Lyme Disease - The Culprit Behind Your Mystery Symptoms?
Lyme disease is the most common vector-borne disease in the United States, meaning it results from an infection transmitted to humans by blood-feeding arthropods such as ticks, fleas or mosquitoes. Lyme disease is typically transferred to humans from the bite of an infected tick, carrying the bacterium Borrelia Burgdorferi and/or Borrelia Mayonii. While it was previously thought that only ticks can transfer Lyme disease, latest research is showing that Lyme disease can be transmitted by almost anything that can bite you, including mites, fleas, mosquitos and spiders. Further, it can be transmitted from sexual transmission and from an infected mother to baby. More so, there are even theories, that it can be transmitted by eating infected meat that has not been fully cooked or from ingesting undercooked eggs from an infected chicken.
In the past it was assumed that Lyme disease is only found in specific areas of the world, but today we know that it is found in every state in the United States and many countries - and unfortunately more and more cases of Lyme disease are being discovered with each passing year. According to the Lyme Disease Organization, Lyme disease has been transmitted all across the United States, as well as in more than sixty other countries. More than 300.000 people per year (some studies even say 400.000) are infected with Lyme disease and the numbers are rapidly growing because our immune system gets compromised due to daily exposure to environmental toxicities, EMFs, pesticides, herbicides, heavy metals, plastics, etc.
Lyme is often referred to as “the great mimicker”.
There are several factors that come into play, that make the diagnose of Lyme disease difficult:
Lyme disease has over 150 different symptoms associated with it, and its presentation can vary from person to person. Research shows that tick infection rates vary from 0 to 70 percent even within the same region.
Only 40% of people who have been bitten by a tick get the bulls eye rash.
Ticks carrying Lyme can spread disease within minutes.
40% of infected people do not recall being bit by a tick. In fact, the majority of people get Lyme disease from immature ticks (called nymphs) which are very tiny, about the size of a poppy seed and difficult to feel or see.
Borellia is often accompanied by co-infections like babesia, bartonella, rickettsia, mold toxicity, parasites, heavy metals etc. Typically the severity of symptoms in a person is directly associated with the number of pathogenic bacterial species in the individuum.
Borrelia burgdorferi can cross the blood-brain barrier, mimicking cognitive diseases.
Lyme bacteria are able to change their size and shape which allows them to migrate to other parts of the body. This is called pleomorphism.
Lyme disease testing is highly inaccurate.
Only half of the people with Lyme disease are diagnosed.
The average Lyme patient sees 5 doctors over 2 years before being diagnosed.
All of these factors make the detection of Lyme difficult, allowing it to go underground and become chronic easily. Chronic Lyme is considered to be the real risk, as leaving Lyme disease untreated for many years can cause complications that affect the vital organs, blood vessels, and the entire immune system.
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The Lyme bacteria can come in three different forms:
spirochete (spiral)
intracellular
cyst (round body)
Keep in mind that only the spirochete form triggers the bullseye rash. Since it is a corkscrew-shaped spirochete, it can drill into and enter almost any organ or system in the body. This includes the brain, central nervous system, heart, joints, and muscles.
Common Lyme Co-infections include:
Rickettsia
Babesia
Bartonella
RMSF
Ehrlichia
Mycoplasma
Mold toxicities
Underlying gut infections
Heavy metals
The number one, most common symptom of Lyme is pain that migrates around the body. The early stages are often accompanied by flu-like symptoms, fatigue, fever, aches and pains, swollen glands and/or headaches, that may last for a few week. Later stages of Lyme (or chronic Lyme) are characterized by moodiness, dizziness, joint pain, extreme fatigue, memory loss and/or seizures and may appear either gradually over time or flare with major physical or emotional stress.
Here’s a rundown of Lyme’s most common sign and symptoms:
Chronic fatigue
Joint Pain / arthritis / fibromyalgia
Exhaustion, no matter how much you rest
Autoimmunity: Lyme bacteria hide in your cells. Your immune system now views your own healthy cells as foreign invaders, attacking them, in order to get rid of Lyme. This problem can escalate to rheumatoid arthritis or a process, that looks exactly like multiple sclerosis.
Mental disorders (depression, anxiety, mood swings, “lyme rage”)
Swollen lymph nodes
Food allergies
Headaches & migraines (especially on the back of the head)
Heart palpitations & dysautonomia
Myocarditis & pericarditis / lyme carditis
Brain fog & the inability to concentrate
Neurological facial paralysis (Bell’s Palsy), which is often confused with a stroke
Flu-like symptoms (chills with or without fever, sore muscles, stiffness, sinus infections, stomach & digestive problems)
Numbness & tingling throughout limbs
Neuropathy: pain down the arms
Unexplained hair loss
Seizures
Eye problems (Oversensitivity to light, increased floating spots)
Vertigo
Liver problems
Static shocks
Abdominal pain
Sudden meat allergy
Ringing in the Ears / Hearing Loss
Suicidal Thoughts
Lyme disease symptoms are broad and not specific to Lyme alone. Symptoms can manifest as other chronic disorders like:
Autoimmune disease, Dementia, Alzheimer’s disease, Thyroid disorders, Parkinson’s disease, Multiple sclerosis, Rheumatoid arthritis (joint inflammation) and/or Lupus.
