My Lyme Disease Story

I work at a utility company in New England which as far as I know is one of the worst pandemic areas for Lyme disease in America. My job puts me at an elevated risk of tick borne illness because I am constantly crawling through shrubs, tall grass, and sometimes wooded areas. For my entire life I've been very healthy, I work out regularly, im Active, I don't smoke, Drink, do drugs, or really anything that elevates my risk of health problems, but things started to change around may of 2015. One morning after waking up I looked down at my legs and noticed that the lower half of my left leg was severely swollen. There was no pain but the site of it was concerning so I went to the hospital. At the hospital I received numerous test all of which came back negative, so in the end the doctors discharged me without any satisfactory answers. Even though the doctors were convinced that my sudden symptoms were no big deal, in my mind, knowing that my job elevates my risk, I immediately suspected Lyme disease. A few days later I visited My chiropractor whom also has Lyme Disease, and she recommended I take the Banderol and Samento supplements along with a fish oil supplement. I immediately went on the regime and for the next month or two while taking the supplements my symptoms were largely gone. I still noticed my foot would swell up slightly on the occasion but it was barely noticeable, and I was not really concerned about it. A month or two later I began wondering if perhaps the doctors were right all along. Maybe my leg swelling up was just lymphedema. Maybe it was not a big deal. Maybe I really didn't have anything wrong with me, so I stopped taking the supplements. A few weeks after I stopped taking my banderol, samento, and fish oil supplements my left leg started swelling up again, but this time that was not the only weird symptom I experienced. My jaw started hurting for no apparent reason, at one point making it difficult to chew food; my fingers started getting tingly like that feeling you have when you lay on your arm, and your hands and fingers start to go numb; My mind was not working right; I had mental fogginess, and forgetfulness, I felt like George foreman just punched me in the head and I lost a dozen IQ points; Every now and then I noticed weird rough heart beats; and in the middle of the summer, at the age of 31 I contracted pneumonia which left me out of work for a week. These symptoms persisted for several months. At this point I was seeing doctors regularly taking numerous test to rule out STD's and other medical conditions. The doctors also tested my for Lyme Disease a couple of times but the test kept coming back negative, well sort of ? I remember the doctor calling me, "Matt the Lyme test came back positive. We need to give you the second test [I believe it was the western blot] to confirm that you have Lyme before we can treat you.” I took the second test and of course it came back negative. Suddenly the doctor changes her tune about the first test, denying that she ever said it was positive. The truth is, I've always been skeptical of Lyme Disease testing, as their seems to be a lot of dissatisfaction over the results coming back wrong for a large percentage of people. Given the weird symptoms I've been having, given the fact that the doctors could not figure out what was wrong with me, I once again became convinced that I had Lyme Disease. After doing some research I began taking a cats claw supplement, fish oil tablet, and a pro biotic (the ones shown on the amazon links). Upon restarting an herbal supplement protocol my symptoms very quickly were greatly subdued. This is when I started researching medical doctors in the Boston area that were Lyme literate, and came across My Path Medical. Unlike the other doctors I've been seeing the doctor at my path medical believed that based on my symptoms I likely had Lyme disease, however she told me that because I did not test positive for it that she could not prescribe me anything, so she made some recommendations to my herbal supplement protocol mainly adding Lb-core, and Stevia. I had blood drawn a couple more times which did eventually lead to a positive test and managed to get officially diagnosed with Lyme Disease a few months after my initial visit with the doctor. Upon discussing treatment options with the doctor I decided that rather that taking prescription anti biotics, I would stay on the herbal supplement protocol for a long period of time, and will get retested in hopes that the disease will die. I have not been retested, but I have stopped taking my herbs some time ago, and no symptoms have returned. I am cautiously optimistic that the Lyme bug is dead.

My Lyme Disease Herbal regimen

My herbal Lyme protocol is broken down into four main categories, anti microbials, Biofilm breakup, support for your bodies rebuild effort, and pro biotics. Essentially you take the anti microbials in an attempt to kill the harmful bacteria. You take an omega 3 supplement and a multi vitamin to help your body rebuild your joints, organs, and brain, while it is being attacked by the bacteria, and you take a pro biotic in order to help support your immune system. Pro biotics have been shown to attack and kill invaders and also stimulate the bodies natural response to bad biotics. There is a large variety of anti microbial supplements that you can take. The ones that I take and have heard the most fanfare about are listed on the supplements page, which includes cat's claw, and both banderol, and samentol. I do not take all four of these at once, its typically one or the other although I do sometimes combine them. I often take the anti microbials in higher dosages than what is recommended on the bottles. When I was taking Banderol and Samento, I would add about 20 drops of each to a bottle of water about three times per day. I took this without a meal usually after waking up in the morning, sometime in the mid day, and a few hours before going to sleep. When taking a generic cat's claw supplement I took 8 capsules 3 times per day without a meal, spaced evenly throughout the day. LB-Core by green dragon botanicals was recommended to me by the doctor in Boston and is a patented concoction of various anti microbials. I took this in very high dosages eventually working my way up to 12 capsules 4 times per day. This supplement is supposed to be the knockout blow to the Lyme bacteria and is why I was taking so much of it. You can probably substitute just about any anti microbial or combination that you can thing of, some ideas include black walnut husk, garlic, or ginger. You'll have to experiment to see what works best for you. Various bacteria as well as the bacteria that causes tick borne illness form a protective layer around themselves called biofilms. Biofilms enable the bacteria to hide from anti biotics which is likely the reason why so many people report having their symptoms return shortly after ending anti biotic prescriptions. Stevia which is the sugar substitute that many people like to add to their coffee, was recommended to me by the doctor in Boston, as a means of breaking up the biofilms. I have done my own research on stevia and did come across a promising study which showed that stevia does indeed do a lot of harm to the bacteria that causes Lyme Disease. This study claims that stevia was at least just as effective as the anti biotics that doctors typically prescribe for Lyme patients. I take whole dried stevia leaves at the same time that I take my anti microbial. I simply grab a few leaves out of the bag and eat them whole. They taste quite good! While taking the anti microbials I also take various omega 3 fatty acid supplements, and a multi vitamin. As mentioned earlier the goal of these supplements is to help my body repair itself while it is being attacked by the bacteria. You can take any fish oil, krill oil, or algae oil supplement, along with your multi vitamin. I typically took the recommended dosage with a meal. The particular brands that I took are featured on the page with the amazon links. And finally to wrap it all up, I take the recommended dosage of a pro biotic before going to bed at night. One important note is to have as much time as possible between taking the pro biotic and the anti microbials. The anti microbials will kill the pro biotics before they have a chance to take root. The doctor recommended that I wait at least two hours after taking my last anti microbial, before taking the my pro biotic. I like to stretch the time even longer, often taking my last anti microbial at 5pm and taking my pro biotic 5 hours later before I go to bed. I believe that taking the pro biotic before going to sleep is the best bet, because your body is at rest and gives the pro biotics their best chance of making it out of your stomach alive. Well this is it, this is my entire regime. So far it has worked very well for me, for the entire year plus that I've been taking these supplements I've had no, to very very mild symptoms that are not necessarily related to Lyme Disease. I have now been off of these supplements for well over a year and have not had a return of any symptoms. So hopefully, the big bad Lyme bug is dead for good!