Richelle

I took Richelle to our fantastic chiropractor yesterday.  He's far more than a just a "bone-cracker" but also uses supplements, homeopathic remedies, and applied kinesiology.  He strongly urged me to have Richelle tested through IgeneX or Spirostate for a complete workup of all the bacteria, viruses, spirochetes, etc. (also known as co-infections) that might be in her system.  The run-of-the-mill tests done in your average Lyme illiterate labs don't test for those (and you have a better percentage of accuracy by flipping a coin if the lab uses the ELISA test).  But at about $650 for the battery of tests, I'm going to have to see if insurance will pay for it.

In the meanwhile, she is taking several supplements known to be beneficial with Lyme disease and will soon start another herbal preparation that my sister recommends.  If you really want to know what they are, drop me a line...I don't want to bore the rest of you!

We think the second bout of paralysis was a herxheimer ("die-off") reaction to the doxycyline she's taking.  With Lyme, it's typical to get a herx reaction two days and as well as four weeks after starting antibiotics and her second episode was at the two day mark.

Other than hating to give up sweets because of long-ish term antibiotics, annoyed at watching her gluten intake because of what Lyme typically does to the gut, and detesting the amount of water she has to drink to wash everything down, she's doing well.  She had a short bout of "why me" but when I pointed out that at least it's invisible to the public unlike her brother's Bell's palsy six years ago, she pulled herself out of it.

Lyme also causes increased fatigue and we came to an agreement:  As long as her bedroom light is off and she's going to sleep by 9:30pm, I'll let her sleep herself out instead of bouncing her out of bed at the usual 6:00am.  It means a change in our school schedule but we'll figure it out.