My most bizarre symptom by far has been something called Mal de Dembarquement, or MDD. In French, MDD literally means "badness after getting off a ship." My LLMD says this is "very lyme" but I've never spoken to anyone who has experienced it. I'm wondering if someone here has? While I wouldn't wish it on anyone, it would be a great relief to hear that I'm not alone.
Here's what it was like. I began to wake up in the morning feeling extremely heavy. As if my whole body was being tugged down towards the bed. This happened for about
a week. I had been taking muscle relaxants before bed for spinal pain, and I figured it was just the effect of the pills I was feeling in the morning.
Then the feeling intensified. When I walked, my legs felt about
1,000 pounds. It was not vertigo or dizziness, but it was a very strange and extremely strong sensation of my body being sucked downward. As if magnets were on bottom of my feet and attaching to the floor. I could also describe it as that first moment in an elevator, when you're going up, and you feel that moment of super-gravity, of extreme heaviness. Walking took serious effort.
It wasn't just when I was walking. I could feel the sensation whenever I sat down or laid down. The only time I felt normal was when I was in a moving car. (sounds bizarre, but that's a hallmark of MDD.) After about
a week of this, the sensation transformed. Suddenly, I felt incredibly light and bouncy. I felt like, when I walked, I might float out of my body with every step. others with MDD have described this as 'walking on a trampoline.' I could lie and bed and feel as if I were on a roller coaster. Sometimes I'd look over at my husband and say, "wheeee!!!"
It's called MDD because it's a similar sensation to getting off of a ship before you have your land legs. You brain thinks you're on a moving vessel of some sort. It hits some people, mostly older women, when they get off a cruise, and it can last for a long time. It can also just hit, randomly and spontaneously, no ship involved. After about
2 weeks, that symptom morphed into something else, the lyme found a different way to torture me, and I haven't experienced it since. By far, it's been the strangest thing ever. Has anyone else experienced this? Thanks!
