Friday, August 31, 2012

headache free

Health Update:

So I've now been on the new detox supplements for over a week.  After being off the antibiotics for two full weeks and on the detox supplements for 5 days, my headache decreased significantly.  I woke up this morning headache free.  Actually, I woke up clear headed and with a little bit of energy (I think this is due to the different kind of b12 I've been taking).  It's a spray.  The energy makes me feel better over all. 

I am still having pain in different muscles and bones, but at least for today my head feels better.


Home Update:

So I decided to make use of my energy spurt  this morning and do some things around the house.  I focused on the downstairs so I'd feel accomplished when I was finished.  Plus the items I did downstairs were easy accomplished in 5 minutes or less each.  I finished one task, rested some and the moved on to my next task.  It's my goal to always keep the downstairs area looking tidy so that if I were to have guests (neighbors, family or friends) come by that I wouldn't feel the need to "have" to clean.  We need to really work on the upstairs, but I am taking it one thing at a time. 

  • My Office - Straightened
  • Guest Bathroom Downstairs - I cleaned the toilet and sink.
  • Dining Room - Straightened
  • Kitchen - Straightened (and cleaned the stove top)
  • Living Room - Straightened
  • Master Bedroom - Straightened.
  • Master Bathroom - cleaned toilet and sinks.  
I love my new house.  It's so relaxing and comfortable.  

Fun (I left the house) Update:

  • On Wednesday, I did an informal observation at friend's school.  She was appreciative of my input and has already implemented several suggestions.
  • On Thursday, I had my hair trimmed and styled. 

Sunday, August 26, 2012

Fun through the pain

I decided this past week that I needed to have a little fun through the pain.  I was invited to three different things this past week.  Against better judgement, I decided that I would do all three things.  So this post is to remind myself that I can have a little fun throughout the pain.


  •   On this upcoming Monday, a church is opening up a child care center.  My friend, Jamie, is going to be the director of the center and this past Monday she invited me to come to her open house and to go out to eat with her.  My responses to these kinds of things are generally "Thanks, but I just can't."  So my response to her was, "I think I can make that."  I wasn't sure if i would or not, but I really wanted to go to support my friend.  So I did.  I arrived good and early so that if I had to cut out early at least I had a chance to see Jamie.  I wound up staying the entire open house and going out to eat with a few of our mutual friends afterwards  I am so glad I did because it enabled me to "meet" a new person that was from my small little town.  I spoke about this happy accident on my post on Tuesday.  
  • On several occasions, I have been invited to a fellow Lymie's house.  I really am not fond of going to other people's homes.  I generally can't make myself comfortable there so I avoid it at all costs.  I hate to ask certain questions to find out if I'll be comfortable (such as, "Does anyone in your home smoke?") at their home so am typically unpleasantly surprised when I walk into their home and it reeks of cigarettes.  Well this particular Lymie lives about 10 minutes from me and has invited me over several times.  So on Thursday, I decided to go over.  I stayed about 5 hours (which is a life time for me at someone else's home).  We talked a lot of Lyme Disease.  It was fun for her as she had never met in person anyone with Lyme.  
  • Then on Monday morning, I received a text from my new neighbor inviting me over to come hang with "the ladies" on Friday night.  I simply replied that I may not be feeling up to it (which was true), but that I may pop in for a few minutes to say hello.  That would give me an easy out if I wasn't feeling well and an easy pop in and pop out excuse as well.  However, when I popped in -- I began to enjoy the company so much I pretty much stayed the whole time.  There were chairs for me to sit in, we gambled a bit - hey it wasn't my money and I won the fake game twice.  But when it came to the actual game where someone got to take the pot of money -- I lost.  I was runner up to the woman that never wins anything so that was fine.  Everyone had 5 dollars.  My neighbor supplied most of the dollar bills. There were three dice.  On each dice there was either a circle, star, the word LEFT or the word RIGHT.  If you had at least 3 dollars, you rolled all 3 dice.  Each dice told you what to do.  Circle meant you put a dollar in the middle.  LEFT meant pass to the person on your left.  RIGHT meant pass to the person on your right.  STAR meant you kept everything you had.  The winner of the money in the middle was the person who had the last dollar.  It was a simple game and cognitively I was able to play.  I was so thankful that there were no actual card games being played because my brain function wasn't there enough to play something more difficult than pass to the middle, left or right.  
 I knew that I might forget this fun week so I wanted to keep a journal of it so that later when I say I never have any fun at all that I would remember these three evenings of fun. It was also so very sweet all of all three ladies to remember me when they had something fun.  Honestly, most people don't even invite me places anymore because they know most of the time I can't go.  So it's nice to be remembered.  

