Do you see any of these in yourself or others in your life?
- Moody and irritable
- Rigidity
- Impulsivity
- Poor insight
- New distractibility
- Trouble finishing a task
- Acting unwisely with money, drinking, drugs, sex or speech content
- Decreased speech speed and smoothness
- Decreased coordination
- Stress with transitions or change
- Routine lateness
- Empathic deficits
- Social group-think perception deficits
- Poor boundary awareness
A lab told me my patients had many positive results for Lyme. They routinely report negatives. Upon reflection, I realized that I was testing people that had very subtle personality signs. Signs commonly missed by their relatives, friends and physicians.
It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so.
Mark Twain
Yet if you asked these three groups directly, they would then agree they were present. Or they would see a change or a problem but never consider Lyme, biotoxins or severe inflammation as the cause.
Since missing Lyme, biotoxins from indoor mold or chronic inflammation, routinely causes death, I felt compelled to put some sample observations of these three problems in print.
All three affect the front of the brain, appropriately in the front of your head. We call this the "frontal lobe." Think of it as the top of a pyramid. And if a "brick" is out of place, the top of the pyramid will be "off." Similarly, if brain tissue is irritated, inflamed or infected below the frontal lobe, it will hurt its normal function. So why should you care? Again, the brain is probably the most sensitive organ in terms of irregularities. If you deprive it of glucose or oxygen for minutes you are dead, but many muscles can last hours.
Common Frontal Signs
"Flaky" & "Spacy"
*Kim is called "flaky" because she is regularly distracted. She was not that way till she moved to Long Island at the age of twenty-four. She has two kids who are now in school, and while she is busy, even when on a vacation for the weekend with girlfriends she is distracted. Her basement was found to have three species of toxic mold.
"Clueless" About Self Health
*Ed is a respected engineer with a home near deer walkways and rare mice. The neighbor's horse gets two shots a year for "Lyme." A man a few blocks away died of an aneurysm two years ago. Ed's daughter has an unusual arm tingling problem. When I mentioned he might consider being tested by a progressive lab like IgeneX or Bowen for Lyme, he saw no need. He gets "regular yearly exams and lab work, takes nutrients, and exercises."
A year later a child down the street had a seizure and was diagnosed with Lyme. Ed's dog was also diagnosed with Lyme in a routine screening test. He still sees no need for his own testing. He feels "fine." Why would a very smart man, who prepares for everything in his business, not be able to connect many Lyme risks and get a $180-250 test? Insight impairment.
*Mark is a physician who has read hundreds of pages on chronic untreated Lyme and the biotoxins Lyme leaves after it is dead. He knows he has had the illness at least twenty years. He does a couple months of antibiotics and then stops talking to his physician. He also stops taking cholestyramine to bind up the Lyme toxins. Without thinking he drifts into a state of non-reflection and non-treatment. Why? His ability to evaluate himself, or his "eye on himself" is impaired.
Impulsivity
*Michelle has been arguing with her husband allot this year. She spends so much money on cloths, crafts, furniture and antiques that he says it seems she wants him to work to death. She feels guilty at times, and does not know why she spends as she does.
*Her brother "acts out" with drinking and marijuana. He has wanted to cut back on both, but finds it very challenging. He has tried NA and AA, but finds it hard to attend in a sustained way.
*Tom struggles with anger and since his visit to his friend's home in Harrisburg, PA on a hunting trip in the surrounding counties, he finds he "goes off" on his wife in a way that scares her. She is fairly stunned that his drive has turned into greater work intensity and hostility at modest frustrations. He curses, yells and throws things. "He never did this before." She reports. He came back positive for Lyme and Bartonella.
*Lynn loves her husband. He works hard, and she knows he is trying to find them a better life. She is frustrated with her life and yet is unable to explain why. She has traditional morals, but ends up sleeping with the local pharmacist. She asks, "What was I thinking?" She reported having a bulls-eye rash when she was nineteen, and being treated only two weeks with a low dose antibiotic.
Rigidity-to new ideas, changes, demands on time
*Anthony is a bright man, and he has "always been open to new ideas." Recently, he has had worsening pain in his knees and shoulder. He used to play different sports, which caused some injury to these joints. When he mentioned that they were originally from New Jersey, I mentioned Lyme, which has enzymes to dissolve cartilage and can affect bones. He rolled her eyes when I mentioned this, and yet tried to not let me see. I mentioned to him that Lyme could make any area of body weakness--worse. (He kept forgetting this point in our conversations. I guess his joints are somehow affecting his memory?) He mentioned he had been too see Dr. Jones and the prestigious Dr. Smith, and if "I had Lyme I am sure they would have checked for it." I asked him since when were surgeons, who were being sued and made bankrupt, able to find the "free time" to read about cutting-edge tick illness disease material? The unwillingness to even consider my comments a possibility shows frontal rigidity. He refused testing.
*Mark has been having some chest tightness and depression for many years. He was hospitalized twenty-three years ago for a very high fever. He was given antibiotics for an "unidentified infection" and after twelve days was released. Yet he had residual fatigue, depression and anxiety. He has seen over thirty different physicians in six states, trying to find a cause of his emotional trouble. When his labs came back he was positive for Lyme, Erlichia and Bartonella. They were repeated--the same results. Ticks, especially poppy-seed sized ticks, carry these three common infections. He also showed a high inflammation (high MMP-9), and HLA genes that showed he was very mold susceptible to mold biotoxins. He said over ten times, over and over again in the months that followed, "I just cannot believe all those good and respected doctor's missed this diagnosis." He was treated with four different antibiotics, then Actos to cool down his inflammation genes, and cholestyramine to remove the Lyme and indoor mold biotoxins. He is better every few weeks and is improved 80%. He is off three of his psychiatric medications and the other two are markedly more effective. He was agitated and suicidal when I first met him, now he is only occasionally bored.
