Transformational Counseling™

Lyme Disease
& Chronic Illness

I believe there is a way back to relative health, and onward to peace of mind, life fulfillment, and lasting happiness; even after you have been infected with the dreaded Lyme disease spirochete, or perhaps diagnosed with other chronic illnesses.

I believe that for most there is still a way to move forward towards the recovery of your health, and the pursuit of your life dreams.

I believe this based on my own first-hand experience.

In our sessions we will dig deeply into your situation and look for a way back to normalcy. But first please read the Medical Disclaimer below, and then allow me to recount an abbreviated version of my story.

My Lyme Story

In 1998 and again in 2005 I was twice unknowingly infected with Borrelia burgdorferi, aka Lyme disease, which went misdiagnosed and thereby untreated for almost 12 years. There was no bull’s-eye rash. I never saw the insect. I suddenly became very ill the first time, and even more ill the second time, and each time I had no idea what was happening to me.

Since my early teenage years I have had a strong interest in nature, health, fitness, nutrition and wellness. I was always very active in the outdoors: camping, hiking, mountain climbing, canoeing, kayaking, parasailing, snorkeling, snowshoeing, skiing, birdwatching, kite flying, stargazing, wild food foraging, animal tracking, rollerblading, sunbathing, playing sports, etc. I was an amateur nature photographer and something of an amateur marksman as well. I was always in the woods or up on a mountain or out on the water, exploring and enjoying the natural world. Nature in all its beauty and complexity was one of my passions.

In 1998 I moved for a few years to historic Rhinebeck, NY, a frequent haunt of America’s Founding Fathers, and one of the early epicenters of Lyme disease. I was living on a property with woodland and wetland and all variety of birds and deer and critters living outside of the house, and a small menagerie of dogs and cats, and the occasional mouse or bat or frog or snapping turtle visiting inside the house.

Living in an idyllic rural setting, our pets were free to come and go from the house as they pleased. I was aware of the Lyme disease epidemic and thought I took reasonable precautions to avoid it. I sprayed my pants, boots and legs prior to outings and we used tick collars and applied the requisite toxic creams to our pet’s fur. I kept the large yards well mowed and scattered pyrethrum traps and thousands of insect eating praying mantises around the property.

Nevertheless I soon enough developed some strange and disturbing health symptoms that I at first suspected might be Lyme.

Suddenly one day I became unable to walk upon waking in the morning. Crawling to the bathroom with pain and brain fog, confused and frightened, disoriented and fearful about what was happening — thus began my descent into the nightmare of Lyme disease.

As the strange symptoms continued to develop I began to seek medical advice. At a local clinic specializing in Lyme disease I was tested for Lyme and a variety of other possible causes.

Early Lyme tests, it turns out were highly unreliable. And so it was that in 1998 my first ELISA (enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay) test returned a False Negative result. This little piece of medical misinformation led to many years of expensive, useless, misguided tests and treatments, none of which did me any good, while I dragged myself from doctor to doctor, specialist to specialits and clinic to clinic, wihout a proper diagnoses.

During those years, I must say that my trials and tribulations were many, my suffering rather great. Though previously healthy and fit, and despite a healthy, mostly organic, low-calorie, low-glycemic diet, I now experienced endless complications and side-effects, including: failure of the thyroid gland, the onset of hypertension, pre-diabetes, neurological illnesses, catastrophic level tinnitus, excessive weight gain, inflamation and swelling, generalized joint and body pain, chronic severe reoccurring headaches, crippling chronic fatigue, non-allergic chronic sinusitis with severe breathing problems, cognitive impairment, mental fogs and confusion, the onset of nightmares, phobias and eventually depression and PTSD symptoms as well.

I know that many of you who are reading this now, likely may have been through similar difficulties, perhaps even health challenges or personal tragedies that make my story pale by comparison. You may still be experiencing such problems right now. If so I hope we will have the opportunity to discuss your situation.

