I don't know what you mean by separate paths for wakeup and GPIO read.
I've worked with touchsense on the AVR, and we simply scan the keys at a
low rate while sleeping.
Over a year on the tiny battery so no complaints.

ESD can definitely kill the I/O pins, especially if they didn't provide
guarding copper.
--=20
http://www.piclist.com/techref/piclist PIC/SX FAQ & list archive
View/change your membership options at
http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist
.