Learning about Living with Lyme Disease...Know Thine Enemy

I've spent hours researching; I've spoken to someone else with chronic Lyme and I've learned a few things.


 You cannot fight what you do not know.
 1) Lyme is an inflammatory, complex, bacterial disease.
2) It chiefly affects the skin, muscles, nervous system, brain and heart, vision, joints.
3) The bacteria is named Borrelia burgdorferi, otherwise known as Bb.
4) Bb lives in three forms, spirochete, L form and cyst
5) In cyst form, antibiotics are ineffective. The Bb is dormant.
6) The spirochete has a very long generation time, at least 12-24 hours and it has periods of dormancy.
7) It takes 48 to 72 hours of therapy to initiate bacterial killing.
8) Treatment is highly individual. Each person must find the protocol that works for them and continue it for three years, if not longer.
9) As the bacteria start dying off, Bb releases neurotoxin. The individual suffers a herx reaction, bad flu-like symptoms.
10) Three ways Lyme treatment will fail. 1 Non compliance 2 Not enough sleep 3 Exercise
11) Detox is absolutely necessary. There are various effective ways to detox. Some are: dandelion and milk thistle tea, alka seltzer Gold ( only the gold variety), Glutathione supplement, activated charcoal, water with lemon, lots of water, etc.
12) Acupuncture can help. It strengthens the body's immunity and helps with detox and bacterial die off.
13) Listen to your body. Rest when you are tired. Don't force yourself to eat, sometimes digestion is a lot of work. Eat when hungry.
14) Probiotics are always helpful when on antibiotics.
That's what I've learned in the past few days. The research continues.
I attended Physical Therapy today and boy do I hurt. Any physical movement seems to piss off the Bb. But it's necessary to stay moving and try and get some strength back.
Spent last week in therapy just whining, griping and venting about Bb. Tomorrow I see my doctor to look at my current regiment.
Pretty pleased I manged to get a lot done today:)