Saturday, August 25, 2012

House Update




Things are going very slow around the house.  It's difficult for me to do much, but I try to do one thing in the house every day so that the every day life mess doesn't start to creep up in the house.  Today, I want to try to sweep off the back & front porch and side walk.  I'm not sure if I'll get it done, but it is something I'd really like to accomplish today.  I've already swept off 1/2 of the back porch so that is better than nothing. 


We had several warranty items that needed fixing and this was the week for that.  On Monday, we had a guy come look at our tub.  It was really rough feeling and apparently was supposed to be smooth.  It wasn't in our warranty, but our builder took a look and got someone to come out to smooth it out.  On Tuesday, we had a guy come look at our kitchen faucet.  The hot water was coming out at 1/2 speed the cold.  It wasn't like this in any other sink in the house. Plus the part that holds on the sprayer broken into thirds so he looked at that too.  He fixed both problems at the same time. 

Then Thursday, we had the flooring guy come.  He was to look at the vinyl in the master bathroom, the carpet nails and an area of loose carpeting we had near the fire place.  They had only told him there were a few nails sticking up and about the vinyl.  If by a few nails, they meant every single nail was popping through at every threshold and we had to be careful walking in our bare feet into every room of the house or we'd get popped with a sharp nail -- then year, there were a "few."  LOL. 


He fixed the vinyl in the bathroom and I showed him the issue with the thresholds.  He called his boss because he was told it was only a few nails here and there, not every threshold, against the walls and all the way up the stairs.  His boss is supposed to send someone else to fix the majority of it, but he was very kind and tacked down the nails in the threshold in my office and the living room and around the fire place.  He even fixed the loose carpet around the fireplace.  He said at least I wouldn't have to worry bout stepping on sharp things between those two rooms (which is where I spend most of my time), but because the builder won't pay the vinyl guy for the time he spent on the carpet - his boss was going to send a carpet specialist to take care of the rest of our carpet issues.  I think he just felt bad for us especially when he sat down on the carpet by the fireplace, put his hand down and got a sharp metal piece into his own hand. 

In addition to those things, there was a small hole in the concrete in our driveway.  The builder came by himself to fix that Thursday and said he would send someone to take care of the broken brick on the side of our house on  Friday. 

We do have a pest control company to take care of the ticks and various other pests.  We don't have a various other pest problem, but the tick issue was terrible at this house.  They come out quarterly, but if we notice anything in between visits, we can call and have them come out to retreat for no charge.  The past week or two I've noticed some ants on the back porch so I called and they will come out on Saturday to treat for them. 

Friday, August 24, 2012

Day 2 of Detoxification

Day 1 I took exactly what I was supposed to take, no more and no less.  I felt a little more clear headed by the end of the night, but my headache was still there.  I was asked how my headaches feel.  I'll do my best to describe them. 

Honestly, my headaches change through out the day.  Sometimes it feels like someone has taken a child's belt and put it around the circumference of my head and tightened it.  Then, when it can tighten no more -- they tighten it down one more notch.  Other times it feels like someone is taking a blunted object and shoving into my brain.  Most of the time the shoving pain is on the left hemisphere, but it has lately turned into a frontal lobe pain.  I can have sharp pain, dull pain, a pulsating pain, a pressure pain.  Sometimes they happen all at the same time and when this happens I start to see shapes similar to what you would see if someone had taken flash photography over and over again.  

I am not a pain medicine kind of woman. The only time I've taken true pain medication (IE narcotics) is when I had surgery and it was pretty much forced on me.  Even then, I would take it for the day of the surgery and maybe the day after and then switch to something else because I just don't like the idea of narcotics. Also, I am sensitive to over the counter pain relievers.  I used to take either Motrin or Tylenol (both children's versions too because if I take adult strength then it knocks me out), but the most recent times I've taken Motrin I've had a reaction that has gotten worse.  Therefore, I can pretty much only taken children's tylenol.  I *only* take it when I have the all over, different types of brain aches, pain and need something to try to take the edge off.  I knew I was having a problem with pain when I took it three days in a row.  That's when I stopped all my antibiotics.  I thought by going off of them for 4 days the pain would ease off.  It didn't.  That's why we started the new plan for now. 

