A Walk in the Woods

The boys scampered ahead on the wooded trail, eager to explore as only 4 and 2 yr old kids can be. I smiled at J. She and I were enjoying this bucolic family scene in the woods of northern New Jersey. What could be better than this - a small break from our extended family, stealing an hour of respite on a family hike. Sunlight dimpled the trail ahead as the boys scampered along the ferns and flowers. Spring was turning into summer on this late June day, the heat and humidity signalling an end to the moderation of spring and the beginning of the extremes of summer.

A week later, the red mark on my right hip itched like crazy. Spider bite, I thought. But it's surface was raised, almost ridged with round, concentric circles - a very strange spider bite, I thought. But there I was in the wilds of British Columbia's West Coast on a holiday weekend and who knows what kind of spiders you might find at a rustic fishing camp?

A week later, I visited my internist at Minor and James. Thought it strange to have the flu in July and this odd spider bite, though I didn't connect the two. Since I had cut my hand in a boating accident, I thought, "rule of threes - I have three things bothering me, time to see the doctor. Dr. V scratched his head, puzzled as well, and wrote me a prescription for amoxicillin.

Four weeks later, I settled into my seat to watch the Mariners play at Safeco Field. It was a beautiful August evening in Seattle, 75 degrees at game time with a slight breeze from the west. I was enjoying the game when I noticed my vision in my left eye blurred in the 4th inning. A slight ringing developed in my ear in the 6th inning and nearby cheering voices were amplified to the level of someone yelling in my ear. Strange, I thought. What's going on? Later that evening the whole left side of my face went slack. "Honey, stop fooling around." my wife said. "What do you mean?" was my response. "Your face is frozen." she said with a mix of fear and confusion in her voice. I looked in the mirror and my mind went blank.

Many Paths to a Diagnosis

It took 11 doctors at Swedish, Minor and James, and University of Washington Medical here in Seattle and 12 weeks to arrive at a diagnosis of Lyme Disease. It was a classic experience of today's specialized medicine (as a Director of Quality at UW later conceded), where it's difficult to have a 360 degree view of a patient in a difficult diagnosis. Over 12 weeks, I had an offer to do a craniolotomy (that would've been fun - drilling a hole in my brain!), experienced the joys of high doses of prednisone, became wracked with muscle and joint pain, and a piercing, high sensitivity to light, sound and touch, and began to experience memory loss.

Finally, a wonderful doctor saved my life. Dr. Bruce Gilliland, who passed away in 2007, one of the fathers of rheumatology here in the Northwest, did a 2 1/2 hour "Marcus Welby"-like exam and finally took a travel history and connected the dots. Bruce was know throughout region as a "disease detective". This 70-year old gem of a man even walked me to the blood draw.

The next evening he called me at home - my Western Blot was highly positive for Lyme Disease.

What Worked for Me

Once I was diagnosed, I quickly found there were two camps of Western Medical treatment and a myriad of natural, Eastern, and other alternative options. There was no time to waste. I was at 12 weeks, the cusp of late stage Lyme, and my initial spinal tap was milky and cloudy from the millions of spirochete bacteria that were invading my body.After studying research from clinicians at Columbia and Yale and consulting with a wonderful researcher at Robert Wood Johnson, I elected to blast the little devils with an intravenous course of Ceftriaxone, a heavy-duty antibiotic that doctors give meningitis patients for one week. I was so far gone at this point that the recommendation was for 4 or 6 weeks. I chose 6 weeks of having a pik line dropping a daily dose of Cefriaxone to my heart. Day after day, my lovely, patient wife injected the cool liquid through the pik line. I grew more and more tired from the treatment, and soon had difficulty staying awake for more than an hour at a time.I’m convinced that I couldn’t have recovered without this heavy application of Western Medicine. I’m also convinced, though, that my accelerated and full recovery was helped by other interventions. Here are a few that worked for me:

• Acupuncture – to address physical pain and facial paralysis. Immediate pain relief and remarkable recovery from full left-sided facial paralysis.
• Chinese herbs – a Chinese-trained herbalist tailored herbs to my body's needs
• Natural medicine – in particular, German homeopathic drops that helped support my lymphatic system and liver, which were working overtime to flush my body of the disease. These choice of these natural remedies evolved through the stages of my recovery.
• Strong pro-biotic and acidophilus – when you take heavy antibiotics, you must rebuild the flora in your digestive tract
• Teasal root tincture – Native American remedy used for Rocky Mountain fever that Walker Farms, a Midwest farm, produces.
• Massage therapy – to loosen up my twisted body and get blood flow going.
• Daily walks – a block at first, moving up to a lap around the local reservoir, and onto power walking.
• Keeping in touch with friends and family - sending regular updates and connecting live or via phone or email with others gave my experience meaning and gave me energy

Thanks to these interventions, I was able to restore my stamina and general health five months from my September 2004 diagnosis to a level where I felt I could function relatively normally on a daily basis.

What I learned is that you have to own and tailor your health decisions to find the path that is right for you. In my case, I found the integration of several treatments worked for me. But these came together not through my primary care physican or an infectious disease specialist. There is no better advocate for your health than you.