression. So you know, when I tell people about the epilepsy or the seizures, it was like far beyond that because she couldn’t, she couldn’t learn anything. She couldn’t advance in her age. So she was like, you know, years behind the other kids in her first grade class. And all the teachers would say is she’s just lazy. She doesn’t want to apply herself because you’re trying, you’re trying to get her into school, you’re trying to work, you’re trying to get the school to work with you. So there are so many other aspects of it. It wasn’t just the seizure and it wasn’t just a seizure for. I mean, I look back at videos of her, and as a parent, I’m thinking, you know, oh, she’s doing great. And I look back at the videos, and she wasn’t doing great at all. I mean, she was kind of like a zombie. Not really, really, really delayed.

Amy Stone [00:20:37]:
That is really hard. I. One of my very favorite parenting books, which is actually about adolescence, is a book that’s called He’s Not Lazy. It’s about teens. Teens and tweens by a guy named Adam Price. But generally, other than that, I think. I can’t imagine a scenario. I think that most people should just remove that from their vocabulary when they’re talking about kids, because it’s like there are lots of times where kids don’t want to do the things that we’re doing, but I don’t know that there are very many kids out there that are truly, truly lazy. They don’t want to do chores. They don’t want to do some of the other things. They’re not fun. Yes, they’d rather watch tv. They’d rather play their games. They’d rather do those. But the reality that an educator and somebody who’s, you know, purpose is supposed to be helping kids would say to a parent, hey, your kid is lazy. That just must. I just. That. That just hurts. It must have made your blood boil. All right. Yeah, that. Really. So this. You guys start down this path when she’s three is when it really begins. You make the enormous sacrifice of energy and effort that you guys are alternating nights, staying up all night. So this is not easy for you. You’re watching her, which also means that you’re on guard all the time, paying attention, which sounds like it would be like a heavy weight, you know, Is tonight the night that we have. We go through this again, like, so really, really high stress situation, and then it’s. It’s. Did you say it’s seven years until you get the. The tools that actually begin to turn it around? Or. How old was she when she got the Vegas simulator?

Mike Knox [00:22:10]:
You got it at 8. 18 now. And actually today is the very first day that she went with her friends on her own.

Amy Stone [00:22:18]:
So how old is she again? Tell me again.

Mike Knox [00:22:21]:
She’s 18.

Amy Stone [00:22:22]:

18. Okay.

Mike Knox [00:22:23]:
Very first day where she went with her friends in a car to. She. They went to a garden. But before, prior to that, she was never going to have her independence. So today’s a great day where she has her independence.

Amy Stone [00:22:35]:
So that is a. That is a perfect segue because Anytime I talk to somebody where we’re talking about a health scenario for the kids, I do want to, like, sort of flip it around and talk about the good things about the kid and, like, really sing their praises, because we’re talking about, like, an illness and this hardship. But so today she’s out on her own with her friends, going to the garden. That’s amazing. What are some other. You don’t have to get too personal, but what are some other wonderful things about your daughter? Because she’s so much more than this illness and the diagnosis.

Mike Knox [00:23:08]:
Oh, yeah. She’s just been. You know, I couldn’t. It’s so funny that I, like, in law enforcement, all the most part, the kids are these, you know, people at the office, like, has she run away yet? Is she hooked on heroin? I’m like, no, she’s just a happy little kid that, you know, likes to be happy. And I think that her spending so much time in the hospital, missing so much school, she’s just. She feels so grateful for every day that she has. And, you know, I was a horrible student. She gets straight A’s. She works so hard, and she has to work 10 times harder than the other kids because of her brain injury. And she never complains. And I couldn’t. There’s nothing that I can say bad about her. It’s like, that’s her fault. Her fault is that she is so good. And, you know, that was, like, today or yesterday, I was, you know, so excited that she was going off by herself with her friends, because that’s stuff that I was doing at the age of 10. You know, I was out riding my bike with my friends. Or 14, I was out drinking with my friends.