Day 2

So anyways.  This morning I got up and started day 2.  I had originally planned to only increase the dosage of 3 of the items, but decided to go ahead and up my dosage on a few other items as well.  Things that stayed the same as yesterday I marked with "same as yesterday"  I have a long way to go before the first three items are at the dosage I'm supposed to be taking.  (depending on how I take it - under the tongue - 10 drops or in water 30 drops)

This is what my morning supplements looked like:

  • Cerebromax (2 drops x twice daily)
  • Spinalmax (2 drops x twice daily)
  • Matrix Support (2 drops x twice daily)
  • Tox Ease GL (full dropper x twice daily) - same as yesterday
  • Solray D Spray (2 sprays x twice daily) 
  • Methyl B12 Spray (1 spray x twice daily - same as yesterday
  • Lymph 2 (full dropper x twice daily - well before other supplements)
  • Hawthorn Intrinsic (full dropper x twice daily)
  • Vitamin C (1 gram AM, 2 grams PM)
  • Multivitamin (2 x twice daily)
Tonight I'll do the above and add the Vitamin B

Since I increased the dosage of so many items (6), I won't add anything new today. 

This morning I woke up with stabbing pain in frontal lobe and a numb sensation in my right hemisphere.  I do feel more clear headed this morning (IE, I could think of the words hemisphere and circumference without having to do a lot of googling to figure out the words I wanted to use). 

____









Thursday, August 23, 2012

Avoidance

I typically avoid writing about specific supplements that I take.  I do this for one of two reasons.  I don't want anyone to think that they should self treat with the over the counter supplements that have been prescribed to me by my doctor for very specific reasons.  Also, I do this to protect myself. 

However in order to help myself heal and get through the process, I have decided to do what I never do.  I am going to share about the supplements I'll be taking.  Now one thing you must realize is that I am *VERY* sensitive to supplements and medications.  I always thought this was due to my very low weight, but now that I am in the normal weight range - the sensitivity continues.  So, I rarely start off where I need to.  Example was when I was on LDN.  The typical amount of LDN for patients was in the 4.5mg area.  I had to start off at 1/2 mg.  I finally got up to 3mg, but I was never able to stabilize there. So in the end, I stopped LDN because I never could reach the dosage that my immune system needed.

A lot of people use "pill containers" for their daily doses.  However, I use mostly homeopathics in dropper form so those pill containers don't do squat for me.  So what I do is work out an excel spreadsheet.  At the top of the sheet, I list Sunday through Saturday.  I list them twice.  One for AM and one for PM. One sheet of paper is my week's worth of supplements/medication.  Then on the left side of the paper, I list all of the supplements/medications.  I make sure that there is an outline for each little box so that when it prints off I am able to easily check off the box for that particular supplement on that particular day.  If am I dosing up --- for example:  1 drop on Monday, 2 drops on Tuesday, 3 drops on Wednesday -- then I mark how many drops for that box so that I know when I grab that bottle --- exactly what my dosage is.

Right now I have 23 items listed on the left.  However to start, I won't use all 23 items.  In fact, last night I only used 6 items.  This morning I only used 10 items. Some of the times I won't be using for another few weeks, but I wanted them on my excel spreadsheet already.  Some things on the list won't be taken on the same day.  Example is that the first 3 items on the list will be taken on day 1,2,3 of the week and the second 3 items on the list will be taken on day 4,5,6 and 7.  Some items I only take once a day (like the Vitamin B because it makes me nauseated and I can fall asleep before it makes my stomach turn).  Some items I don't even have at home yet.  Some items I know exactly what they are for and some I have no clue.

All of the items on my list:

