Does anyone really know how to treat lyme?

Does anyone really know how to treat lyme or is this all still an ineffective guessing game?

I just read this article http://lymevlog.wordpress.com/2014/06/04/treat-babesia-with-anthelmintics-not-antimalarials-ii-learned-after-eight-years/

which I found discouraging. I don't even know if I have babesia, but I was on plaquenil and now malarone. And this article is saying they are ineffective.

Are we just being experimented on by doctors who have no idea how to treat this? Does anyone get cured?

I had been feeling optimistic earlier today, noticed some improvement, followed by a set back.

But now I am doubting my and all doctors again. I know Richard horowitz is well respected for really helping people does even he know how to cure lyme? Does anyone?

Or are we all just doing all these things only for it not to work?

 

Every time I hear that people do get well I want to know what their protocol was that got them well.

 

Lymepickle  what do you make of this idea in the article I posted that antimalarias actually suppress the immune system and also are not effective fro treating coinfetions? Should I not take these antimalarials? And do you know about tinizodale? the author of this article mentions it.

Well Kate, not sure. I'm lucky I guess I don't have Babesia? I doubt I have Babesia but maybe it is possible although I have no Babesia symptoms. I am taking Septra DS and plaquenil which are supposed to be effective at treating Babesia, so maybe I have Babesia but it is just being treated and so I have no symptoms?

It seems like a tough one to treat and can take 5 months. Like anything else with these infections you have to be persistent with treatment to get well.

From what I understand babesia causes red blood cells to swell that's why all the problems with babesia. Katebirch I think that good LLMDs are just trying to address all the possible reasons that caused your immune system to go down in the first place while killing the bugs and keeping you from collapsing from the toxins. Thus said, I think that if you do that and test for everything on the face of the planet that could possibly lower your immune system there is 98% chance (my guess) you will be well. You will have to keep up with supporting your immune system and staying toxin free for the rest of your life and if you do so I believe you can be well, for many people better than they were before Lyme. There are symptoms I have had since I was 8 that I don't have now and to me that is unbelievable. I believe that if I continue with extreme detox, killing bugs, eating right, staying mold free, I can be well and have a good life.

Kate,

There are some issues with Lyme that turn it into something that is a whole other ball game than most other diseases and infections. 

Dr. H ... ( I think everyone knows our famous Dr and I don't think he's at risk of being known publically since he's the best public voice from a Doctors viewpoint)  The 16 point MSIDS model.  There are just so many issues that need to be addressed with this illness. 

Has done the best job of showing the variation of treating different people.  There are issues in Lyme... If a patient has heavy metals their immune system is sluggish.  Lyme has an effect of knocking out the immune system and everybody's immune system is different.  We are starting to learn that it is virtually impossible to 'Sterilze' the body.  And the longer that you go with this infection the longer the disease has to root itself into your body. 

 

Some people have really good immune systems.  Then Lyme throws everything out of balance in our bodies and all these things need to be reworked.  Then when Lyme is combined with co-infections it just makes it all 10 times worse. 

The complexity of this disease is an issue of itself, and I think it is just too complex for most Doctors to understand, unless they spend more time trying to understand it.   Some just choose to give up.  I think this just adds to the controversy, and of course there is penalty for treating which is another issue of the disease. 

Ultimately it is upto our immune system to take control of the infection. 

Not easy to treat at all.  And everyone is so different in their state of health and the health of their immune system.  That's why we hear of stories of some people having Lyme and not even knowing it! Their immune system just keeps it under control! 

I find the whole thing very discouraging. It seems to me that much more people don't get better than do. It seems to me that the ones who get better only get partially better and then who knows how long that lasts. It seems to me that lyme disease has not yet been figured out and it may be many more years until it is. It is very discouraging. Here we are, many of us, on these long doses of antibiotics and not even sure if all this poison will cure us. I know it is better than letting the infection go untreated but I feel very discouraged that so few people seem to get better.

And I only had it for 7 months, and in that time I treated it for the first two months ( though sporadically) and didn't get too advanced symptoms, but I still feel discouraged.

There is still so much unknown about it and it is horrendous that those of us who made the mistake of say- taking a walk in nature one day- should have our lives ruined over it. It is one thing to have to do a few months of unpleasant medicine, quite another thing to do all the medicine and then still not get cured.

I was even on this form when I got my tick bite and researching a lot, and I still didn't do the 30+ days of doxy when I could have. I am just so discouraged and sick of feeling like crap and exhausted and all those things. It sucks and I don't know what the future will bring for my health, or how much the antibiotics alone are having a bad impact on my body. So discouraged.