Amy Stone [00:24:07]:
Right.

Mike Knox [00:24:08]:
No, I don’t have any problems whatsoever with her. She doesn’t talk back to me. She’s always there. Like, we look at our family like we’re a team, and she’s the team member, and I have no complaints whatsoever. And she’s just a happy kid, and she loves making videos, and she loves talking with her friends, and she’s just a, you know, normal, normal teenager.

Amy Stone [00:24:29]:
I love to hear it. I really do. All right, so let’s talk a little bit more about the pressure on you and your wife or you. You can just talk about you so that it’s easier. And anybody else that was around as you guys were living through, not just the diagnosis, but continuing on for that, we’re talking. We’re talking 15 years of managing an active seizure disorder. What does the pressure feel like, and what are you know what. How did. What was it like to go through that?

Mike Knox [00:24:57]:
Well, number one, I always wanted compassion from people, and I never got it. And that really angered me so much because that’s. I just wanted people to hear what I was going through. Nobody cared, especially my office. Nobody cared that you couldn’t get your work done. And you were in the hospital with your kid, who is. You know, you’re. You’re thinking, this is the day you’re going to lose your kid. And those people are like, well, did you get your reports in? And you just realize how horrible humanity is? And you kind of just. And you really break it down to day by day, and you no longer are looking at vacations or adding stuff to the house or whatever it is. You’re just focused on this illness and your kid and getting your kid better. And people leave you, your friends and your family. They don’t. They don’t know how to deal with it. It’s not their fault. It’s just that people stop contacting you because they’re living there. You know, they get mad at you. Well, why can’t you come to our birthday party in Orange County? Well, because getting in the car causes my daughter to have a seizure. You have family members that are like, well, I don’t. I don’t understand why you can’t drive four hours to our house. Because we can’t leave the house because she might have a seizure. Well, that’s no way to live your life. Well, that’s the life that I’m living. And you’re constantly arguing with people until they finally just leave you. And you’re. And you’re. You. You feel fortunate. Thank goodness they left me alone. And you basically just close your doors and you’re living within your house because you’re waiting for those seizures all the time. And that’s what it was. Couldn’t go to the store, couldn’t do the simple tasks, couldn’t go to the gym, couldn’t do the things. Because I’m waiting all the time for these seizures to happen because her medications were failing and everything. All these, you know, doctors were giving us wrong information. So you’re very isolated from everybody else. And I can remember the day that I went to go pick up her medication that the Lakers had won, and everybody was cheering, and I just hated the world and hated everybody there. And I just had to remind myself, like, it’s not their fault. They don’t understand, but this whole society is going on without you, because now you’re living in the realm of having a sick child. And so I definitely, again, just what I got out of the whole journey was just to be grateful for my life and my family’s life, which is.

Amy Stone [00:27:05]:
A very gracious outlook to share. But I think the other part of it is also very helpful. And what’s interesting is that many people experience flashes of that where if when you’re going through grief and somebody in your life has gone through something, you walk into like the grocery store and you think to yourself, how can people just be going through their day when this horrible thing has happened to me? But you were. And then there’s the realization that of course they can do this because it’s not happening to them. But you were living this day in and day out, 24 hours a day for years and years and years. And you’re not the only. There’s many, many parents and people who are living through that. And so the, the. The idea that to be compassionate and we all say it right, we don’t know what other people are going through, like, be kind, because we don’t know what other people are going through. But it is harder to live that way all the time. It’s. We need constant reminders. So I appreciate that. I do. So we do have somebody in my family that has a seizure disorder. So I have a little bit of exposure to it. But I feel like you’ve said this a little bit. Epilepsy is one of those things that people know about and that they know it exists, but they may not really know about it. They’re unaware of it. They don’t know what it looks like. They don’t know what it’s like to live with it. I know that’s true for me. The first time I saw a seizure, I was like, I did not think that that’s what that was going to look like, Even though I would have thought I would have. I want to give you a chance to talk about what you would like people to know from the outside that would be helpful as they go through the world. Like, what do you think after living with somebody that you love dearly, who lives day in and day out with epilepsy? What do you.