  • Cerebromax
  • Spinalmax
  • Matrix Support
  • Detox 1
  • Detox 2
  • Detox 3
  • Tox Ease GL
  • Solray D Spray (has Vitamin D and K)
  • Methyl B12 Spray 
  • Lymph 2 
  • Hawthorn Intrinsic
  • Scrofulara Intrinsic
  • Lapacho Intrinsic
  • Probiotic
  • Vitamin C
  • Vitamin B
  • MultiVitamin
  • BAB 1
  • CLA-K
  • Whey Protein
  • Vitamin E
  • Mepron
  • Zithromax
The items I started last night/this morning and I marked which ones were NEW overall and which ones were NEW formulas for me and which ones I've been on before:
  • New: Cerebromax - started at 1 drop x twice daily - on Thursday, Fridays and Saturdays only
  • New: Spinalmax - started at 1 drop x twice daily on Thursday, Fridays and Saturdays only.
  • New: Matrix Support - started at 1 drop x twice daily on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays only.
  • Old: Tox Ease GL - FULL DROPPER (this is not new to me) x twice daily
  • New Formula: Solray D Spray (has Vitamin D and K) - started at 1 spray x twice daily
  • New Formula: Methyl B12 Spray  - started at 1 spray x twice daily
  • Old: Lymph 2  - FULL DROPPER (this is not new to me) x twice daily
  • Old: Hawthorn Intrinsic - 1/2 dropper (not new, but body is not ready for full dropper) x twice daily
  • Old: Vitamin C - start at 1 Gram x twice daily, but will ramp up quickly b.c it's not new x twice (might get up to three times a day) daily
  • Old: Vitamin B - 2 at bed time
  • Old:  MultiVitamin - 1 am, 2 at bedtime 
The Lymph 2 MUST be taken away from food and other supplements.  So I must take that one as soon as I wake up and about 20 minutes before bed and other supplements. 

I will be slowly moving up in dosage on the first three items and also slowly adding in some other items next week.  However, today, tomorrow and Saturday I will focus strictly on these 11 items and increasing the first three things by one drop per dosage per day (IE by Saturday I hope to be taking 3 drops x twice daily).  It's hard to know what are side effects from herxing, detoxing and simply the supplements not agreeing with me.  I am to add one at a time and every few days add a new one.  Last night I started 2 new formulas and this morning I started 3 new things (they must be taken together).  The rest of the stuff I've taken before which is why I started off with 11 things today. 

I really need this to work.  I'm in a great deal of pain. 








Wednesday, August 22, 2012

Confirmation

I had my follow up today.  I was pretty much bluntly honest.  I haven't had a good health day since before my last visit. Someone asked me what were my symptoms since getting out of remission.  What aren't my symptoms?  Well, here is a list of symptoms that I have endured over the last month.

  • Headaches
  • Neck Pain
  • Shoulder Pain
  • Elbow Pain
  • Finger/Hand Joint Pain
  • Hip Pain
  • Knee/Shin Pain
  • Ankle Pain
  • Feet Pain
  • Leg Pain
  • Lower Back Pain
  • Itching (mainly on face or arms, though occasionally on legs)
  • Sneezing
  • Comprehension difficulty (understanding what people say - especially on the phone, but I've noticed lately that I've even had trouble understanding things that I normally comprehend)
  • Chills
  • Sweats
  • Fatigue
  • Twitching (mainly head/arms/hands, but feet/legs occasionally)
  • Breathing difficulty (sometimes can't get a deep breath) 
  • Coughing
  • Fevers
  • Light Sensitivity
  • Noise Sensitivity
  • Ear Pulsing
  • Lung/Side Pain
The worst symptoms that affect my overall daily experience are the neck pain, headaches and fatigue.  Although all of the other pain things can affect how it impacts my daily life. 

I haven't been on any "killer" medications or homeopathics in 6 days.  I thought that by today my body would have stabilized, but that has not been the case. So over the next few weeks I will be working on some things that hopefully will help release the toxin load in my body to help my body stabilize. Then, I will slowly add in the "killer" things focusing mainly on Babesia. So I will restart only two antibiotics:  Zithromax & Mepron.  Omnicef and Doxy will stay on the back-burner for now.  We briefly talked about IVs, but we'll push those out again simply due to financial restraints. I will take one day at a time.   I admit it.  I am overwhelmed. When I think about how well I was doing 2 or 3 years ago, I get extremely upset. 



Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Small World, Big Memories

Yesterday, I had the pleasure of supporting a friend.  I met this friend in January of this year.  We have the same non-Lyme passion of early childhood education.  I knew God had big plans for her from the very first day we met.  Long story short, she's the director of a new child care center that's faith based.  They haven't had their first official day, but yesterday was open house.  She asked me a few weeks ago if I would be interested in coming up and having dinner afterwards with our former professor (now friend).  I typically say I probably can and then health reasons lead me to cancel.  I said I probably could and waited for the other shoe to drop.  Although I didn't feel my best, I put on my big girl britches (yes I said britches) and drove out to the boondocks (yes I said boondocks) to see my friend get her groove on at her open house. 

