My Remedies for Lyme

I have been amazed at how well homeopathic remedies work. They have literally saved my life. Every morning I take all my homeopathic and herbal drops and my small pile of assorted pills.

These drops and pills range from probiotics that heal my gut, drops that strengthen my immune system, remedies that fight off the Lyme, keep the Lyme that we've gotten rid of at bay, strengthen inherited weaknesses, give strength to my lymph and adrenal systems, support my gall bladder and liver, help to rebuild the connective tissues in my brain and other things I'm sure I'm missing.

I am so grateful that such remedies exist and am grateful for doctors who know how to find exactly what's ailing me and what remedies my body needs, can handle and will use.

Eye Opening Lyme Video

My eyes were opened to the devastating effects of Lyme when I watched this video for the first time a couple years back.



Fortunately this story has a fairly happy ending!

Darn those Spirochetes!

Videos: The Reality of Lyme

Purpose of this Blog

The purpose of this blog isn't so that I have a place to whine, cry, and get attention for my invisible suffering. Not at all. I took some time to read about other people's Lyme stories on the internet last night and, afterwards, felt that, I too, wanted to share my story. Even if my story is only one of a staggering amount - I like the thought of adding my story, like a drop of water in a large pond, to the stories of so many others. Maybe, just maybe, it will help others realize how real, debilitating, and serious this disease really is.

In my opinion, it's as bad as Cancer. Lyme disease is so evil!!! (and I laugh as I say this!). Instead of killing us off (which, heaven forbid, I have no desire to die) it tortures many, leaving us alive yet dying at the same time for many, many years. But eventually it can lead to death and has actually robbed many lives. But for the most part, thanks to this new and advanced life form called the spirochete, it mainly and "only" causes a lot of prolonged suffering.

If there are any passions or pursuits Lyme has given me it's that, as mentioned, I want to help raise awareness in others of how debilitating and real this disease is and help open others' minds as to how to go about treating this ravaging disease - antibiotics aren't the only way (nor are they THE way) of going about treating this disease, especially when it's in its chronic form.

More N.D.'s and holistic physicians need to share methods that work with one another so that successful methods of treating Lyme can be spread to as many doctors as possible and there needs to be a way for these millions of Lyme sufferers to know about, learn about and receive help from these doctors, without having it be like finding a needle in a haystack, to find them!

Also, Holistic Doctor's, Naturopathic Doctors and Lyme Specialists shouldn't have to feel that they need to keep what they're doing quiet or under the radar - especially if their treatments are working!

Much needs to be done - Lyme sufferers are caught in some strange crossfire. Suffering away and not sure about what method or which doctor can really help them!

The Reality of Lyme

Sometimes, even on my non-crazy brain days :), I laugh out loud at this whole experience of mine. "This is so real." I say.

Having Lyme disease, I do my best, every day, to deal with whatever symptoms I'm handed for that day. I'm constantly pulling myself together and doing my best to be strong, move forward, have faith, remain hopeful and remember that Heavenly Father is aware of my suffering, my strengths, my weaknesses, my potential.

I tend to suppress the reality of what I'm dealing with. "It's not that bad." my subconscious tells me. But then, many times, I wake up to how much and how long I have been struggling on a particularly hard day and think just that, "this is so real!" And it almost seems funny.

So, why not see a regular Western Medicine doctor? Along with going with my gut instincts or promptings of the spirit or common sense, I've done my researching. Antibiotics can help people who just recently and knowingly got a tick bite and got that bulls eye mark following it.

After you've had it for many years and it's become chronic (and your digestive system has already lost it's state of homeostasis due to an imbalance of good and bad bacteria from prolonged antibiotic use as a teenager because of acne) antibiotics are not the answer. Most often the Lyme may recede only to emerge later with a vengeance! Paralysis and death can or will occur in such common situations.

