Why I Stopped Treating Lyme and Started Healing From It: Healing Late-Stage Lyme Disease
Healing from late-stage Lyme disease is possible.
After 6 years of living with Lyme disease, I gave up on treating it.
Before I go on, I should note that I am not anti-western medicine. I am a certified field biologist with a degree in Environmental science. I believe in science. And I believe that western medicine has helped us tremendously in many ways… But when it comes to healing late-stage Lyme disease, it has failed me, and millions of others horribly.
My first four years living with Lyme went misdiagnosed as arthritis, but as soon as I knew what was happening, I started treating Lyme disease with conventional antibiotics. I dreaded taking my medications because they seemed to make me feel ten times worse!
I became so wrapped up in researching and learning all I could about what Lyme does to the body, sifting through controversies, and spending all my time in online Lyme support groups. I was learning more and more about treatment failures and hardships during every waking hour... and I was spiraling. I was worn out in every possible way one could be, and I was getting sicker each day.
Conventional medications prescribed to me within a span of six-months for the symptoms of late-stage Lyme disease.
Treating Lyme was getting me nowhere.
I look back now and realize that if I hadn’t made the decision to stop treating Lyme and start healing from it, I would likely be in a wheelchair or possibly dead by now. There are countless stories out there of people just like me, suffering for years while trying to treat Lyme disease conventionally and getting nowhere but worse. Right around the time I gave up on traditional treatments and trashed my truckload of medications, I came across a book called 10% Human that completely changed the way I thought about my Lyme treatment.
Instead of just focusing on killing the bad bacteria, this book inspired me to start looking at how the body heals itself and how to start rebuilding my immune system and my health.
After reading that book, I shifted my focus away from treating by killing the bacteria that cause Lyme and started focusing on actually healing from it, both physically and mentally. I stopped most conventional treatments and began learning more about biohacking, balancing my microbiome, and healing my immune system.
What is biohacking?
Biohacking is a relatively new phenomenon that means to develop a deep understanding of your body’s biology and using that knowledge to make yourself as healthy as possible. In practice, it’s taking full, personal responsibility for your body and your wellness.
There are countless ways to “biohack”, but if you are new to it, here are some simple examples:
Sleep
We all know we don’t sleep enough. But beyond just getting enough sleep, it’s about maximizing that sleep. Things like not drinking alcohol, keeping your phone off an hour prior to sleeping and making sure you keep your sleeping environment dark are important to getting better-quality sleep.
Movement
Even if you are suffering from the worst of symptoms, it is especially important that Lyme sufferers maintain a level of physical movement. This can range from gentle stretching on the worst days to a small walk, on better days. If you are ready, yoga, longer walks or gardening are great ways to keep your body moving.
Purpose
If you have been sick for a long period of time, have lost your career due to illness or are suffering from the intense isolation that often comes with chronic illness, you can easily lose sight of having a purpose. This can lead to a loss of motivation in life and an overall sense of despair.
The thing to remember with Lyme or any chronic illness is that even if your former purpose seems to have fallen away, it doesn’t mean you can’t create a new one. After losing my career due to illness, I spent a long time feeling detached from any purpose, wondering why this happened to me, and how I would ever find a life of meaning again.
Only after my healing journey began did I realize that my illness is in fact directly tied to my new-found purpose of educating and helping others heal from Lyme!
If working isn’t possible for you right now, you can find other things outside of work that gives you a sense of purpose.
Glen Horst is an expert in palliative care and writes that finding a purpose means you can assign a meaning to your life no matter what the situation – which helps with acceptance and feeling better about what you are dealing with.
Whether it’s online volunteering, writing, art, creating a support circle, being mindful of small satisfactions, or growing a plant or vegetable, there are countless ways to bring yourself a step closer to establishing new meaning amidst your health crisis.
How I’m healing from late-stage Lyme disease.
Part of the price paid for treating Lyme is the massive die-off of cells due to intense antibiotic use. In short: your immune system will TANK while treating Lyme. For me, that meant everything hurt, extreme fatigue, cognitive problems, and digestive distress. I also developed severe allergies and reactions to many foods and household products.
Through my research, personal trials, and work with other Lyme patients I have learned there isn’t a one-size-fits-all treatment that suits everyone. But, I have seen and experienced first-hand how supporting the immune system will strengthen the body, and bring healing. Here is a sampling of a few of the things that have helped me the most:
Breathing Exercises (Specifically, Pranayama.)
Prioritizing Self-Care
Cold Water Therapy
These things have been so helpful in my healing and my recovery, that I developed The Lyme Ease Detox Camp to teach others how to take control of their health by reducing toxins and inflammation, and start healing from late-stage Lyme disease.
Mind over matter, matters.
One thing that was pivotal to my healing was paying attention to my thoughts and beliefs around having Lyme disease. I began to notice the physical tension and negative emotions that I was carrying about treatments.
I started to tally up how much time I was spending comparing my current abilities to my pre-sick abilities, and it was a constant energy drain...not to mention totally depressing.
I knew that the physical regimen only covered a portion of my healing. The psychological toll was also affecting my health and my ability to heal, and I knew something had to change.
I slowly shifted my thoughts and beliefs towards healing late-stage Lyme disease rather than just treating it, which in turn disrupted my thinking pattern...which completely shifted my emotions and daily behaviors for the better.
The two things I focused on the most were gratitude and meditation. I began practicing gratitude for my medicines (yes, you read that right.) and meditating on a daily basis. The power of doing just these two things drastically shifted my emotional state, allowing me to cope with the physical symptoms better, which allowed me to start feeling better over-all.
Take control of healing late-stage Lyme disease.
The power is in you – in all of us – to take control of our own healing.
While there remains a huge amount of conflicting information, misinformation and little scientific research on Lyme, it really is up to you to decide that you are going to get better and be unrelenting in your journey to heal.
Just by changing your focus from treating to healing, you put yourself so much closer to returning to better health and happier days.
I hope you find this information helpful in your healing journey. For more help understanding Lyme disease, prevention, and holistic treatment options, check out my new book, The Lyme Ease Survival Guidebook