Narcissism/Profound Self-Centered Thinking
*Alice complains routinely. She high jacks conversations to talk about herself. When you talk with her you sense she is not connecting--you could just as easily be a chair. She was diagnosed with Lyme by IgeneX, Bowen Research and had a SPECT scan consistent with Lyme. On a heavy metal challenge she showed elevated arsenic and lead. A home water test by Doctor's Data found both metals elevated in the well water. After treatment, she slowly had a personality shift. Her ability to care and connect is clearly improved.
Processing Trauma
*Pam had her husband cheat on her during their early years of marriage. She is married over 30 years and talks about it like it was yesterday. I have no evidence that he has violated his vows since those early years when he was an alcoholic. They have had eight years of therapy, but the pain of the betrayal has not been "metabolized." Both are IgeneX positive for Lyme and she is also positive for Bartonella. After four months of treatment, she suddenly came up positive after five failed Western Blot Lyme tests done at a routine massive national USA Laboratory. She had a bulls-eye Lyme rash in the 80's and two years ago.
Excess Irritability
*Tom has slowly become more hostile over the last fifteen years. He scares his wife with his temper. She reports at times he "shorts out." He is unsettled if faced with more than one topic or activity at a time. Occasionally, modest sounds, sunlight or people talking all at once anger him. Often their children speak simultaneously--it seems to cut him with an invisible knife. He yells at them.
He is very hostile at the end of a workweek, and seems thin skinned, with little emotional reserve for the weekend. He improved for four months with a new generation antidepressant and an anxiety medication, but dose increases did not regain his improvement. He was PCR Lyme positive on his sixth urine at Medical Diagnostic Laboratory and had a positive Western Blot with IgeneX. After treatment, his wife and older daughter reported he a 75-80% improvement in his mood. He opted to stay on both his antidepressant and anxiety medication.
Eccentric Personalities
*Doug is called "unusual" by his loved ones, and is despised by many people in his company. He is hard to understand. He is clearly self-centered, but something else is present. He assumes others in the company and community would do him ill. He does not seem to care for anyone but his wife and kids. He is smart, but some of his activities are fairly bizarre. He takes credit for projects obviously designed by others. He hides behind corners to listen to other employees. He feels he has wisdom on medical matters that he has not even studied. His four daughters are all Lyme positive and one had a Bulls-Eye rash sixteen years ago. He refuses testing.
Road Runner
*Ellen was always a vibrant person, but in the last four years she seems wired and unusually intense. Her personality is like a fire hose, and she is uncomfortable unless she is moving and doing. She has no depressive restlessness or anxiety. She is most comfortable doing fifteen things at once, and living frenetically. She is Lyme positive along with another member of her household. She has been called, "hypomanic" and "an overwhelming personality," but she has no insight into this increased eccentric energy.
Forgetful
*Barbara jokes about her memory and about her "age." She is only forty-six. Her mother has a better memory! While memory is related to many parts of the brain, the frontal lobes are also included. She is Lyme positive.
Organization Extremes
*Tony is a computer tech who has always liked some order. Yet two years ago after a trip to upper New York State fishing, his housemate and friends noticed he gradually became more unsettled with slight "disorder." Changes that bother him more include a plate left out, a bill paid too close to the due date, unexpected modest changes to his budget and car cleanliness. He was found to be positive for Lyme, Bartonella and Erlichia.
*Marianne's home has slowly become very sloppy and disorganized. She lives alone, since no one has wanted to live in such a messy home. In past years she has managed different businesses, and so clearly this is a lost ability. She is Lyme and American Babesia positive, in addition to regular exposure to outdoor water with biotoxic algae. After treatment with antibiotics, Actos and cholestyramine, and another short-term anti-inflammation agent, along with removal from her water exposure, she eventually could manage her home, bills and life better.
Regressed Feelings & Thoughts
*Kimberly has slowly been feeling a need to be closer to her family and especially her mother for reasons she does not understand. She finds a deeper need for affection, "being heard" and time alone with her mother. Nothing in her life circumstances seems sufficient to explain this change. She feels her feelings towards her family and mother is now "clingy." She is Lyme positive.
*Kevin used to be moderately open-minded, but now he seems to think in caricatures. People are smart or stupid, good or bad, mature or childish, black or white. People are for him or against him, supportive or drags. He is Lyme and Erlichia positive, in addition to exposure to indoor toxic mold in his second home in the mountains.
Dead Creativity
Lisa has a good sense of humor and likes to design flowerbeds. She also is an exceptional dog breeder. Over the past years she has become less spontaneous. She might think of a quip, but by the time she gets it out, the timing is past. She occasionally plants a few plants, but she has gone from annuals to perennials--she doubts she will have the drive to do even those next year. She has asked her niece to handle the breeding strategy, and tells herself this is because of her niece's experience. But her niece does not have these gifts. Lisa is Lyme and Babesia positive.
This list is not complete. Yet hopefully it will expand the discernment of relatives, friends and people who are currently positive, to "see themselves." My Frontal lobe examples could have many different causes. Yet I have listed commonly missed causes.
To Your Health and the Health of Your Loved Ones,
Dr. J