ISO Bartonella Help. Or maybe this is a Detox issue. Anyone?

Hey All -
I have been having a horrible struggle since I did a round of cholestyramine. My LLMD's intentions were to see if the cholestyramine would clear everything up and that my issues were more related to toxin build up, or if they would make things worse which he believed would then point to the fact that we haven't gotten rid of the bart and lyme. He believes the majority of my sypmtoms are bart related.

So, I did the Actos and cholestyramine round for 1 month. After starting and getting used to the cholestyramine for a few days I felt much better and my lumps on my shins disappeared, but then I took a sharp turn for the worse. It left me with lots of pain in my upper right quadrant, right below my ribs, tight muscles on my right side from my ribs down to my hips, the lumps on my shins came back worse then ever, my neck got sooooo stiff and my glands started to swell which led to tonsillitis and a trip to my primary care physician for a diagnosis of viral tonsillitis. It seems like this roller coaster started about 3 weeks into my cholestyramine and just continued after I took myself off of it.

My tonsils finally deflated, my throat hurts less, my neck is not as stiff but my jaw is still tight and sore. My lumps on my shins are very sore, and my glands ache on and off every day. My pc sees nothing wrong with me so it's either a virus I'm fighting or some lyme related thing. My biggest challenge for the past week or so is the muscle tightening and nodules appearing and disappearing on the right side of my abdomen between my belly button and my ribs. I've had this pain before, just after starting my abx with my first LLMD. Prior to starting treatment, I've never had these painful lumps in my stomach areas.

I had an ultrasound from my pm a year ago and they found nothing even though there were sore palpable lumps. At the same time they sent me for mamograms and ultrasounds for similar palpable painful lumps in my breast tissue and after a year of monitoring and multiple ultrasounds and mamos, they are gone and they never saw anything on any scans even though they could feel them. They weren't worried as the lumps/nodules come and go, are movable and the thought is that they may even be in my muscles when it comes to my stomach. The working theory I have is that they could be toxins building up in my fat as I get them right where I have fat (breast tissue, arm fat and belly fat). They went away at the start of the cholestyramine but are back now with a vengence.

I'm hoping someone out there who's had bartonella can help me out. Or maybe I just need some feedback from someone who experiences similar issues due to lack of proper detoxing. I asked this a year ago relating to my breast tissue. The breast lumps aren't really there any more. Not sure where they went, maybe to my stomach! Has anyone had these types of lumps/nodules? How big are they? Do they hurt? What can you do to get rid of them? I take activated charcoal, chlorella, citrus pectin, my abx are pulsed to help with the herxing. I use a portable fir sauna multiple times a week (everything gets worse after using it). I can't do baths, I can't do foot soaks. I can't seem to detox well and I'm just hoping that if I can get this stuff moving I would feel better.

What sort of treatment helps most with bartonella or for people who can't detox as well? Help!

Just a little frustrated and down in the dumps. Accupuncture didn't help, liver and kidney functions are all normal, previous ultrasounds have shown nothing. Heat doesn't help, saunas don't help and warm baths make it worse because I don't think I sweat well so anything trying to get out just gets reabsorbed. Thanks in advance!

Hi Justascarf,

I'm dealing with Bartonella too.

I have the lumps on my chins since I'm 15, I'm 33 now, they never disappeared. In my case, they were diagnosed as erythema nodosum. Like Tickledpink says: not really a feast for the eyes. I used to be so ashamed for my legs in summertime... First they're red and swollen, very painfull, then they become less 'active' and turn into bruise-like things that stay for almost a year. They are appearing everywhere on my chins... last month I had one showing up above my knees.

I tried EVERYTHING, got admitted in hospital twice for complete rheumatic testing, lots of xrays to exclude sarcoidosis, taking anti-inflammatory medication, , wearing compression socks (very attractive ), binding my lower legs with pressure bandages (even more attractive ), stopping anticonception (helped a bit, but didn't make them disappear) - but these were all measures taken by drs that didn't have a clue. Now I know they're a symptom of Bart.

I don't have any extra advice on detoxing, I'm searching a lot too, cause I'm herxing almost all the time - started the coffee enemas last week, and this made more improvement. Have you tried that? I'm sure you'll get more info from the others on the forum, they can give you great advice!
Just wanted to 'reassure' you on the lumps on your chins... you're not the only one wearing these marks...

Marie

Thanks for the info Marie. For me the Bart stuff has always seemed to be the worst of my symptoms. I have mostly muscle pains and my joint pains are pretty mild if at all. They make their presence known every few weeks but a year into treatment they are pretty much gone. There used to be a lot of people who had Bart on here. I keep on searching for my issues and end up with a lot of the same people having the same problems in the past. I wish they were still around so I could ask them what they did that worked best! Thanks for your feedback.

Hey Trav -
Thanks for the info. I never thought about the colon. Funny thing happened. While sitting at the computer the lumps disappeared but I got pain up higher around the right rib and then about 30 mins later it's all gone. We'll see how long it stays this way. Strange. As for the lymph nodes, I talked to my lymphatic drainage therapists and my LLMD and they both said that you can't feel lymph nodes in your stomach as they are buried under skin, fascia, fat, fascia again, 3 layers of muscle and then they fit somewhere in between and under colon. I have often wondered. Thanks again for that tool. I need to remember to look at it more often when I'm trying to figure things out!

Hey ecotick -
My doc had said that based on my survey I may have Babesia but he definately thought Lyme and Bartonella. We haven't even addressed this yet. I have an appt. next week and am building my list of questions to email in advance so that we can both be prepared when I get there. Thanks for the suggestion! Maybe that will be it. I hope something gets figured out. More then anything I hate not knowing why and how to fix it. 24+ years of not knowing why and now I have an answer but things are still going crazy and I can't figure out why.

Thanks for giving me a new path to explore!