Lyme test bands

hello and Welcome to the forum

as far as we know - a greater number of bands reported on western blot has no relevance to symptoms severity

what has been recorded in studies and by LLMD's before is that positive serologic tests ( western blots and ELISA ) seem to occur more often in patients with clear arthritis / joint swelling.

its also common for symptoms to get worse before they get better during treatment - though this is often more pronounced in the first week or so - in some cases it can last for 6 -8 weeks or more -

i experienced this when treating with doxycycline and azithromycin

Lyme Literate MD's normally treat for at least 4 weeks after symptoms have resolved

most of the symptoms from Lyme are mediated by the host immune response - as they are mostly all driven by inflammation - in this case dysregulated inflammation that suits the bacterium more than it suits the host - but that is true of most other diseases too.

there is a phenomenon called "variable host response" - which applies to all tick borne infections - this is where due to differences in each individuals immune system - every individual who gets infected with the same organism gets a different constellation of symptoms.

this is likely what's happening in your case - perhaps exacerbated by "herxhiemer like" reactions to treatment - but unfortunately it does not tell us much about prognosis.

symptoms of this group of diseases ( lyme often travels with a number of other tick born infections - like bartonella babesia, anaplasma, RMSF, Ehrlichia etc etc - and also community acquired infections like mycoplasma and chlamydia) are highly variable over time - and can flare unpredictably

you mention stress - so its worth noting that any form of stress - physical, emotional, lack of sleep, trauma, overwork, bereavement, surgery etc etc can often cause sufferers to have flares in symptoms

Lyme is famous for "migrating pains" which appear to move from one joint or location to another every few days or few weeks - but several member here have described pain or dysfunction to once side of their body that is more persistent - so its a spectrum.

if i was in your place i would do whatever i had to do to get stress under control and continue abx beyond 28 days

Thank you for the responses. Very helpful. I will call my primary care tomorrow. If they don't respond positively, I will call a llmd that's about 2.5 hours away.