Last Monday, I finished my fifth 28-day package of CHIM, part of the Alfons Ven remedies program I’m using. I had high hopes when I started the package because I fared reasonably well during the fourth package. Instead, I had a very difficult time. I felt like the CHIM was peeling back another layer of illness for me to grapple with. At times it was confusing, and I wondered if […]
I’m about a week into using the Alfons Ven protocol. It has been a roller coaster in so many ways. Some days, I’m more symptomatic than I’ve been in months, days that feel like the worst of the autumn relapse. Other days, I wake up ready to get out of bed and do lots of things. It feels like I’m cycling through each of the symptoms I’ve ever had, in […]
A while back, I figured out the connection between my vagus nerve and all of the worst symptoms of my menstrual cycle (see Surviving Vagus). I came up with an action plan that involved not triggering my vagus nerve at the onset of my cycle. The best plan, of course, is to get rid of the hair-trigger on the nerve, which will hopefully happen once the Bartonella infection is gone. […]
Last night, after writing out all my thoughts about my symptoms, I had insomnia. It gave me time to think things through in the quiet of my mind without any distractions. I have two new ideas, somewhat related to each other, that will help me going forward. Fanning the Flames As I looked at all my symptoms, or the fact that I’m having a big symptom flare–especially in my joints […]
With the ups and downs of the past week and a half, and a very sleepy woman writing this post, I want to focus on one small but significant breakthrough: red onions. Red onions aren’t something I eat everyday, nor were they high on the list of foods that I couldn’t eat but incessantly wished for. They are a pleasant treat, a crisp, biting, refreshing addition to a salad or […]
I’ve spent a lot of the past five weeks in bed or, more precisely, lying down in various places around the house. I was too sick with bronchitis to coil for the tick-borne infections, which meant I had a lot more time on my hands then I’m used to. I did my best to entertain myself watching episodes of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and reading Conn Iggulden’s Conqueror series […]
I’ve been talking to myself a lot the past month. It’s been a physically challenging, emotional roller coaster of a month. The vaccine I took at the end of March continued to wreak havoc on my immune system. The Lyme infection got more active. The Babesia infection got more active. The Bartonella infection got more active. And the unidentified other infection I suspect I have also seemed more active. Even […]
Since I’ve returned from visiting my sister’s family during the middle of March, I’ve been focused on getting rid of Bartonella. I’ve been vacillating between feeling like I’ll never get to the end of coiling and realizing that I might actually beat the Bartonella infection in the next few months. When I got back, I hadn’t coiled in 12 days. As soon as I started coiling for Bartonella again, I […]
Protozoa are the single-celled infective agents behind Babesia. They are a different kind of organism than bacteria, which is why most antibiotics have no effect on them. The drugs we take for protozoan infections were developed for Malaria, one of the most deadly and well-known of the infectious protozoan species. I never tested positive for Babesia. My doctor made a clinical diagnosis, partly based on my symptoms and partly based […]
As the holidays approach, I have the cultural angst that many Americans do, with the mixed memories of previous Christmases, both extremely joyful and extremely difficult. So I’m trying to excuse myself for the way all my feelings are being amplified by continuing to coil aggressively for Bartonella. It’s funny, but the more I coil, the more emotional I feel. I have moments of calm, but the stormy times are […]
Coiling for Lyme 