Kyla is one person dealing with Lyme. She explains a bit about this:

You might be thinking, “Why can’t you just take antibiotics if Lyme disease is caused by bacteria?” Well, you can. If the tick bites you in an area you can see, if you develop a telltale bulls-eye rash or other telling symptoms and seek prompt medical treatment, a heavy dose of antibiotics might do the trick. If, however, you don’t realize you have Lyme disease until almost 2 years later, like me, it is much more difficult to treat. The Lyme spirochetes are smart, and they are relentless. They burrow through connective tissue like a corkscrew, faster than things can move through your bloodstream. They encapsulate when they detect a hostile environment, and then reemerge later when the “coast is clear”. They enter and destroy tissue in every organ in your body. They literally “eat” brain tissue, causing memory loss. They like to hide in the pericardial sack around your heart, causing palpitations and heart damage. They damage your liver, your kidneys, and just about every other important organ of your body.

So what am I feeling today?

Woke up shaky

Lots of eye pressure

Tired

Muscle weakness esp. in shoulders and neck

Dizzy / Wavy thinking and visual disturbances

Muscle stiffness esp. in neck and shoulders

Inability to respond well to info. around me

Slight head bobbing when still

Today's not a very good day. :)

Symptoms

So what is living with Lyme like? Well, I can list the symptoms. 


Now, I don't deal with all these symptoms all the time. The spirochete bacteria that make up Lyme are an interesting bacteria.They thrive one day and retreat on others. They have a party in my brain one day and on others thrive in my muscles or joints.

Symptoms? Here they are:

Body Aches throughout back and arms, settling in arm joints

(I have progressed enough that I no longer deal with the body aches. yay!)

Shakiness (neurological)

Tremors (head, hands, arms)

Foggy Brain

Slurred Speech

Stuttering

Dizziness

Deliriousness

Disconnection from life and people around me

Neck and shoulder muscle weakness

Fatigue

Aches in certain areas on body for months at a time

Shoulder pain (gone too! had this for 1 1/2 years)

Easily irritated

Inability to process what others are saying to me

(this was the case, many times, on my worst days)

Head Pressure

Head Aches

Fidgety

Distant - lacking genuine emotions about life and others

Strange sensations while walking (unable to feel that I'm walking)

Strange constant visual disturbances (almost like double vision)

Body under constant physical stress of one kind or another

I believe that sums it all up. What would doctors label this as? Fibromyalgia. Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Depression. MS.

No, my friends. THIS is LYME.

People's Voices

During my 5 year trial there have been many voices, usually from well-meaning loved ones, who had a suggestion or two for my condition.

The frustrating thing about Lyme is that I look just fine. "What's wrong with her?" people quietly ask "She looks fine." Yes. I can pull myself together enough so that I can function around people ... for short periods of time.

I remember one time, while at a meeting for a church ward activity, I was feeling so miserable. My brain was burning. My muscles were so weak. I couldn't think. I couldn't express anything in words that made sense. But I pulled myself together with every ounce of energy my invaded muscles could muster and got through it without embarrassing myself too much.

I went home and crashed. Life is like that quite a bit for me. Go to church (or most of it anyway) and crash. Go to a family function and crash. Go to some fun event with my family and crash. Goodness even go on a walk with my children! Crash.

Naps aren't an option for me. And it's hard. I want to be strong. I want to be fit. I want to go, go, go. I want to because I know that's who I really am! "The German Workhorse." is what my husband titled me when we were first married. "Look at Claudia go!" is what my gym teacher proudly exclaimed as I did push up after push up.

I'm competitive. I'm strong. I can handle pain beyond what most anyone I know can handle. I can endure hard things. I can have a good time. I can be humorous and sarcastic. I can run and run, pushing myself to extremes.

Lyme has changed all that. My nerves rattle at the slightest sudden onset of stress. I wake up super shaky on a bad day. I need to rest and sit quite often. I need naps every day. Pain is something I no longer handle well. My adrenals are shot. I'm constantly in a quiet mode, reserving energy for the constant healing and crisis my body is under.

I do have some good days though. Good days aren't free of symptoms, ever. But I, for whatever reason, have energy that day and feel like life's going to be okay. That even though something might not be going quite right, things will be okay in the end anyway.

So, when those well meaning voices come: "Why don't you just exercise?" "Where's the doctor that can give you that shot to fix you?" "Maybe you need to take more vitamins." "Maybe you need to let go of emotional issues." I do my best to handle them well.

If I were to say, "I have cancer." Anyone and everyone would have compassion, would pray for me, would be understanding of any random ailments that come my way. But with Lyme the reaction tends to be: "What's that?" or "She looks fine." or "Yeah, sometimes I worry about every little ache or pain too." or "She's still sick?"