Why is testing for lyme so difficult?
As mentioned above, testing for Lyme disease is extremely difficult as the infection will often hide in biofilm and spread throughout the body. Traditional tests for Lyme are:
the ELISA test (60-80% false negatives) which looks for the presence of certain antibodies, but they may not have been produced as the infection can suppress your immune system, plus Borrelia can be hiding in biofilm or
the western blot test , which is a little bit more accurate, but it still misses around 25-30%. It often used as secondary confirmatory test, but it misses acute infections often. Therefore testing for lyme often yields false-negatives, meaning the test did not detect the presence of Lyme, but the person is symptomatic.
Therefore, the detection of Lyme disease relies heavily on diagnosis through a patient’s symptomatology and health history.
The disadvantage of antibiotics in treating Lyme
While conventional medicine still treats Lyme disease with weeks or months of antibiotics, this method is considered as harmful in functional medicine:
It disrupts the healthy gut microbiome and can impair the immune system, since ~70-80% of our immune system cells reside in the gut. The combination of a weakened immune system and a disrupted gut microbiome potentially allow other pathogens to manifest.
Staying long-term on an antibiotic treatment may cause intestinal bleeding, blood clots in the lungs and anemia.
Antibiotics are ineffective in the treatment of Lyme disease because the Lyme bacteria is able to change its’ physical shape from the typical spiral shape into a resilient cyst-like ball. This formation prevents that the antibiotics can get into their system to eradicate the bacteria.
Lyme bacteria form biofilm, in which they hide and colonize. Biofilm can make the bacteria up to 10,000 times more resistant to antibiotics and can trigger them to even produce more and stronger biofilm.
Lyme bacteria are able to communicate which each other: as soon as one detects antibiotics, they are sending out warning calls to the each other in order to start the formation of a resilient cyst.
Lyme is able to cross the blood-brain-barrier, which most antibiotics are not able to reach.
Lyme bacteria loves to hide in parasites. Parasites are often resilient to antibiotics, which allows the bacteria hiding in parasites to reinfect you, even if you’ve successfully eradicated Lyme in the rest of your body.
The CDC reports high rates of relapse after courses of antibiotics.
What to do when you’ve been bitten by a tick:
Pull the tick off immediately: the sooner you find and remove it, the less likely you’re getting infected.
Use fine-tipped tweezers to grab the tick as close to the skins surface as possible.
Pull upward with steady, even pressure. Don’t twist or jerk the tick, this can cause the mouth-parts to break off and remain in the skin. If this happens, remove the mouth part with tweezers. If you are unable to remove the mouth easily with clean tweezers, leave it alone and let the skin heal.
After removing the tick, thoroughly clean the bite area and your hands with rubbing alcohol and soap water
Never crush a tick with your fingers. Dispose of a live tick by putting it in alcohol, placing it in a sealed bag/container, wrapping it tightly in tape or flushing it down the toilet.
Alternatively you can send IGeneX the tick to test and determine if the tick is carrying the pathogens that can lead to tick-borne illness: Borrelia burgdorferi (Lyme disease), Tick-Borne Relapsing Fever (TBRF), Babesiosis, Anaplasmosis, Ehrlichiosis, Bartonellosis and Rickettsiosis.
Apply a bentonite clay poultices, to pull acute toxins from the acute bite. This lowers your risk of infection. Instructions: mix bentonite clay with distilled water until it’s like wet play-dough and spread it over the area (about 2x2” and about 1/8” thick), cover it with gauze preferably until it dries and leave it on 24 hours. This will draw out any toxins that are still in the area, as well as any tick parts that may be left.
So what do you do when suspecting Lyme?
First and foremost, look at your symptoms. Lyme is a symptom-based diagnosis. When addressing Lyme, it is essential to do some preparatory work. Do not jump right into killing Lyme, as the foundation for proper detox needs to be laid with drainage support, as Lyme can clog up the lymphatic and drainage systems. Supporting drainage and getting the body fluids moving properly sets the foundation to stir up Lyme from its hiding places. Make sure to eradicate parasites BEFORE addressing Lyme to avoid any reinfection. If there are parasites carrying the Lyme bacteria in your system, you can get reinfected again and again. Going after Lyme disease is a marathon, rather than a sprint - but it is possible to get into full remission.
If you have mysterious ailments or identify with several of the symptoms above, it is time to raise the question: could it be chronic Lyme?
I highly recommend you to seek a practitioner, that understands the complexity of Lyme disease. The sooner the better, as it is easier to treat in the early stages.
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