A New Path in Nutrition

Since I have been on treatment for nearly two years, we've been evaluating my current status and options for the future. Obviously, my health, treating this disease and the way it has impacted us financially have all been the subject of many, many prayers over the last year and ten months.

Thankfully, I've made great strides since starting treatment, especially if you're looking at the bigger picture. It's been difficult at times, and sometimes for me personally it's been almost unbearable. Still, it was and has been the necessary thing to do. This summer was a particularly rough time for me. I was on a course of meds that made me so sick! For almost two months I was vomiting several times a day, with such bad "heart burn" anytime I would lie down that my throat felt constantly raw. All this was in addition to the aches, pains & problems of Lyme disease, and while trying to down a fistful of prescribed pills every two hours -- most of which require food, and most of which I knew would make me sick again. The massive doses of antibiotics have plenty of other not-so-fun side effects, too...but I'll spare you from the gory details. It was really frustrating to me, because it felt like such a set back to be a year and a half into treatment and to still be so sick.

I felt myself slipping into a serious depression, something I've battled the entire time I've been sick, but I always felt I had done a good job of avoiding it. This is mostly due to my wonderful husband and a couple wonderful friends, who stuck with me through the worst of my treatment -- particularly the weeks and months just before I was diagnosed with Lyme and then the first six months of my treatment. I was too sick at times to sit up in bed. But these wonderful people went out of their way to adjust normal things so that I could still get out of the house and do them. Bryan and I have been visiting National Parks almost since our first date. No matter how weak, fatigued or sick I was, we would go. Needless to say, he's spent a lot of time in the car with me driving from viewpoint to viewpoint in these amazing parks, then getting out and patiently helping me to slowly get to where we wanted to get a picture. I know he would much rather be backpacking, or at least hiking in these amazing parks. But he's never once complained or made me feel responsible for keeping him from that.

Once at the Grand Canyon, determined to see the place, but almost too weak to stand up, I paid for the exertion by collapsing on the stairs of one of the main viewpoints. I sat as close to the side railing as I could, since I knew that I didn't have the strength to get up, but I was blocking half of the narrow path. I was silently crying from fatigue and frustration. It's been so hard for me over the last couple of years to feel like my life is passing me by, especially when I've been in such amazing and beautiful places. That's where the limitations that Lyme Disease has imposed on my life burst brazenly out into the full light of day. I try to swallow them back when I have those feelings and force myself to move on and think about positive things. But once in awhile, especially when I'm very tired, all of the frustration, disappointment, sadness and loss come gushing out in the form of tears. When this happened at one of the most amazing places on Earth, Bryan didn't say anything. He just stood in front of me with his hand rubbing my shoulder, apologizing to other tourists as they moved around me. This moment has been repeated over and over again over the last year and ten months, and writing about it now makes me even more grateful for his love, patience, support and strength.

Other friends have supported me by being willing to take time out of their busy lives to come to my home and spend time with me, sometimes sitting on my bed and talking with me, cleaning my house, walking my dogs, bringing dinner or even helping me do my hair & makeup before taking me out to do things. For a long time, this meant wherever we were going had to be planned out, and my limitations - mainly fatigue, weakness and severe joint pain, had to be accommodated. This meant trouble walking almost anywhere. I'm amazed at how patient my friends were. Back in those days I was soooo slow! I have bad days now, where I'm still a bit slow -- but not like that, thank goodness! Anyway, all these wonderful acts of kindness are really what kept me from becoming severely depressed, and I think they have helped me work more speedily through the healing process. I've got so many fun pictures and memories from this time in my life. Someone else looking through the pictures might not have a clue as to the pain & difficulty I was experiencing in life right then. But I'm actually grateful for that. I've come through it all with wonderful memories and pictures to look back on. As life goes on, the difficulty of the moment fades and you remember only the highlights. I'm grateful for that, too.

Well, towards the end of this past summer I recognized that I was having a really difficult time staying positive about anything, and I began to wonder if we were still on the right path as far as treatment. I felt as though I had plateaued as far as the abatement of my lyme symptoms, and I was so tired of dealing with all the side effects of the medications while getting only mediocre results. But it's a huge question with even bigger implications for the future. This gave us reason to step back and really look at everything, and try to do it objectively. So for the last couple of months, we've been praying about what we should do moving forward. There are so many big questions in life -- the answers to which have enormous impact or implications for many people. But I don't know if I've had to make any bigger decisions thus far in my life than the ones I've had to make during the course of this illness and the subsequent treatment of it. It's downright scary at times. But we've tried to avoid paralysis from analysis. I guess that's the beauty of faith & prayer. You make an educated decision, take it to the Lord and then through the wonderful process of personal revelation, (most often feelings of peace on the matter) you move forward with faith.

So that's what we've done. About nine weeks ago, a friend of mine approached us with a suggestion. A nutritional approach and products that had greatly helped his wife with a serious, chronic illness. I felt ecstatic at the possibility of having a glimmer of hope, and after researching the results that others suffering with Lyme had gotten on these products, Bryan was still really skeptical, but willing to let me try. It seemed a little crazy to begin with, so we didn't tell many people. But I felt good about it, and my husband supported me. It's been seven weeks today since I began this new path -- a nutritional approach -- and I've had nothing but great results and continual improvement. It's hard to believe, but I am so happy! I am stronger, have much more energy and stamina, my head is clearer and I've got less pain than I've had in years. I'm so excited about the future and continuing to get even better! For the first time since all of this began, I REALLY feel like I'm getting my life back!