When I meet new people for the first time, I can be awkwardly shy.  I'm not sure if they notice and it maybe that I only feel awkward on the inside. This was going to be a night of awkwardly shy.  I knew it, but I also knew that I would at least know two people there and once you get to know me good luck getting me to be quiet if I'm feeling chatty.  I was there for quite some time and had spoken with the associate pastor several times.   At one point, we were alone in the hallway and he asked me where I was from.  Well, the funny thing around here is that most people are "from" somewhere else.  So I simply use my two word answer, "North Carolina."  He said he realized that, but where in North Carolina. 

It's at this point I have to really dig down and think.  It was obvious he knew I wasn't from the county I live in (those born and raised here in this county have a most definitive accent), but what do I say because it's kind of a story.  Well, I decided to be honest because well I was in a church and I was speaking to a pastor.  So I blurt out that I'm from ( J - - - - - - ) until I moved to ( O - - - - -) and then I went to Western Carolina and finally moved to where I live now.   Well the first town I list, no one ever knows where that is.  Ever.  Most people have it confused with another town which is much much bigger, but then he said something about it being near the border.  I was impressed with his knowledge of my little tiny town. 

I'm not sure if I've ever shared, but I have these dreams.  I can dream about something and it either has happened or will happen.  Not every dream comes true, but some do.  It's very strange.  Some are very specific (like the time I dreamed that I met my friend from childhood as an adult - I hadn't seen him since we were children - yet in my dream I could see exactly what he looked like as an adult - then when I saw him and it wasn't a planned meeting, I knew it was him because our happenstance meeting happened exactly like my dream).  I can go months and months without dreaming about people from J - - - - - - and then I'll dream about it for a week at a time. 

Back to my story.  A little bit after I told him a little bit of my story, I left him to talk to my friend.  We're hanging out when all the sudden the pastor walks in with another lady and her child and says that we need to connect.  Most of the time when this happens, it's about Lyme Disease.  He knew about my Lyme Disease and I was just assuming that maybe this lady was needing some information.  I was already thinking in my head about whether I had any advocacy stuff in my car when he said something about how we needed to connect because we were both from "J - - - - - -."  Honestly my first thought was that she was probably from the "other town" because people get *that* confused.   

I introduce myself and tell her my maiden name and she tells me hers.  Well her name sounded familiar in a way that I knew we probably knew her, but that we weren't close friends at the time simply because our ages were different (4 years in elementary school is a huge difference). We started talking about the area.  It was awesome.  Even though we didn't get to talk very long, it was nice knowing someone that knew all the areas I remembered. I explained where I used to live and she knew exactly the house I was talking about.  I told her my friends and she knew most of their names.

I think we are shaped largely by where we spend our youth.  Some of my most vivid memories come from the time when I lived in J - - - - - -.  I missed it so much when we moved so I would relive things in my head every night before I went to sleep.  I would say my friend's names over and over again so I wouldn't forget.  As an adult, I remember the weirdest things.  I remember the really really really long metal slide at the church.  Now I will tell you that I thought I was just thinking it was extremely long because of my size and things as adults often look tiny in comparison to what you remember, but I mentioned this slide recently to someone and they too commented on it's extreme length when I said I remembered the metal slide at the church.  I remember sliding down this slide in my blue snowflake dress and getting rust on my dress.  I remember eating pancakes on Sundays at church and once they were running out and my friend (who was a boy, but not my boyfriend) gave me his pancake because I wanted another one.  I remember taking communion on the 5th Sunday of a month.  I remember being shocked when they allowed me to be an acolyte and actually carry a flame down the aisle and light a candle.

I remember the fun summer of swimming.  I remember my favorite pink bathing suit which was a two piece.  I remember walking from the pool to the store across the street to pick up candy (Now & Laters, Fun Dip, Razzles, Boston Baked Beans, Pop Rocks, Big League Chew, etc. and my brother loved to get Atomic Fireballs).  I remember having to sit on the side of the pool once every hour.  The lifeguards said it was  necessary, but I thought it was because the adults wanted some adult pool time without us kids in the way.  I remember being scared to dive off the board.  I remember really only doing it twice in my entire life.  The last time was such an mortifying moment that I have refused to dive or jump in a pool since.  I remember the basic instinct of trust.  All of my friend's moms were my extra moms.  I remember eating the best banana pudding on the planet from a restaurant that I can't remember.  I remember HUGE trees.  These things were massive and I would love to know if they were truly as massive as I remember. 

