The symptoms of Lyme disease can appear in every part of your body. Are you familiar with them? Or could you have forty of them without even realizing?
Secondhand Benefits of Motherhood
As I was researching Lyme disease to write a blog about my daughter, I started suspecting I might have it too. The more research I did, the stronger my suspicion grew.
But, unlike my daughter, I never had the Lyme disease rash, or at least not one that I noticed. Of course, my husband is color blind. If the rash was on my back or scalp, or the same place as my daughter’s, it’s unlikely either of us would’ve noticed it.
Partly because of the missing or unseen rash, I wasn’t sure when I was infected or when my symptoms started. At the time, I guessed I had contracted Lyme between May and July and started with symptoms by July or August.
The Symptoms of Lyme Disease
As I mentioned in “Am I Dying? Daydreaming about a Diagnosis,” I went to an immediate care clinic on August 28, 2018. The nurse practitioner diagnosed me with sinusitis and prescribed ten days of Amoxicillin. But two days after my last dose of antibiotics, a host of other symptoms began to appear.
My fatigue became more constant, severe, and debilitating. I often felt weak, shaky, or lightheaded.
Sweats, insomnia, and sleep disturbances plagued my nights. Nausea, sore throats, rib soreness, ringing ears, and motion sickness plagued my days.
My legs twitched. My hands tingled. Strange, painful sensations appeared and disappeared throughout my body.
Mentally, I felt like I was walking in a daze. I would often forget what I was doing or reach for a word or phrase and be unable to find it.
Joint pain came and went and migrated from one part of my body to another. The same thing happened with muscle aches in my arms and legs.
My bones would occasionally crack as I did simple things like walk or get out of bed. At times, my whole body felt like a rickety old skeleton. Though I was only forty-one, I sometimes felt like a ninety-year-old woman.
What on Earth Is Wrong with Me?
On September 11, I wrote in my prayer journal, “Help me discover, preferably quickly, what, if anything, is wrong with me. If I have cancer or Lyme disease, please heal me quickly and completely.”
Soon after that, I made an appointment with my husband’s primary care provider. Meeting with him proved both beneficial—to a point—and completely bewildering.
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