08/05/2025
To the many making jokes and laughing about someone coming out with a diagnosis of Lyme Disease - celebrity or not… You would NEVER be laughing or making jokes if you or your child had it. Especially if it turns chronic!
Let it attack your brain so you have complex neurological problems like having a hard time remembering things, being disoriented, numbness and pain in your hands and legs, have trouble walking, trembling/shaking, vision problems, constant muscle spasms, severe headaches 24/7, mental health problems arising that you never had before, Bell’s palsy. Let it attack your nervous system so you have debilitating 24/7 panic attacks, depression, anxiety, constant fear. Let it attack your heart so you have palpitations, arrhythmia, fluttering heart, mitral valve heart prolapse. Let it attack your body so you have constant inflammation that leads to stabbing pains, chronic fatigue, constant nausea, recurring fevers, vomiting, joint pains, and ice pick headaches.
And then when you feel all this, go try and seek help from doctors. Watch them look at you like you’re making it up, because all your blood work is “fine”. Let them give you the “gold tier” CDC test that misses 70% off all positive Lyme cases. Go from doctor to doctor constantly being invalidated and told “it’s just anxiety”. Have them send you to specialist after specialist, constantly hearing, “there’s nothing wrong”.
Try also asking to be tested for tick-coinfections that may come with Lyme, which upwards to 50% of patients have; and again- be looked at like there’s no tests and no help. All the while these other tick co-infections wreak havoc on your body, brain, nervous system, kidneys, red blood cells, heart, and more- like Bartonella, Babesiosis, Anaplasmosis, and Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever.
Then come home and look at the reflection in the mirror- completely defeated, lost, hopeless, feeling utterly alone; while starting to wonder if you really are insane, even though the person looking back at you is a shell of the person that you used to be, feeling panic, in constant pain, your face sunken in from weight loss, and still screaming for help inside.
Watch the life you had slowly slip away from you. Your personality that you used to have- happy, positive, fully of energy- watch it slowly turn into depression, hopelessness, and chronic fatigue. The hopes and expectations you had for the future, disappearing. Look at your children and see the fear and worry in their eyes, because they’re watching you physically, mentally, and emotionally decline to becoming bedridden. Watch the people who love you, constantly worry as they frantically seek help and answers also. As we all wonder, how something the size of a poppyseed can take your life away.
Funny still?
To the ones out there fighting Lyme and/or coinfections, whether out loud or in silence; I see you, I hear you, and I feel with you- you’re not alone. We heal together. 💚
Signed by someone fighting Lyme Disease and Bartonella for over two years- Anna
