What is your take on Lyme as a diagnosis for ongoing neuro issues?

[freefallin]

I've been experiencing progressively worsening neurological issues for the past about 9 years of my life. The first issue I experienced was a loss of my sense of taste; food suddenly tasted like nothing one day when I was 14 years old. Then I started having issues pronouncing certain words, dizzy spells, issues with balance, trouble remembering words, a near inability to concentrate, difficulty processing new information, ringing in my right ear, excruciating 24/7 headaches, frequent urination (like every 20 minutes), brain fog, hand and tongue tremors, sensitivity to certain types of lighting, and a few other issues. Doctors can't figure out what's wrong with me. They usually just see that I'm 23 years old and conclude that it's all in my head because I'm too young to be seriously ill. Out of desperation, I went to an acupuncturist/herbalist, and he's telling me that my symptomology sounds consistent with Lyme Disease. I've looked into Lyme in the past, but I gave up on considering it as a viable option because it seemed like every symptom in the book was supposedly associated with Lyme kind of how you can attribute just about anything to anxiety, depression, or fibromyalgia.

Looking for opinions essentially. Is the talk about Lyme Disease in the alternative medicine sphere hype, or is there some validity to it? He told me that getting tested for it won't necessarily rule out  the possibility of Lyme because the test yields a lot of  false negatives and positives.

[freefallin]

I'm not sure.
I know the potatoes are no-goes because they're in the nightshade family, but I have to do more research to find what's so bad about the nightshade family. I think bananas and several other fruits are forbidden because of their glycemic index, but I would need to read the book this diet is based on to understand the rationale behind eliminating certain foods and incorporating others.

[mojogal]

Gottcha,
We just don't want to see you wait and get worse. The longer you wait, the harder to cure.

[JackieCalifornia]

Why no bananas and potatoes?

[freefallin]

He wasn't trying to tell me that changing diet would cure me of Lyme (which he never said I definitely have). What he was saying was that, if I'm not comfortable taking herbal formulas, we can still work on my diet, which may help at least lessen some symptoms and which would be better than doing nothing at all.

[mojogal]

You can always get the grant and do the phone consult route.
I don't believe that changing diet will cure you of the Lyme, if it was that easy we would all have done it.
Just think about it.....

[freefallin]

Thanks for the suggestion, Bob. I don't think the symptoms of toxoplasmosis sound that consistent with my symptoms, but who knows! They're pretty nonspecific just like the symptoms of all of these other conditions that affect the nervous system. Why can't everything be more clear cut?!

I saw my acupuncturist yesterday, and he didn't sound as confident that I may have Lyme. I mentioned to him that I wasn't comfortable taking aconite-containing formulas, and he said if I wanted, we could nix the herbal route all together and just focus on dietary changes and acupuncture. I told him that, if I have Lyme, that won't take care of it, and he was just kind of like, "I don't know if you have Lyme." He also said that he didn't think it was really necessary to get tested for it since he's seen many herbalists treat people successfully with Lyme-like symptoms who didn't have a formal diagnosis. He also kind of reinforced what ILADS told me; we live in a very non-progressive state, so finding an LLMD is pretty much not going to happen. He has me on a very strict diet protocol now. So many of my favorite healthy foods like bananas and potatoes are forbidden. :( I'm willing to try it, however.