Bicillin, Round Deux

When my Lyme disease is flaring up really badly (like now), my brain starts trying to spell things like a 1st grader would./Win mi lim dizeaz iz flar ring up rily badlee (lik naw), mi brayn starrts tri ying to spel things lik a furst grayder wod. Needless to say, writing has become incredibly difficult and time consuming for me.

Stringing together words and sentences into anything coherent is daunting and takes days. I'm embarrassed to admit that I've been working on this particular blog post for several days, desperately trying to put facts together in proper order, not omit any necessary information, and/or at the very least, to make this post make sense! If I don't break up my posts into small paragraphs, I'm not able to read them at all, which is a common problem among fellow Lyme sufferers.

Gratuitous picture of my cat to help break up the text. You're welcome, Lyme friends.

When I got off of my intramuscular Bicillin injections (shots to the butt) a few months ago, my nasty brain symptoms came back and I felt myself slipping back into the brain sludge that makes Lyme disease mimic Alzheimer's disease--finding myself lost in a brain unable to remember the whos, whats, whens, wheres and whys of daily life that most of us take for granted unless sickness comes and steals away our memory. (We don't even need to talk about the microwave incident today...)

I've fallen back down to functioning at a much lower level of my pre-sick self--maybe around 45%. I tire very easily and I can't remember anything without sticking post-it notes to my forehead.
So, on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, my butt has a date with Bicillin, once again. Last Friday was my first day back on shots. The reason I'm back on these injections after I already did several months of them is that it was too soon to quit, (quitting the shots was my own personal decision and was not my doctor's suggestion) and so the Lyme disease came back with a vengeance.

Let us all pause for a brief intermission as we all OOH and AHH over this Mama Llama and her cute baby.

While on the shots, I was functioning at about 90 or 95%. The goal with Lyme treatment is to be symptom free for two months before quitting treatment. I thought I would be okay to switch from shots to oral antibiotics, but my body wasn't quite ready and my health has gone downhill ever since.

Most oral antibiotics do not cross the blood brain barrier, whereas intramuscular injections do. That is important in the case of chronic Lyme disease because this infection is in my brain. And I really, really, really would like my brain back! Perhaps it's time to start posting fliers on telephone poles in my neighborhood: REWARD! Have you seen this woman's brain? If found, please return (minus spirochetes) to Alyson.

Well, folks, my brain is shutting down now. So, go on! You've got your update! You'll get another post when my ability to read and write comes back. And if this post doesn't make a lick of sense, well, enjoy this picture of a frog...

Ribbit!