Lyme disease

My whole life I have been a very active person who would spend 2 hours in the gym and after go play basketball for another 2 hours. I rarely had any problems with fatigue. In late May of this year I noticed that things I normally could do with ease started to become a lot more difficult for me. In fact in about 2 weeks time I felt myself becoming very tired and weak and sleeping a lot. It didn’t take more than 3 weeks of feeling tired where I walked downstairs one morning and my mind was in a terrible fog that wouldn’t let up. I saw my primary care doctor 5 times over the next two weeks and each time I went I left without and answer or the “pollen count is high” narrative. These symptoms worsened over the next couple weeks and I soon found myself feeling extreme pressure in my head and very painful sound sensitivity from my right ear. My mother took me to get CT scans, mris, eegs, and SPECT scan and everything came back normal. It wasn’t until I saw a doctor who treated my sister for Lyme disease about 8 years ago where I got a blood test and came back positive. I started feeling sick in late May and in early July I got a proper diagnosis. I thought that was the end of it and was put on 30 days of doxycycline and cefuroxime. Unfortunately I saw absolutely no improvements under that protocol so my doctor then put me on 60 days of IV ceftriaxone. For the 1st 2 weeks I felt that was helping me. My brain fog was lifting, I had the energy to make it through a day, my sound sensitivity was still high but I felt that would take some time to fix. However after the first 2 weeks I noticed I started to fall back down into a pit where my brain fog worsened, my sound sensitivity felt like I was being punched in the face when people talked to me, and I was getting pins and needle sensations in my head. Recently I did another test from the doctor who diagnosed me and it came back positive for bartonella. We have started doxy monohydrate 100mg and rifampin 300 mg (600 mg next week) for the bartonella and Lyme. My family and I even flew out to Arizona to do testing with Envita medical center to try and get the most accurate results we can. I found my sickness very early and I am crushed that nothing seems to be helping me. We have a plan to go out and seek treatment from Envita considering my illness is so recent I feel they have a great chance of helping me. If anyone out there is very knowledgeable on lyme I’m just curious why I’m not getting better. Is it because I haven’t treated the co infections yet? Am I overreacting by wanting to go to Envita this quickly or is it the right response. I’m just very scared that my first rounds of treatment have given me little relief.

While coinfections could be the reason the treatment hasn’t made you better, there are other possibilities. Toxic mold exposure can also cause symptoms that overlap with Lyme and especially bartonella. Have you had any known exposure to toxic mold or water damaged buildings?

You caught it very early, treatment just takes time, so you need to be patient. But yes, you probably have co-infections that will need to be treated, and in my opinion Bartonella symptoms are far worse than Lyme itself. Stay hopeful though, because it seems you found a smart dr. who diagnosed you right away, which is key. You might also have Babesia even if you don't have symptoms for it, or if you test negative for it.

JTobin,

Honestly, your symptoms sound like babesia may likely be present as well. Babesia is known for causing head pressure, brain fog, and a lot of head and brain related symptoms. I believe babesia is a lot easier to diagnose. It can be seen through a microscope on a blood smear. Glad you got a positive bartonella test to confirm that one. Many people with bart don’t test positive.

Here is W. Anderson’s take on babesia symptoms. He also has a write up on bartonella and others. When I first saw this, it threw me for a loop. I had been convinced that bartonella was my big one and hadn’t really considered babesia. When I compared my symptoms to his assessment of bart and babs, I had more lifelong symptoms of babesia than I did bartonella. https://www.gordonmedical.com/babesia-like-organisms-bablo-consideration-signs-and-symptoms/

I will say that his views are different (almost opposite) from others I have read. I believe he does provocation testing with Byron White Formulas to try to discover coinfections. What’s interesting is the BW Formula A-Bart has a lot of anti-parasitic herbs. So, does it really bring out symptoms of bartonella (bacteria) or babesia (parasite)?? Something I wonder about.

Personally, I have had the biggest bartonella flares (scratch marks, foot pain, bouts of rage) when taking herbs for parasites. I’m not sure why this is.

WalkingByFaith - Just out of curiousity, which parasite herbs caused the Bart-like reactions and do you think the herbs were helping to treat Bartonella as well?

Interesting, thank you. I looked them up and see a lot of them use some variation of the wormwood/black walnut/clove formula. I tried that once a couple years ago (because I read about it on the Real Food Rebel site) and it made me feel like I was dying.