Mike Knox [00:28:48]:
What do you wish people knew that it’s not funny? I mean, I see so many people that you’re trying to talk to other people, and then somebody, especially on social media, will chime in with a joke thinking that it’s funny. And I don’t find it funny whatsoever. And I’m a comedian and there’s monetized on YouTube and TikTok videos of people having fake seizures. They’re making money off of it. YouTube won’t take it down. TikTok doesn’t take it down because they’re making money off of it. And what I really want people to know is that it’s been around 4,000 years and we still are making fun of it. And that needs to stop. That’s. My daughter has, you know, just simply wants to go to school and learn, and she gets bullied by other kids who think it’s funny, you know, and it’s like, oh, we’re going to prey on the weak person. The weakest person here. We’re going to prey on.

Amy Stone [00:29:37]:
Yeah, that’s. No, that’s very good. All right, so you mentioned it, but I’m going to let you talk about it. What you do, you don’t go through your life all the time talking about epilepsy, even though you probably could. And you, I know you’re an advocate, but you, when you aren’t advocating about epilepsy, you’re a comedian. Tell us about that and tell people where they can find you and share that part of the journey with you. Sure.

Mike Knox [00:30:00]:
The easiest place is mikeknox.com or I’m on any social media as Mike Knox. Comedy.

Amy Stone [00:30:06]:
How did you. How did you. How did you bridge from parole officer and dad and Epicus epilepsy advocate to comedian?

Mike Knox [00:30:18]:
Well, I did it. So I did acting and comedy when I was younger. I mean, there was, you know, like, when I was trying to do acting at 18 and I got roles, I just didn’t even show up for them. So my mind frame is a little different now where I actually do want the job. And comedy I did in college and kind of started doing it really well until my daughter got sick, and then I had to give it up now that my daughter is a lot better and I’m retired and I can do it full time. And so it was always something that I wanted to do. It’s just anything in the arts is hard to make a living off of. That’s large reason why I got into law enforcement. I just needed medical insurance. And so comedy was always something in the back of my mind, something to do. And now that I have the time to do it, I’m just having fun doing it, you know, And I listen to other people. You know, I was on a set Monday, and people are complaining. We’re in Santa Barbara on a bluff in a view of the ocean. People are complaining. And I’m like, people have no idea how horrible life can be. So I’m just having fun.

Amy Stone [00:31:16]:
That came up in an interview I did a couple days ago that the person said she was talking about how going through adversity and going through a tough situation does really give you the opportunity to focus on the fact that I’m not going to be upset about these other things anymore. I’m not going to be the person who complains about the simple things. So that is very good. All right, so now the final questions. Just for fun, the idea is just to answer with whatever comes to mind. So the first question, I have a twofer. Are you ready?

Mike Knox [00:31:49]:
I hate these, but okay, go ahead.

Amy Stone [00:31:51]:
Hopefully they’ll be fine. Hopefully they’ll be fine. No pressure. These are ridiculous questions. All right, but. Okay, but there’s a two for. Right. One is, is I’m curious if there’s a comedian who inspired you to go into comedy. And then the second part of that is, who is your favorite contemporary comedian right now?

Mike Knox [00:32:06]:
I love Kirk Fox. And he was. He was somebody that I saw a long time ago that I was like, oh, that’s the Persona that I would like to. Was. I was collecting information to do comedy. I was like, oh, that’s the guy that I would like to. To the act that I’d kind of like to have. And then as I got older, he’s still one of my favorites.

Amy Stone [00:32:33]:
So very good. So one answer for both. So I’m glad I put both of those in there. Okay, number two, what is the best advice that you can remember your parents or any other adult when you were a kid ever giving you?

Mike Knox [00:32:47]:
Like an adult giving me the advice?

