good news PANS /PANDAS LYME

[msegal7]

Hi all,

I am an addicted reader here on the forum and have posted a few times but mostly dig for information. I have felt a little badly not sharing our successes and the moment I consider posting, the wheels seem to come off the bus. I wanted to post our progress now because my DS 14 is doing so well and I think it might be of help to some of you. I know I read and re read those hopeful success stories during the dark days of PANS.

 

My DS began treatment 2 years ago and we began to scratch at the layers thinking the sudden onset of tics, ocd, anxiety and sleeplessness was strictly strep related. Wishful thinking.....it has been quite a journey. There are moments it seems there isn't an antibiotic we didn't try. We found Dr. T, then we found another local doctor who is more familiar with Lyme and PANS in general and we were off. It has been a very long road and there have been a lot of ups and down. We tried so many different supplements I could run a vitamin shoppe from my pantry of things that held promise but didn't work or caused a rapid decline. Slowly but surely we began to peel away the onion layers. We used multiple antibiotics and we pulsed tindamax (2 weeks on and 2 weeks off). We tried every anti inflammatory supplement we could find and we really saw improvement. There were flares pretty often and just when I thought we were rounding the corner, he would turn back around and run the other way. It was very up and down.

 

Sometime, about 3 months ago, I realized that we were missing something. He was at about 85% but I couldn't find a way to get him all the way home. I didn't want to settle for almost back to normal. It didn't feel like antibiotics were going to get us there. I started thinking we were having a serious detox issue and that his gut was causing the problem also. I couldn't figure out what we had missed because it felt we had addressed so many angles.

 

I read the boards a lot but only squinted through anything on methylation. I was afraid to even consider it....thought my head would explode. Thanks to all of you (LLM) for your brilliant input and critical advice. I had my son on Quercetin, Garlic and anytime I gave him an epsom salt bath he itched for hours. He reacted to B vitamins with increased ticcing. I had to look at methylation. I ordered the 23 and me and sure enough we have some significant mutations that require us to alter the supplements we are giving. The main thing was a CBS mutation. I took him off all things that might cause a problem temporarily while waiting for our Dr. appointment to discuss the results and lo and behold he got to 90%. Then we started slowly adding in herbal remedies following Buhner (thanks Rowingmom.) We did this with the help of an herbalist and we went low and slow. I started to back down some of the western medicine (cefdiner, malarone) and we are now at 95%. I am slowly ramping up the herbal tinctures and watching in amazement as we see the re emergence of our boy.

 

I wanted to update all of you and give a little hope. There is a way out of all of this and it requires an ability to zig and zag and swear to something only to swear it off the next day. It requires flexibility and diligence and the support of all of the people out there who have been in your shoes and truly understand your pain. I wanted to let you know that we see the light here at the end of the tunnel.....and if it stalls out.....we will do something else.

 

Hang in there. You are all amazing and your kids are lucky to have you.

 

[msimon3]

So happy for you! Thank you for sharing your update. It is great and inspirational to see a success story like this.

[rowingmom]

Nicely done!

[ktdommer]

How wonderful for your family!

[qannie47]

ditto to rowing mom!

[chubbermommy]

Thank you for sharing that. I also read and re-read the success stories on this board. I'm so happy for you and your son. One day, we'll get there too!

[stacestar]

I'm so glad your son is doing so well!

 

I just wanted to say I like one of your last lines you wrote, (well, of course the whole post was good, as it's filled with good news!), but to me this especially means something:

"we see the light here at the end of the tunnel, and if it stalls out…we will do something else."

 

I'm grateful that my son is doing really well too, but there is still that last bit to deal with. I sometimes get frustrated, thinking…why isn't this done yet? Or I sometimes get anxious or scared, but then lately I've been finding peace in thinking the same idea you wrote so well there…that there's a light at the end of the tunnel, I can see it, and we will get there, one way of another…we will.

 

(and I have to throw in a thanks to rowing mom too! I think she's found her calling.)