The update is finally here!

Hello Folks!  I am sorry this update is a little delayed.  Things got a little crazy around our house with my health, so unfortunately the blog took the back burner.  I am going to try to update every week, but as treatment gets more intense and I feel worse, it might be every two weeks.  Hopefully, we will turn the corner soon, but right now it's a battle.

Let's see if I can remember everything that went on...

First, I want to say a big thank you to my friend, Jill, who came to help us out from Saturday until Wednesday.  It was such a blessing to have her here.  She is so kind and has such a heart for the Lord.  Jill ~ Thank you for sacrificing your time.  We appreciate it so much! You are such a joy! May God bless you abundantly girl. Love you!

I am up to 1 gram of Zithromycin and 500mg of Flagyl 3 times a day.  That is a lot of antibiotics and I would have to say my body is not handling it so well.  By last Thursday, I was REALLY sick.  I took effort to talk, walk and communicate with others.  That sounds crazy but doing any kind of movement was a huge chore.  I am always one to answer messages, texts, e-mails and calls pretty quickly, but I am afraid that did not happen a lot.  Between this and trying (keyword is trying) to keep up with my grad classes, it was a fight.  I did get everything completed by the deadlines, but I have a TON to complete by the end of the semester which for one of my classes is Nov. 21st.  Crazy huh!!  I need to push through, but some of these days all I want to do is sleep or die (sorry, the second is my dramatic side coming out, but sometimes feels that way). I pretty much run IVs all day and by Thursday it literally feels like I am just putting poison in  my veins. I know I am not, but with the side effects and the ugly symptoms that arrive, it sure feels like it!  Thankfully, my doc said it seemed like I needed a break over the weekend, so instead of doing Vitamin C IVs for Friday, Saturday and Sunday, I did nothing.  This was a big mistake, but we didn't know it at the time. 

My break over the weekend, caused my body to stop detoxing.  Vitamin C is a great immune booster, but when you take in high doses IV form, it also helps you to get rid of the toxins that the Lyme bacteria produces when it's killed.  At the time, we didn't think it would be that big of a deal to miss it.  However, we learned our lesson.  My symptoms went through the roof and the most annoying was that I started reacting to EVERYTHING!  Never a fun time, believe you me.  So, on Monday, we talked to the doctor and we will not be doing that again.  Since, I was already super set off allergy-wise.  Doing my IVs at the office on Monday was a chore.  It took a long time to get them done and I reacted to some of them, specifically the Vitamin C IV.  Crazy huh...well my body does this funky thing where if I gap certain things, when I start them up again, I react.  However, I made it through the day and things have started to lessen as we have gone on through the week.

We have had to really up my dose on probiotics and praise the Lord, I am tolerating it. I was starting to see signs of Candida (that is what you get when too much good bacteria is killed), so we had to make some changes to my diet (which is always such an insane challenge because I am so limited).  It seems to be working, but I am SOOOO hungry! :P  So, that is one problem we have encountered.  It's not too big of a deal yet, but we have to watch it carefully.  Please be praying that this will be resolved quickly so that I can add some of the foods I can eat back into my diet.  I have lost about 27 pounds since the end of July, so I really can't afford to lose any more weight. Nothing fits anymore (which is nice except I don't have very much to wear) and I keep getting smaller and smaller.  They are not concerned at this point, but 7 more pounds lost would put me at a not so healthy weight.

The second big piece of not-so-good news is that my liver enzymes are high again and keep climbing.  One month ago, they were a bit elevated, but nothing we needed to watch carefully.  However, this month's report showed them higher. So, I just heard from my doctor and we are going to try to up my detox protocol and will have to take weekly blood draws until we see improvement.  Antibiotics are really hard on your liver, especially when you take them long term.  Add that on top of my body not being able to get rid of the toxins without assistance and it creates a problem.  We would REALLY appreciate your prayers for this. It's so important that my enzymes go down so that we can progress with my treatment protocol.  I'll keep you posted on what they are doing. :)

Finally, I still need to get on a bunch of supplements and medication that my doctor wants me to take. We have to do it so slowly and can only do it when I am not dealing with allergic reactions already (if I react, we have to make sure we know what I am reacting to).  As you can probably guess, we haven't had too many of those "good days" in the last couple of weeks.  Please be praying that my body will calm down so that I can take the supplements.  Please also pray that I tolerate them!  It's so hard for me to take pills for some reason.  I do better with IV stuff, but herbs and supplements always give me a ton of problems. 

Well, I think that is all that's happened.  Tomorrow, we will go to my doctor's office and Brian gets to go with me! Yay! He went last week too and it's so nice to have him along. I know it's hard on him not being able to be with my at my appointments.  Starting next week, I will only be able to go to my doctor's on Mondays to get infusions and then pick up my supplies for the rest of the week.  It's going to be challenging to not be able to go twice a week especially if I have problems.  However, I am way too sick to drive myself, so we will just have to deal with it.

Thank you all for your prayers! This truly is a fight to the finish and we are definitely feeling the battle big time.  However, we know that with God there will be victory.  What that will look like, we are not sure, but we trust in His sovereign plan.  Blessings to all of you!!