Amy Stone [00:32:49]:
Yeah, an adult when you were younger.

Mike Knox [00:32:51]:
It was. It’s definitely. It stayed with me my entire life. It’s just show up on time and do your job.

Amy Stone [00:32:56]:
That’s a show up on time. Then my dad gave me that same advice. He was like, he’s like, you just got. He’s like, so much of life is just getting there. Yeah.

Mike Knox [00:33:06]:
And I see this. I see it all the time. People are hours late, and then they come and complain and they don’t even do their job. I see that more and more nowadays. One of the things that my dad. My dad gave me very little advice, but my dad told me one time there was a car broken down on the side of the road, and the guy had a bunch of kids and he said, don’t be that guy. And that always stayed with me for my entire life. It was such bad advice.

Amy Stone [00:33:29]:
But don’t be the guy with the broken down car and the kids and five kids. Yeah.

Mike Knox [00:33:34]:
It was still out of the blue and I was like, I think it was 12. So I was just like horrified that he would even say that to me.

Amy Stone [00:33:41]:
And what does it even mean? It’s like, it’s like, don’t have a car that breaks down. Don’t have five kids. Like, I need some context here, dad. Like, what is it that. What am I exactly supposed to avoid here? That could have gone a bunch of different ways. I thought, like, he could have, it could have been like, stop to help him and don’t be the guy that drives by, you know, but that’s, I.

Mike Knox [00:33:57]:
Think looking back, I think he was talking about himself. He’s stuck in the car with his ex, you know, his soon to be ex wife and his two kids that he hates.

Amy Stone [00:34:05]:
So he’s like, yeah, he’s like, be careful with your life choices. As if any of us walk into any of these decisions with the idea, with the knowledge of what’s going to happen. Nobody knows. We never know. So. All right, very good. Okay, last one. When you go to weddings or other events where there is music and dancing, which it turns out you have not had a ton of this in the last decade or so, but if you do, do you love to dance? And if so, do you have a signature dance move?

Mike Knox [00:34:30]:
No, I absolutely hate dancing. I only dance because my wife wants to. But I do love weddings because there’s always alcohol there, everything’s free. And you never see those people ever again. This idea that these weddings are going to be these magical places. Everybody, for the most part within the like two years are divorced or passed away. It never seems to, you know, be any different than that. And that’s just my wedding.

Amy Stone [00:34:58]:
No, but it’s true. It’s like, it’s like a little tiny portion of. It’s a gathering of people, most of them strangers. And you hang out and then you leave.

Mike Knox [00:35:07]:
And it’s mostly for the mother in law. It’s not even for the bride or the groom. It’s, you know, it’s. As I get older, I really realize, wow, the grandkids are for the grandparents. Because it’s like this do over for the most part. They get to experience the little kids again. And I, you know, as you get older and you’re kind of a little bit more wiser to things, you realize, oh, this is the time for those people.

Amy Stone [00:35:29]:
Yeah. I do remember when I realized that when planning my wedding and I was in the phase where I was like, oh, I was think. I thought I was planning my wedding. And then I started to talk to the other adults, and I realized I was like, oh, no, you guys think this is for you. None of my opinions actually matter. Okay, now that we’ve got that clear, let’s plan the event.

Mike Knox [00:35:51]:
Yeah. You know, I look at. I. Like, our wedding was so expensive, and everybody was like, kill. Wanted to kill each other. And I just thought, like. And I can’t say anything as the groom because I wasn’t paying for anything, but I was just like, there’s got to be a better way than this. Yeah, we see everything. There’s so many magazines about it, and it’s. It’s. You know, we’re. We’re prepped to think that that’s the greatest day, and you really just. It’s kind of the whirlwind where you just don’t even remember because there’s so much, you know, anxiety going through you that.

Amy Stone [00:36:22]:
I agree. I agree. All right, that’s it. Mike Knox, thank you for being a great guest today on the show.

Mike Knox [00:36:27]:
Thank you for having me.