Barons Jan 6th

Since I last posted Megan did Home MTC, Provo MTC, and arrived in Georgia. Right now she lives in Roswell, Georgia which is a city almost as large as Orem on the outskirts of north Atlanta, about half an hour from downtown Atlanta.

She is in a trio companionship and leaves with another companionship so there are five of them in one apartment. Her area is in Milton and Alpharetta, which is about 10-15 minutes from her apartment.

It’s been kind of a weird time to start her mission because of the holidays. She has spent a lot of time hanging out with the members and other missionaries.

The time before Christmas was crazy, as it is for most people. Here are some of the things we did –

• Go to Eliza’s honor band concert
• Watch Kayla and her cousins sing in a stake musical fireside
• Go to Kayla’s Seminary Choir concert
• Go to Ruby’s Choir concert
• Go to Kayla’s Choir concert
• Go to our annual nativity event at my parent’s house
• Go to Ruby’s Orchestra concert
• Kayla, Eliza, Kate, and I went to the Tabernacle Choir Christmas Concert
• Go out to dinner and play games with Darrin and Mindy and some of their family
• Have a nice Christmas Eve dinner at my brother’s house
• Have a fun Christmas day at one of my other brother’s house
• Go to Darrin’s grandson’s baptism and go out for lunch and later dinner

I’m sure most of you had similar schedules. When you put all that with all the regular activities, school, work, doctor appointments, etc. we were ready for a break. It turns out that the week between Christmas and New Year’s was relatively relaxing and much appreciated.

My Health Update

My health and crashing issues were getting worse even though I was trying really hard so I finally just gave up trying to do it the affordable way, which was basically just wasting my time and money, and decided to take a chance on a doctor that doesn’t take insurance.

I have been going to Forum Health in Orem, which is really expensive since they don’t take health insurance. I kept finding their website over and over when I would put in the various symptoms that I had. I’m paying for it with our HSA account that we have been putting money into for a few years and trying not to spend.

At our first appointment he talked to me for a long time and decided what blood tests to run. They ended up taking I think 23 of those vials of blood and I had blood work done at three different places. Most of the bloodwork wasn’t too exciting and told me things I already knew.

He did do a food allergy test and I was happy to see I didn’t have that many allergies anymore, which says to me that NAET works. Most of the random things that showed on the blood work were foods I had already figured out that made me “crash” so I went and had NAET done for those foods over the course of a few weeks. That is a relatively easy fix.

So now I have a few more foods I can eat. There are still plenty of other foods and food combinations that make me crash but at least I can eat some things now that I couldn’t before.

The biggest issues that came up on the blood work were several chronic infections. Most of them I already suspected were giving me a problem but I could never find a doctor that would test me for them, let alone have a solution of how to get rid of them. Here’s what came up –

• Long COVID
• One specific type of Lyme disease called Borrelia Burgdorferi
• Babesiosis (which is related to Lyme somehow)
• Cytomegalovirus
• Epstein Barr Virus
• Parvovirus B19
• Herpes Simplex 1
• Streptococcal A

I’m actually excited to know about these viruses. I’ve had so many random symptoms over the years and could never find the cause of them. I suspect that many people have chronic viruses and don’t know it. With these chronic diseases, your body basically gives up trying to fight them and you don’t actually feel sick but the viruses go around doing damage and causing symptoms all over your body.

Here’s a summary of my base treatment plant, which is subject to change –

• Depress the histamine systems in my body with some supplements and prescriptions
• Boost my immune system with some supplements and prescriptions
• Take some supplements to improve my gut
• Take a supplement to help with the biofilm that is basically a shield protecting all these chronic infections

I started with all the above, adding something new in every few days. I don’t feel all that different with most of the pills but I trust that they are helping. However, with one of the supplements, I noticed that almost immediately after I started taking it my crashing was very improved. I was crashing almost every day before and now it is more like once a week – so that is encouraging!

So all the above is to get my body prepared to start fighting the various infections. We have to fight eat one individually and go in a certain order.

I started with long COVID. I am taking one round of Ivermectin which I think will last 90 days. I finished and can’t tell much of a difference but they said to keep taking that until it’s gone and start on LDI therapy for the Lyme disease.

The idea behind it sounds a lot like allergy shots or homeopathic drops. The first step is to find the correct dose. The doctor’s office makes it by hand and puts it in needles so they can easily measure it. I break off the tip of the needle and squirt the liquid under my tongue, then let it sit for a minute then swallow.

If nothing happens, then in ten days I move up to the next highest dosage. If I have some improvement then I take the dose again. If I get worse, that means I have too high of a dose and I have to wait seven weeks to move back down on the dose.

Once I get the correct dose then I stay on that dose for 2-3 years. It trains my body to not overreact to Lyme, like when you get allergy shots it teaches your body to not overreact to pollen. It’s kind of weird because the Lyme is still in my body but good because if I was to get re-infected then nothing would happen. I don’t totally understand it.

They told me it would likely take a few weeks or months to get the correct dose but I felt quite a bit better for a few days the first time I took the lowest dose so they want me to try that dose again next week and see if I feel better for longer.

So, in summary, I’m going to a new, expensive doctor who found some problems with me and explained a lot of stuff to me for hours that I don’t completely understand but all I need to know is what to do when and eventually I will start feeling a lot better (hopefully).

After we finish the LDI for Lyme then we may do it for other infections and/or we may move on to some other treatments he briefly explained to me. It’s all very individual and dependent on how your body reacts to each treatment.

I’m feeling good about it and hopefully, I will eventually feel a lot better. I hope the money I’m spending on it will be worth it in the long run because I can eventually spend a lot less time and money on doctors and supplements. Also, if I feel better then I will be better able to earn more money to pay for the doctor but, more importantly, just feel better so I can live a more fulfilling life.