My Lyme Journey
I grew up playing in the woods and tall grass outside of my house in rural Swanville, Maine. I was strong and healthy, but at the age of 6 started having severe pain in my neck for no apparent reason. My Mom, being a concerned nurse, took me to several doctors and eventually I was misdiagnosed with Fibromyalgia and sent on my way. As the years went by, my joint pain became my normal and I stopped complaining. Like so many with Lyme and co-infections, the symptoms set in slowly and for years life went on relatively normally. But I began having extreme psychiatric/brain problems as a teenager including depersonalization, OCD, and mental fog/confusion that was often expressed in constant journaling. I was put on anti-depressants and survived by using drugs recreationally and expressing myself through music.
Throughout my 20’s, I continued to experience psychiatric and emotional problems, had “oppositional disorder,” and felt “separate from myself.” I was on and off anti-depressants and pain killers and self-medicated with ecstasy, marijuana and alcohol. By age 33, I discovered my house was infested with mold as my joint pain and mental disturbances peaked. Mold toxicity often exacerbates existing health issues, especially when neurological. I noticed I was also becoming intolerant to many foods and sensitive to chemicals in everyday environments. Life became a battleground of things attacking my senses and immune system. After multiple stressful life events occurred that year (including a bad case of poison oak in which I was put on Prednisone, a steroid known to bring Lyme out of hiding in the immune system), I was left bedridden, knowing that something was wrong in my mind and body that no doctor had ever picked up.
It had affected my hearing system so badly that I was no longer comfortable singing, producing music, or teaching piano, and my entire life and career began to spin.
And so the 3 year search for a diagnosis began. I saw over 20 conventional medical doctors, functional doctors and specialists. Not one of them mentioned Lyme Disease. But after multiple friends brought it up, I went to a naturopathic doctor and asked to get tested. Sure enough, at age 36, I finally knew the mysterious monster behind my cascading symptoms, lack of energy, and “just not right” feeling. The search continued as I looked for treatments for Chronic Lyme Disease, which had made a home in my immune and nervous systems for 30 years. Many other co-infections had taken advantage of my compromised system as well, including mercury toxicity, candida, parasites, SIBO, Epstein Bar Virus, Bartonella, and hormonal imbalance. Some of the treatments I tried with little affect were antibiotics (Doxy and Rifampin), Alinia, Ivermectin, Disulfiram, Septra, herbal and homeopathic protocols (Buhner and Cowden), hyperbaric oxygen, neurofeedback, chiropractic care, colonics, and the Bemer PEMF mat. Thousands of more dollars were spent on detox regimens, alternative healers and supplements. I now manage my symptoms of hearing and neurological disorder, gut disorder, nerve pain, joint pain and fatigue through simple lifestyle changes and an ongoing working relationship to honor and nurture my body.