However, today, I can just smile about such comments and shrug them off. Why would someone understand? No one can or will unless if they've been in the debilitating, quiet grips of Lyme.

It's okay if no one understands. All that matters is that I get better and that I will be able to live life to its fullest, enjoy my children, my husband, and this wonderful opportunity of living on earth that I've been blessed with.

An Overview

Where do I begin? Should I explain the onset of my symptoms from five years before? Or simply begin with what life is like for me now? There's so much to say...

Five years back, my symptoms began with relentless pressure in my eye sockets. I thought I had a sinus infection. I held off on treating it seeing as how I was pregnant at that time. Once I had our little one I began treating my symptoms with sinus medicine which, surprise, surprise, did nothing to give me relief.

After that I saw an eye doctor, thinking that perhaps my eyes were perhaps having some problems. I was in the clear there as well. I began having severe neck pain. I saw chiropractors who gave me little or no relief. The pain in my neck became so intense that I went to an Insta Care one day worried that I might have a tumor at the base of my skull.

The doctor simply told me I had depression (I broke down crying in his office - I guess human emotion and distress screams depression to some doctors) and he advised that I get an MRI - which I did. The tests came back just fine. So, apparently, I was just fine.

Symptoms went from that to constant overall head pressure to the point that, one day, I remember being in the bathroom repeatedly hiting my head on the wall. Why? I'm not quite sure. I couldn't take the constant discomfort anymore.

Eventually I saw a TMJ dentist who, after three hours of thorough x-rays, agreed with my own conclusions that I had a subluxated sphenoid bone which was causing an array of issues with the overall structure of my skull.

A few mouthpieces later and, only after one glorious week of relief, the relief wasn't permanent, the mouthpieces were terribly uncomfortable and embarrassing and on I went to other things.

Lyme started really kicking in at this time. My neck and shoulder muscles would become so weak I had difficulty holding up my head. I knew I had Candida and thought, at that time, that Candida was the cause for these strange symptoms.

I went on a Candida diet (low carb.'s, no sugar, no grains, no starches) and used herbal remedies (Oregano, Caprylic Acid, and others) to help me get rid of Candida. I had severe Herx Heimer reactions but continued on knowing that I was getting better in some regards and yet, never really felt better.

The neck weakness continued on having sporadic flare ups that I would constantly, without clear deciphering, try to link to what foods I was eating. Eventually I had symptoms similar to Parkinson's. My head would have a shake to it which when not focusing on it would cause my head to wobble enough that my husband asked, "Are you shaking your head at me?"

I found out about and used the Pulsar Machine for the Lyme doing the treatments every night for 5 nights. I felt some life coming back into my system but my days were still very unpredictable and my digestion became shot. My intestines bloated out to the point where I looked as if I was 3-4 months pregnant. It was quite embarrassing and very uncomfortable. Nothing seemed to give me relief.

That problem went away after a few months. The other symptoms still remained. Now it was also hitting my brain. I began stumbling over words quite often. I had a hard time forming thoughts into verbal explanations. Aside from having the constant foggy brain I had dealt with for several years, thinking was now becoming more and more difficult.

The end of last year was the closest I was to losing my battle with Lyme. I began having continuous repetitive thoughts. Walking became a strange sensation where, although I was walking, I couldn't feel myself walking and a fear would grip me, especially in public places that my legs would simply collapse from under me.

My repetitive thoughts went hand in hand with my answering my own thoughts out loud. I was aware enough of my surroundings that I would do this away from others. It was almost a relief to be able to answer my own wild thoughts out loud and vocally say a repetitive "hello. good-bye. hello. good-bye." out loud as well - which is something my N.D.'s and I laugh about now.

One of the symptoms of Autism is hand flapping which, on one of my worst days, was something I fought off doing, feeling as though it was the most natural thing to do with how muddled, confused, messy and loud my brain and the feelings that came from within it were.

Fortunately, due to the goodness of Heavenly Father, I was seeing a Naturopathic Doctor at that time who was able to diganose me with having multiple strains of Lyme and brain fungus' and treated me through homeopathic and herbal remedies which I know saved my life.

I am currently still seeing this experienced doctor. The results are slow, tedious and expensive but I'm getting results and will stick with this treatment for the time being.