What do you know about lyme disease?

perhaps you would like to donate your organs.

anybody seen this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxWgS0XLVqw

would be interested in hearing from ilxors who know a little more about the subject - the doc was fascinating look into the politics and economics of 'chronic' lyme disease but somewhat one-sided.

Campaign Mailer: Romney Vows to Fight the 'Epidemic' of Lyme Disease in Virginia

http://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/new-front-lyme-wars?mbid=social_twitter

yikes

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jul/16/pentagon-review-weaponised-ticks-lyme-disease

https://www.thequietepidemic.com/

this doc was pretty good

fwiw i have chronic lyme -or- chronic co-infections to be specific, maybe or maybe not lyme itself; it has been & continues to be a nightmare, i could say a lot on the topic; currently treating herbally & hoping for progress soon

I was seeing an intense acupuncture/holistic guy for awhile whose big thing is Lymes, and he insisted all my issues were due to Lymes after doing some applied kinesiology. Turns out it was leukemia, but he would probably say that the Lymes caused the cancer or that I still have borrelia too.

Anyway I know it's a real thing and my heart goes out to you and anyone struggling with it, especially who doesn't get diagnosed or treated properly, but that whole experience was a headfuck and not helpful for me.

damn yeah it is rarely straightforward & b/c the diagnostics are so bad & the symptoms can be almost anything, almost the hardest part is deciding what path to take (if you have the resources to do so), what practitioner of what type to trust, etc.. that all took me well over a year and obv im not totally positive im currently on the right protocol but i trust my current doctor/herbalist..

my aunt was diagnosed with this recently and SIX DOCTORS have failed to help her relieve her symptoms, which include weird pains in her side and achy kidneys? i chalked it up to the medical system being inhospitable for 70+ y.o. women who aren't afraid to speak up for themselves.

Looks like I mentioned my sister earlier in this thread — at that point she'd been dealing with it for three years, it ended up being really a decade that it pretty much dominated her life. Her son was only 3 or 4 when she got sick, so he pretty much grew up with her being sick all the time. She went for a bunch of intense treatments and did generally go into remission over time, although it's one of those things I think you're always worried about reactivating somehow. But she's been much improved, back to working full-time etc. And yeah, the level of ignorance and skepticism she ran into over and over was maddening, I heard a lot about it.

yeah my mom was sick with this for years when i was a kid, took forever for it to even be correctly diagnosed

living where we are, it's never been a delight at the end of the day to round the kids up and do the daily tick check.

i would love to know what is probably a great scam: doing the tick lawn spraying.

I was born in the US pacific northwest and have gone on so many hikes and outdoorsy adventures and have never once seen a tick, nevermind picked one off myself or anyone else

However I understand this is changing and that is terrible, I have a friend with Lyme's who has had a hell of a time with it as well as getting any kind of treatment, almost as if general practitioners don't know anything about it or don't believe it's a thing

I did spend a year in the SE US and encountered bed bugs which I was also oblivious to til they started eating me, still traumatized, am worried about the bugs

Had it the summer between 12 and 13– thought it was a nasty summer flu and that I was suffering from growing pains, then one night (about six months post-flu) my knee swelled up to the size of a volleyball and i was rushed to the ER, had my knee flushed with antibiotics and was on a morphine drip for a few days. The knee still gives me trouble every now and then but I am mostly fine.

I had a tick embedded in my left arm, near the elbow. I removed it but was pretty sure the head stayed. I've recently started having pretty bad joint pain in my left elbow in the morning (I sleep with my arm under the pillow). I keep trying to convince myself it's just age and not Lyme disease.

I mean you should really go and get some antibiotics, fr

The problem was, this was months ago.

Nonetheless

yeah jimbeaux, i rec antibiotics. it really is no fun when it starts infecting the joints.

I've been on several rounds of antibiotics for other things. No idea whether they would have helped this.

There are lots of different kinds of antibiotics, not to be patronizing but maybe you should do some googling

I'm reading y'all as concerned, not patronizing. I'll ask my doc about it.

I am not a doctor, but that might not be Lyme. There are other sorts of infectious arthritis; antibiotics would be a good idea.

Of course, not everyone gets the classic bullseye rash and telltale symptoms.

To further complicate things, the standard tests have a lot of false positives. There's a special lab on the West Coast with the most accurate test.

I had Lyme several years ago. There was no specific triggering tick bite. Of course, I'd been camping for 30 years and gotten lots of ticks. No rash. But the disease hit me in the dead of winter - agonizing knee pain and high fever. Went away as fast as it arrived and hasn't returned.

On the other hand, my sister has had chronic and often debilitating Lyme for 10 years. She's always had autoimmune trouble, and the combination has been agonizing. She also didn't have a specific tick bite to point to - just that the virus sticks around once it gets into you and presents in different ways.

Then there's a work acquaintance who is convinced that Lyme can be sexually transmitted and that he inadvertently gave it to his wife, who subsequently became disabled. I am skeptical.

FWIW, I have had plenty of tick bites over the years, and even developed a rash with one. That one was tiny and went undiscovered for a few days. As soon as I found it, I went to the doc and did get a course of antibiotics. There was no rash with the one at the elbow.

wow I started this thread a long time ago

I found a tick on me on Friday when I got home from a hike, but it hadn't dug in yet... I put it in a film canister, and put it in the freezer

Need to get tested.

I grew up in one of the worst areas in the US for Lyme and have never been tested. Over the past 15 years I've been diagnosed with recurrent uveitis, IBS, gastroparesis, and now possibly some form of arthritis. Now I'm no House or even a medical professional but all of those things are generally associated with autoimmune disorders and because Of where I great up I keep thinking of Lyme. Anyway - bout to undergo a whole lot of tests. :/

sorry to hear

as you may know, testing for lyme is notoriously inconsistent. i had a lot of negatives before getting several definite coinfection positives from igenex (specialized testing unfortunately pretty expensive); clinical diagnosis is also important, good luck

I know. :( I'm really glad you finally figured it out. I have no idea what it is but looking at all these seemingly unrelated things - I feel like somehow they must be related and am determined to figure out what's going on.

Thanks table.

Hope you get the best possible news E

ENBB, lyme infected my knee when I was 13, was in hospital with a morphine drip for three days. luckily have never had any later issues, but that experience really shaped me— lyme is no joke. hope it gets figured out and you might get some relief!!

that sounds like some type of acute lyme, glad you never had issues afterward

chronic lyme is demoralizing. in the 3 ish yrs ive had it, i feel like ive aged 30 yrs in how my body feels. plus, i dont outwardly look different or sick so friends and family sorta dont believe you, most mainstream doctors dont believe you & cant/wont treat you etc etc

post-lyme syndromes are real.

"chronic lyme disease" is people who want to be on antibiotics forever, which is a bad idea.