Lyme

I picked up Lyme sometime last summer.

Around Ottawa it seems relatively unknown.
And because of randomness of the symptoms, if you can't self diagnose it - you are going to have problems getting it diagnosed.

I was able to self-diagnose through online resources. What I did find is that it has many symptoms which I had been experiencing, but was unaware were related to Lyme.

When I explained them to my doctor, he said that I was likely right, but he had no first hand experience with it.
He started me on antibiotics and ordered a blood test. There is one lab in Ontario that does all the Lyme testing and it takes about 6-8 weeks to get results back.

Symptoms I experienced:
- numbness in face or extremeties (late August)
- irregular heartbeat (can also be attributed to caffeine, alchohol, stress - all which I have abundant exposure too) (mid September)
- cognitive difficulties (mid September)
- rash - it wasn't the bulleye rash you see pictures of. It was an oval about 2 x 4 inches on my right side. Looked like a sunburn - wasn't itchy. (early October)
- tick bites (mid October)
- headaches, neck and ear pain (mid November)
- aches in shoulder joints (mid November)

The headaches, neck and ear and shoulder pain hit suddenly. Last day of rifle season - I was in my treestand and turned my head to look over my shoulder. Just like that.

The antibiotics have helped. I finished them about Dec 20. So close to 2 months later, I still have problems with my shoulder and the irregular heart beat. Loss of strength (another symptom) is an issue - but I back to being able to do 20 pushups which is a lot better than none - which is where I was in December. I go for a retest at the end of the month.

Take Care Werner-and Thank You for sharing your experience.You are on good way to recovery............

I must have Lyme disease Too. I haven't been able to do 20 pushups for a few years now!! Hope you're feeling better Werner. I hear it the poopies.

Mercy . I'm very sorry that happened to you and wish you well.

We hear about this stuff but it sure gets real when you read about actual cases. A friend of mine contracted it from his cottage in the Thousand Islands. Good to hear you are getting proper care Wernier.

Wishing you a speedy recovery and things get back to normal for you....Werner... Scary stuff when there's no one around to diagnose the disease...

It seems to be showing up more and more from what I read in outdoors articles and on the History channel show "Curse of Oak Island" the one brother was identified with it and it looked like it laid him out with exhaustion, aches and pains etc. (sort of like a flu) as well as the symptoms like the bite mark and from the show it looks like he was off his feet for weeks. Hope it is better soon. Remember you can catch it again (if I understand what I read right) so don't think you are immune if you start feeling like that again.

If you go into the woods spray your clothes with Permethrin - it will last several months and kill any ticks that climb on you - the problem with Lyme disease is that there is no direct blood test to detect it - basically what you test for is antibodies that the disease creates in your body - a deer tick can also pass on other diseases besides Lyme - what I do if I find a deer tick on me is to take it to my doctor's office where they send to away to test it - results are got about 4 days - in the meantime the doctor prescribes an antibiotic - if the test comes back negative I stop the antibiotic if positive I take it for about 10 days - that should take care of things - if you have the disease for awhile then you could take an antibiotic for a month or two - once you have Lyme disease you will test positive for a long time because the antibodies linger in you body - I hope things go well with you Werner - if taking the antibiotics for awhile and you still don't feel good have some blood work done to make sure you didn't get a parasite from the tick

Good to hear your recovering , I’ve met two others with Lyme and both went threw heck and back because it wasn’t publicized and no one could figure out what it was

That's pretty scary, sorry to hear about this Werner. Glad the treatment is working out.

Thanks for the informative post as well. I bet a few people will read this and realize they know someone with similar symptoms.

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