Living day after day with a chronic illness is exhausting. The past few days have been full of isolation as I have been unable to do many of the things with my family that I have wanted to. My neurological symptoms and pain seem to have crept back up and will not let go.
Lyme is a tricky illness. You treat it with supplements, herbs, oils, antibiotics, whatever you can find to kill it off. As you kill it off, your already depleted immune system becomes overloaded with toxins from the die off. You then scramble for ways to detox. I am constantly searching for ways to flush this junk out of my system so I can bounce back to living life and not just surviving each day.
Looking back over the last 8 months since I was diagnosed, I have come a long way. I have seen great improvements, but the setbacks are frustrating. I seem to take a few steps forward to finding “normal” and then get punched in the gut to end up at what feels like square one. When the setbacks happen, you try to put the puzzle pieces together to figure out what you did differently and what might have caused a flare up in the symptoms.
While I have been frustrated this past week with the setbacks, I can’t look over the victories. Last weekend I water skied! YES!! I managed to get myself out of the water and skied. It was amazing! I also was able to stay in the water and help teach my daughter how to ski. She managed to get out of the water for a few seconds. Hoping by the end of summer she can pop right up. That little escapade around the lake was followed with some pain, but it was worth it!
I also faced a fear and conquered a new detox method. CRYotherapy – I stepped into a chamber for 2.5 minutes at temperatures of -150. I didn’t cry, but it was COLD! This two minute session could have been what sparked my downward spiral as it riled up the lyme. It’s all a learning curve to figure out what works for your body, what will improve your symptoms, and what will cause too much die off for your body to handle. I’m still learning, but each day that passes, I am that much closer to recovery. Battle buddies, keep fighting with me. We can beat this. #GodsgotUS #cryotherapy #ididntcry
Living with Grit and Grace 