Madison Area Lyme Support Group

I was 11 when my body changed. First came the fevers and headaches. Then tremors. Then seizures.  

Joint pain and frequent injuries meant sports disappeared. Brain fog and panic attacks meant school did too. By eighth grade in 2019, I was absent from most everything that had once defined me. I went from being a straight-A, four-sport student with a thriving social life to spending Thanksgiving and Christmas in the hospital. 

After two and a half years of severe illness, 30 doctors, and multiple misdiagnoses, I finally had an answer in 2020: Lyme disease, bartonellosis, and babesiosis. The diagnoses of three tickborne diseases brought some hope, but names alone couldn’t bring relief. My immune system was so depleted that a bout of mononucleosis that year broke me. 

I lost the ability to read. To walk. To talk. To eat. Even my short-term memory failed. My body stopped producing blood, making testing impossible. The hospital sent me home and told my family to prepare for me to die. 

But immunotherapy and aggressive treatment with long-term antibiotics, countless supplements, and daily injections gave me back pieces of myself. The first time I could read again, I clutched the words like they were oxygen. 

More than novels or school assignments, it was research that became my anchor. I became a detective, immersing myself in a cold case file of my old lab results and new studies, searching for answers that puzzled even my doctors. My days blurred into hours of YouTube lectures and Q&As from experts—each lesson a clue helping me to decipher how an infection could ripple through so many parts of me. When my liver could no longer withstand the harsh drugs I’d been taking for years, I researched alternatives, drawing on pioneering studies by Johns Hopkins researchers. I brought printed copies of these articles on herbal therapies to my doctors, ultimately shaping the protocols that led me to remission. (See link for article)

_______________

**Comment**

Completely relatable.

Similar stories only the names have been changed….

For more:

• https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2020/11/06/the-proof-is-in-the-pudding-my-letter-to-the-tbdwg/
• https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2022/02/08/meagain-new-beginnings-how-nicole-williams-overcame-lyme-and-began-a-journey-to-start-a-family/
• https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2021/10/07/meagain-from-crippling-pain-to-living-life-trish-laubes-battle-with-lyme/
• https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2021/04/07/meagain-sprinting-toward-health-how-brad-riegg-hit-the-ground-running-again-after-lyme/
• https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2024/06/12/a-candid-and-moving-account-of-one-familys-lyme-story/
• https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2020/12/15/bills-lyme-story/
• https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2020/11/20/jacks-lyme-story/
• https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2025/10/17/coach-sidelined-with-lyme-hadid-battling-depression-and-anxiety/
• https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2022/04/12/after-accusing-hadid-of-faking-illness-people-whine-about-pictures-of-worms-found-in-her-body-being-tmi/