My Lyme Story

My life was typical of any busy wife and mom raising a daughter, running a successful business, and enjoying fun adventures like traveling, socializing with friends and family, and watching my daughter head to Kindergarten. Life was good! In 2016, that came to a full stop when I started displaying extreme fatigue, brain fog, chills, tremors, anxiety, and panic attacks that landed me in bed unable to work, drive or handle daily tasks. My doctor took one look at me and said I was "fine", possibly depressed and recommended therapy. I was angry and frustrated over the gaslighting and I immediately found a new, naturopathic doctor who listened, did proper testing and diagnosed me with Stage 4 Adrenal Fatigue and food sensitivities. I was also diagnosed with active Epstein Barr Virus, MTHFR gene mutation, heavy metal toxicity and a C-Diff bacterial infection. With treatments  I was mostly back to my old self but many symptoms lingered and limited my life. 

In 2019, I moved from Colorado to my home state of Florida, for an adventure and to share beach life with my daughter and hubby. I planned to be active outdoors, grow my business, and enjoy making new friends and memories. That plan did not happen. One month after moving, my body crashed. I found myself on the floor of my bathroom having a seizure that landed me in the ER, while my family sat in shock and scared for my life. These were the scariest days of my life! Leaving our life in CO for a new state, new home, new school, and new job was a lot. I quickly searched out a new healing team, doing remote phone appointments with my doctors while lying on the couch, unable to think from brain fog and anxiety. My body was stuck in "fight or flight" mode and I was coping with it literally minute by minute.

My new functional medicine doctor ran many tests and  I was diagnosed with Late Stage Chronic Neurological Lyme Disease and Mold Illness. This was the root cause of all my symptoms and other illnesses. I cried when I received my diagnosis, because I was SO happy to put a name to what was happening to me. That also meant I was entering down a rabbit hole full of overwhelming information, and potential treatments that may or may not work. Chronic Lyme is so misunderstood and hard to treat,  so most patients spend thousands of dollars out of pocket to find relief or the hope of remission. Needless to say our nest egg quickly vanished!

If you know me then you know I am super stubborn and I don't give up easily. I am also a massive researcher. This has helped me to dig deep, learn everything there is to know and refuse to surrender until I am fully healed and happy! After two years of very hard work, unwavering consistency and staring Satan himself down many days in bed, I am incredibly grateful that my Mold Illness is almost in remission after a lot of home remediation, detoxing, testing, treatments, rest and support. I am focusing on building up my immune system and detoxing so my body can safely handle moving on to the next step of Lyme treatment this fall. I will likely experience more symptoms as I treat Lyme, but it's not my first rodeo. I CAN and WILL get through this with as much hope, patience, trust, grit and grace as I can muster. 

I have a knowledgable health team, a loving and supportive family, and a strong desire to come though this healthier than ever. I recently learned about the Wave1 and how it's helping Lyme patients to manage treatments and pain symptoms while healing. My doctors highly recommend it and their patients have seen great results. My hope is to have the opportunity to use this as part of my treatment plan to truly heal my Lyme and get back to living my best life so I will be here for my family for many years to come. Every diagnosis, symptom, doctor, treatment and challenge has formed me into who I am today. I would not change that, but I am beyond ready to get back to being my healthiest self and focusing on more than just my illness. My ultimate goal once I win my battle with Lyme, is to help raise awareness of the over 300,000 new cases per year in the US alone, and help others battling chronic illness to find hope and healing.  Thank you for taking the time to listen to my healing journey!