I have a wish.  I would love for all of my old friends to be in one place and for all of us to get together as adults.  I've seen a lot of them in the last few years, but I haven't seen all of them.  Now I'm not naive, I know we aren't 10 to 12 anymore.  I know people have changed.  I would like to think that if I had stayed there that we would have all stayed best friends through high school.  I realize now that we got the best of each other before the drama of hormones and influx of new friends at middle school.   However, it would be nice to create new memories with them instead of the images I have in my head of all of us being 10 to 12.










Friday, August 17, 2012

Re-introducing myself to all of you

This is taken from bits and pieces of old blogs and plus some new information.  I want to reintroduce myself to all of you for all the new readers. I began this blog entitled Living the Lyme Life in September of 2008.  I had already been in treatment for Lyme for 18 months and wish that I had begun the blog earlier. Although if I had started the blog earlier, the name would have been titled:  Living a symptom filled day with no actual diagnosis life. Quite a mouth full.


My name is Jennifer and this is my blog.  I began the fight of my life in 1995.  I wrote specifically on the years between 1995 and 2007 on a blog entry entitled Jennifer's Background Story.  This was specifically about when my fight began and the doctors I saw.  It talks about some of my experiences and also my experience the first time I saw my Lyme Literate Doctor. Since my Lyme diagnosis in 2007, I've dabbled in other diagnoses too. I've had mineral deficiency, progesterone deficiency, heavy metal toxicity, multiple co-infections, anemia and multiple other health issues. My PICC Line was inserted into my right arm in July 2008 and I battled keeping it safe daily until February 2009.  Thanks to my wonderful nurses, doctors, insertion team and my husband, I was able to keep my line much longer than I should have.  I used it right up until the night before it was finally pulled and based on how it looked when we pulled it, it probably should have been pulled a few months prior. 

 Most people assume that because I had a PICC line that it was used for antibiotic therapy.  However, it was not used for this.  We used the PICC line for IV vitamins, minerals and other supplemental therapies such as Chelation for the heavy metal toxicity.  In addition to these things, I used an experimental IV protocol for about 9 months.  It is no longer available and I rarely talk about it because of it's controversial nature.  However, I feel like that protocol did more for me than any other protocol combined.  It brought me to remission until the past fall when I slipped out of remission.

I tried Low Dose Naltraxone and while it has worked for others, it gave me terrible headaches.  We finally gave up.  I also used a lot of hyperbaric therapy. I feel it worked really well on some of my symptoms (especially my headaches and fatigue), but due to financial struggles I stopped going as much as I was.  I've utilized a variety of homeopathic remedies and still use some of them even today, but a few months ago I began a new oral antibiotic regiment.  I am supposed to be on four different antibiotics, but I am only able to tolerate three of the four.  My doctor and I will make a call here shortly about whether or not I am in need of another PICC line to use for supplemental and antibiotic therapies.  This worries me, but if I have to undergo this again I feel that I am a little better prepared. 

Currently, I feel that about 90 percent of my life revolves around my Lyme symptom. It stinks, but I live with it.  My husband and I got married in April of 2000.  He is my rock.  He supports me with his quirky sense of humor.  His determination to get to the root of my health issues saved my life.  Together we have rescued dogs.  We have an adopted lab mix from the SPCA and a rescued Dachshund.  We recently moved from our first home into a new home.  Back in December of 2011, I quit my position at a child care center.  It took me a while to do this and I struggled with the decision.  However after my two weeks notice was over, my boss offered me a substitute position and I go in every  now and then to help out. It gives me a little therapy for the soul.  







Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Sitting here

My head hurts so badly that I can see colors of pink and green.   I'm trying to push through the pain because I feel guilty for just sitting here day after day.  I shouldn't feel guilty.  I have this disease that no person (without Lyme) could understand.    So today, I am pushing through the pain.  I started with one load of laundry.  I simply hung up a load of my husband's shirts.  Then I pushed myself to wash and dry and fold a load of towels.  Then I pushed myself again to wash and dry and put away another load of laundry. Now, I wash sheets and blankets that have been sitting in a dirty clothes bin since May.   My goal today is to simply get through all of the laundry in the house.  I want to be able to look at the bottom of every single laundry basket including the load of shirts that I want to hang dry instead of putting them in the dryer. I'm getting there, but I hurt.  I hurt so badly that I just want to cry.  I want to crawl into the bed and cover my head in hopes to stop the pain, but that won't help.  So I sit here doing what will help.  The laundry.  It will make me feel better to get to the bottom of the baskets. I sit here. I don't remember the last day I didn't have some sort of headache.