KQED Inteview With Lyme Book Author and Movie Creator

Click this link for a beautiful interview with the people who created the groundbreaking book, Cure Unknown, and the film, Under Our Skin from KQED, San Francisco:
Lyme Disease
The tick-borne illness Lyme disease is on the rise — but many patients and their advocates say the disease is often underestimated, misdiagnosed and improperly treated. We discuss [...]

“Productive”

About a week and a half ago, I got a sore throat, I lost my voice, and started creating sinus and chest mucus in large and disgusting quantities. Jay got a touch of this, too, violating our usually hard and fast rule that only one of us can be really sick at a time.
He was [...]

The New Normal

If you’re keeping score at home, I’m up to eight IM Bicillin injections over the last four weeks.
The herxes seem to be getting milder, especially compared to the morning I couldn’t walk. My reactions since then are more confined to the “regular” type: Increase in muscle and nerve pain, muscle twitching, shoulder spasms, joint pain [...]

Herxing

My last IM Bicillin shot was last Saturday. It was more painful than usual, even though Jay was very careful and we did everything right. Hot bath and heating pad afterward, everything.
Sunday morning I woke up at 5:30 AM (had to use the loo), but I couldn’t walk. My right hip, the one that didn’t [...]

Not Much Cheer This Year

Gee, I’d sure love to write something uplifting during the holidays. Not likely this year.
On the other hand, I am managing to remember that I am not yet bed-bound, not yet so disabled that I can’t walk at all — I need the power chair only for distances of more than a block or two. [...]

Bad, Not So Bad

My Lyme doc called me Tuesday to let me know that my recent blood tests for Lyme and other tick borne disease (TBDs) may have set a new record for positivity. She’s sending me copies, which I’m anxious as all get-out to see. I mean, anxious as in obsessed. Anxious as in I won’t [...]

Ow.

I am sure that the clinical tech who showed Jay how to give me the IM Bicillin shot yesterday is a fine person. She has a lovely personality, and was cute as the dickens. And I’m sure her skills with needles are renowned and considerable.
But when I asked her about numbing the area first, she [...]

IM (Bicillin) Tomorrow

It’s been a tough fall. As well as a rocky spring and summer. Since I last checked-in here about my illness (was it really October 2006?) my treatment has taken many twists and turns. Including oral antibiotics for Lyme and Bartinella, IV antibiotics for Lyme and Bartinella, more orals for Babeosis, and most recently, I [...]

Back

It’s been a while since I’ve posted, mostly because I had a terrible summer of mostly feeling bad. Same with fall, although there were a few good days (or sometimes hours) where some of you actually saw me!
Since I last wrote, I’ve received these diagnoses via lab tests from my new doc:

Late neurological Lyme disease
Bartonella [...]

When Did I Get Infected?

My friend, Sally, asked me this recently, wondering if Lyme wasn’t a mostly East Coast disease. I thought I’d give the long version response here, so I could give her a shorter answer by email. (And thanks for the good question, Sally!)
My docs and I have traced my Lyme symptoms back to my childhood. It’s [...]