Trying to understand treatment delay/failure

First of all, I'm so sorry. Believe me, I do understand.

I was in treatment for 2 years the first time, and healed. But after extreme stress from 2 family situations colliding at the same time, my adrenals crashed, taking my thyroid with it. One year later, I was bit by a tick and reinfected.

For me, the reason it took 2 years the first time I believe, is because there was a LOT of dysfunction in my body from having these infections for 40 years by the time I finally got effective treatments for me.

This time, after the reinfection, it's been 2 years already, and I'm still really struggling. I honestly believe between the stress in life, and my low adrenal function that I've been battling, my body simply has too much going on to battle it all without extensive support and treatments - so I've chosen to completely restart, from the beginning and treat for viruses first. Making a bit of progress now, as my adrenals are better supported, as is my thyroid, gastro tract and other things. I'll be treating the tick-borne infections soon and believe/hope it will go well.

Do I believe I will heal yet again? Yes, as my sights are set really high, but with caveats. Areas that have been hit hard, may not heal 100%, and I realize that I may not heal 100%, but I'm more looking for an improvement in my quality of life, not complete healing. There aren't many that have had these infections for 46 our of 47 years of their life, so I don't have many to compare to. So, just trying to not get too excited.

Why does treatment take so long? There are many possible reasons, but to start with the easy answer, these are some of the most complex bacteria that are known of today. They can change into 3 different forms - two of which help protect them from ANY threat. And, they only divide and 'replicate' every 3 - 5 weeks, unlike other bacteria that do this many times in just minutes, hours or days. Borrelia takes weeks to do the same thing. The only time they are vulnerable to treatments is when they are in one 'life form' - the spirochete form.

These bacteria seem to attack a body's weakest points, so it's different for each of us. My gastro system has been hit pretty hard, and it's struggling, but not everyone here has these issues (fortunately). So, we all need different approaches, and different support for our body. This makes it more difficult as well to narrow down what works and what doesn't, because we are all experiencing different symptom groups, or different symptoms within a symptom group.

We will need to watch over our health for the rest of our lives, according to the best information we have right now. We need our immune systems to function well in order to keep the bacteria at bay, even after we have healed, for as far as anyone can tell, we can't kill every last Borrelia cell. So we have to rely on the immune function to keep it under control. This can be tricky, because stress alone can reduce the immune function enough to allow the infection to flourish yet again.

Those that are lucky enough to get diagnosed and get proper treatment within about the first 1 - 2 weeks of being infected may be exempt from the above - but the whole 'story' isn't in yet for us to know for sure.

Oh and I did treat for almost a year, but in reality, I will always be treating.

My symptom list got shorter and shorter and then one day I got so sick to my stomach, and up came all my herbs. My next dose of herbs and up them came. It was my husband that said "you aren't sick but you can't keep the herbs down, so why not stop and see what happens."

At this point I had been symptom free for 3 months and was just taking the herbs as an extra precaution.

I stopped the herbs and I got no symptoms back..... for a very long time.

Then I had some stress and I felt a tinge of pain in my head. "Oh no!" My first debilitating symptom lyme had returned. I grabbed my Japanese Knotweed and my Red Root and took a dose. I meditated and was calm for a couple of days....

So far, so good - and that was 5 months ago.

I still have lyme in me. I can feel it. It loves my old injuries and my lymph system. But I am highly functional and very aware of what I eat and do.

No overdoing it on anything!!! I have a balancing act to perform daily. Balance everything. And that is the "key" for me. Enough water, enough vitamins, enough good foods, enough physical activity and enough sleep. I will probably have to maintain this balancing act the rest of my life. But, it is not a bad thing at all.

I hope everyone finds their "key" to living with lyme. I never anticipated getting it all out of my body, so my expectations were met. My expectations were getting strong enough to keep lyme symptoms at bay. I wish this for everyone here.

It's really hard to make plans for the future when you have no idea what level of functioning you will have. Most of us have to just take it as we can, and make those plans as we can without time limits I believe.

There's just no way to know. We are in desperate need of better research and testing.

I will not give up either. I thought I had chronic parvovirus and there's no treatment at all for that so a fighting chance to get back to 95% seems like a good thing.

I understand and empathize with your state of mind though. Some days are better but some days are really tough. I am almost to the 2 year mark treating and while I am significantly better I still have a long way to go.

My hope is to beat the bacteria into submission so my immune system can handle it with minimal symptoms. I doubt we can get rid of it completely -it is a very sophisticated and smart critter and too darned adaptable. But we can get better.

That is my expectation, to be able to function without pain, to take the stairs if I choose, to go for a long walk. I think I will always have to watch what I eat and drink and take some supplements but that would be ok with me.

hang in there.