Reprinted with the permission of itslyme.com #MyLymeLife
Doctors tested me for MS, ALS, Lupus, Lyme disease and vitamin deficiencies but everything kept showing up normal.
When I was 18 I got very sick with a flu-like illness in the summer that didn’t go away. Months later, doctors found campylobacter (a bacteria that infects the intestines) in my digestive track and diagnosed me with Gerd and IBS. I was put on antibiotics for a few weeks and symptoms subsided. Since then I’ve experienced on and off IBS issues that gradually got worse over the years. I developed a food intolerance to both gluten and dairy. It wasn’t until the early spring of 2016 things got really bad.
I had just finished my latest bodybuilding competition and during my whole 20-week prep, I knew something was off. I contributed it to dieting and training too hard for the show. I thought after the show was done things would go back to normal but they didn’t. I developed bad fatigue and the following summer I got shingles. That’s when things really took a turn for the worse.
I had just finished my latest bodybuilding competition and during my whole 20 week prep I knew something was off.
Bryce at a bodybuilding competition
My face and legs began to tingle and twitch and felt like there were bugs crawling on my shins. I developed balance and cognitive issues. I also had floaters in my field of vision. I gradually became weaker but loved the gym so I still kept it up (to this day) but had to stop competing in bodybuilding. I also developed shooting pains in my legs as well as night terrors and anxiety. Doctors tested me for MS, ALS, Lupus, Lyme disease and vitamin deficiencies but everything kept showing up normal.
It wasn’t until I spoke to a lady in Brandon, Manitoba (Canada) who has Lyme disease and she mentioned the testing can be extremely inaccurate and doctors often misdiagnose patients who have Lyme disease. I ended up seeing a naturopath in Winnipeg, Manitoba (Canada) who thought my story fit Lyme disease. He suggested I send my bloodwork to IGeneX labs in California which is a lab that specializes in testing various Lyme strains and its co-infections. I ended up paying $1800 CAD for the IGeneX test and about four weeks later my result came back positive for Lyme and the co-infection Babesia (an infection caused by a malaria-like parasite that infects red blood cells). I then had to travel to Vancouver, BC (Canada) to see a Lyme-literate doctor who could properly treat me. He also clinically diagnosed me with the co-infection Bartonella (bacteria that live inside cells that can infect humans and a wide range of other animals and causes cat-scratch disease, endocarditis, and several other serious diseases in humans).
Bryce’s Symptom Breakdown:
First onset symptoms: fatigue, digestive issues, shingles, tingling, and twitching.
Recall tick bite/bullseye rash: no; no rash
Diagnosis of Lyme Disease: none, but suspected MS, ALS, vitamin deficiency
Lyme Disease & co-infections diagnosed by: blood test through lab in the USA (IGeneX)
The Chronic Lyme Series: Bryce’s Story
Bryce lives in Bandon, Manitoba, Canada. At the time of writing Bryce had been receiving treatment for almost four months, and with a lot of ups and downs, he is optimistic that he has seen some improvement.
