C4a and Symptom Progression/Muscle Pain in Legs

Hi all,

Two part question:

1.) Has anyone noticed a correlation between their C4a levels and how they feel physically?
My C4a dropped significantly over the past few months (12000 to 1200), but my symptoms are relatively the same.

2.) Since the onset my illness in late 2013, my leg muscles and joints (mostly knees and hips) have been incredibly sore and weak. I was a cyclists before I became ill and what's interesting is that all my muscle are sore in the same places they normally would be after weeks of training except in this case the pain never resolves. If I try to do any type of leg exercises my muscle tremble and want to cramp, particularly my ham strings. However, my upper body muscles are still relatively strong and behave normally under load.

Anyone else have this experience?

My c4a is triple what it is supposed to be. I have a lot of muscle symptoms, tremors, joint pain, fatigue, grouchy butt, and achy all over

Just starting with my dx (treating gut) and prepping for abx

Sailorkim said...
My c4a is triple what it is supposed to be. I have a lot of muscle symptoms, tremors, joint pain, fatigue, grouchy butt, and achy all over

Just starting with my dx (treating gut) and prepping for abx

Mine was around the same level right before I started abx, and it actually went up after being on abx for 1.5 months. Interestingly it dropped dramatically after I started HBO therapy.

Hyperbaric Oxygen therapy. Typical treatment involves bringing you up to 2.36 ata in a chamber for 90 minutes while you breathe pure oxygen. The idea is that borrelia (being an anaerobic microbe) cannot survive in a high oxygen environment.

astroman said...
My C4a went to normal, I felt a little better, but not a drastic change. How I feel depends on if I'm on ABX or not, ABX is brutal in my opinion.

I had lyme for years before treatment, it messed up all my muscles - they just didnt recover from exercise ever!

So I've used the foam roller and LaCrross ball, golf balls ect to keep things loosend up. Its the only way my muscles feel better after exercise. If I dont do that stuff, I'm screwed, and get injured. Keeping the IT bands (outer thighs) loose are difficult, but very important. Lacross ball helps there (painfull at first).

So how did you find a place that offers Hyperbaric Oxygen therapy? Is this commonly used for other issues or by pro athletic teams?

Thanks, that kind of answers my question. I was hoping that the C4a test was sensitive enough to reveal whether or not you are still fighting an infection. It sounds like even if you have normal levels you can still be symptomatic.

When I was healthy I was constantly stretching and using a foam roller following my training rides, but I'm pretty sure the soreness I felt was just exercised related. Ironically I had a very progressive year with my fitness before I became ill. I'm pretty sure I contracted lyme years ago and it just took this long to become active.

I do remember having a very difficult time working on my IT bands right before I got sick. No amount of work on the foam roller or hand massaging seemed to help.

I lucked out with finding an HBOT facility near me. I just did a simple google search. Of all the adjunctive and alternative therapies out there I believe HBOT treatment shows the most promise. Although research is inconclusive on it's effectiveness as a Lyme treatment it is known that HBOT treatment stimulates white blood cell activity. So at a minimum you are giving your immune system a little push.

astroman said...
So has the HBO helped muscle tightness /pain?

Gotta go deep in the IT bands, rollers wont do it. Lacross ball works there and it hurts too.-good for sides of glutes too.

No. Unfortunately all my symptoms remain. I did have great improvements in my blood work during the HBOT treatment which you would think would result in some symptom improvement. It's possible that I would benefit from more than the 40 sessions I did.