I wanted to send out a quick blog update because I really have no idea how I will react to treatment--whether I will be MIA or whether I will still be up to computer stuff. I, of course, way overestimated how many folks I would get to email and how many blogs I would get written before treatment started! Ah, the story of my life.
I've been fighting for two months to get this all in place. I'm still waiting for the last little piece to fall into place--hoping that the bicillin will actually arrive at the pharmacy Thursday morning so it will be there for me Friday!
The pharmacy ordered a brand of bicillin not covered by Medical Assistance, so they had to reorder a brand that MA would cover. Can I tell you how many calls I had to make between MA, the pharmacy and the doctor to figure this all out? Good grief. This is how the whole process has been for the past two months.
I started wondering if perhaps God was trying to tell me something--like, hey, don't do this treatment?!
I hope I have chosen the 'right path' for me by persisting and fighting for the bicillin shots.
Anyways, the scoop is that the shots will take place once a week as long as I am tolerating them. We will start with 1/4 of a dose (they come in already measured syringes with a full dose) and work up from there. Bicillin is basically a long-acting form of penicillin that is injected in the muscle. This method is more aggressive than oral antibiotics (which I am doing now), but less aggressive than IV antibiotics, which we know my body could not take. The other advantage is that with the injections, we bybass my stomach which has taken quite a beating from the minocycline. Bicillin stays in the body for about a month.
One other advantage is that I will get a shot, have time to 'dump' the Lyme toxins into my body and then hopefully have some time to detox a bit and clear out the toxins before the next shot. With the regimen I am on now, I am putting antibiotics in my body five times a week and I seem to herx continuosly and be unable to detox. Hopefully, with the bicillin shots being once a week I will have a little time to clear out the lyme die-off.
There are many, many different antibiotics used to treat Lyme. Some people even use a cocktail of different classes of antibiotics all at one time. I chose the bicillin based on talking to other people with Lyme and hearing personal experiences, as well as talking to my Lyme doctor. It's pretty much a crapshoot trying to find the antibiotic that will work for each individual patient!
I'll be camping out at the doctor's office from 8:30 am until about 10:30 am on Friday to make sure that I do not have any reactions or such (keep your fingers crossed, send good thoughts, say your prayers! :)) Thank goodness for iPods!
I will hopefully still be able to blog a bit after the injections start, but I just don't know! Although, Anne and Scott caught the most classic Freudian slip in my blog about the Herxheimer reaction. I wrote that a herx can cause a 'drop in blog pressure' instead of a 'drop in blood pressure'. Both Anne and Scott thought this was quite fitting--as they expect me to blog less and have less pressure to blog when I am herxing! I didn't even catch the typo until they pointed it out.
So, I'm trying to take the pressure off of myself to blog if my blood pressure is dropping...but I'll miss blogging for sure, and would certainly rather be blogging than herxing.
Thank you to all of you who have been my cheering squad through this all. Wow! Humbling. You've been so supportive. I have to laugh a bit though because so many folks have said they are really 'excited' for me about this new treatment. I have to admit that I'm feeling more terrified at the moment than excited!
I try not to ask for too much in the good thoughts/prayer department, but my new counselor says I need to put it out there. So, I guess I feel like I really have a lot riding on this next step-- whether we can find a treatment to work for me, one that I can tolerate, and one that can give me some quality of life back. I feel like I have a lot of my sense of hope riding on these little syringes ready to inject long-acting penicillin into my body.
Blessings and I'll be in touch via blog as I am able,
Emily
No comments:
Post a Comment