Back to my story...

During that dark time of my life, I frequently found myself sitting in doctor’s offices and clinics with patients of various ages and demographics, whose one commonality was that their lives had been shattered by a nanoscopic genetically-modified spirochete bacterium know as Borrelia burgdorferi, or Lyme disease.

Hooked up to IVs or sitting in waiting rooms, I listened to their heart-wrenching stories, and I thought, “well, nobody knows what the hell’s wrong with me yet — but thank God I don’t have Lyme disease!”

And so my mysterious condition was not appropriately treated and my symptoms worsened and progressed.

Then, in 2009 a friend from childhood contacted me out of the blue, an optometrist who had himself survived Lyme disease. Upon listening to my story and asking a series of questions, he suggested that my initial test was likely a false negative and I should be retested immediately. Why hadn’t I thought of this?! Why hadn’t any of my doctors thought of this?!

Lo and behold, the new tests came back positive and very much so. After retesting with the by then somewhat improved ELISA test, as well as Western Blot and Cytokine Testing, a leading LLMD (Lyme Literate Medical Doctor) with a caseload of over 5,000 Lyme patients, declared that I was one of her worst hit, and most troubling cases. My multiple infections had gone misdiagnosed and untreated for a very long time and I was suffering from a complex set of Lyme co-morbidities, and systemic decline.

I was immediately prescribed high-dose doxycycline, a broad spectrum antibiotic, that I dutifully swallowed every day for 6 months. This did absolutely nothing to cure the illness, nor did it kill the microbes, which by then were likely tucked away deep inside my brain and nervous system, organs, joints and tissues.

I was not cured by 6 months of daily broad-spectrum antibiotics, an absolutely dreadful thought in light of today’s understanding of the importance of the microbiome — but it did cause the most horrendous chronic stomach pain, gastrointestinal upset and reoccuring BMS, that lasted for many years, and resisted every treatment: dietary, medical, psychological, energy approaches, and even FMT.

Nothing seemed to stop my stomach pain and nothing eased my cluster of Lyme-related symptoms either. I sought out the advice of specialists and experts. I underwent endless tests and procedures. I tried a long list of remedies and followed the recommended protocols.

In the effort to recover my health, I explored western medical approaches, alternative, complementary, functional, psychological, spiritual, allopathic, herbal, acupuncturist, chiropractic, naturopathic, homeopathic, shamanistic, more pharmaceutical drugs than I care to remember, IV transfusions, heavy metal chelation, FMT, high-pressure CPAP, energy medicine, ELMF, electromagnetic, hyperbaric chamber therapy, Rife modulated frequencies, far-infrared therapy, redox signaling, specialized exercise routines, deep tissue massage, hypnotherapy...

I spent far too much time in the hospitals and clinics of Rhinebeck and the Greater Boston area. I saw MDs and specialists at most of the well-known Lyme and Holistic or Functional Medical clinics in the areas. I was determined to get better and to get my life back again, somehow, but I just didn’t know how to do it on my own. I was struggling.

Because I had been financially successful and I could afford to do so, I spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in the process, and pursued every avenue in the hope of finding a way back to normal, natural, pain-free health and happiness.

But NONE of it worked for me, and I almost gave up trying.

Remarkably however, after about 20 years of searching, I did eventually stumble on a non-medical approach that has worked out surprisingly well for me.

Having found my way back from the abyss of chronic pain and misery, having now lost almost all of my excess weight and many of my recalcitrant symptoms, having recovered my joy and happiness and sense of wonder and gratitude, firmly rooted on my true life path again — I now believe that you too, regardless of your present state of suffering, you can recover your good health, and your happiness as well.

If I can do it, so can you. That is my conviction, and that is the vision that I hold for you in our sessions. Regardless of your present state of pain and struggle, relative health and real happiness, I believe is still your birthright.

If you are suffering from Lyme or another autoimmune or chronic illnesses, we will discuss your situation at length, and I will try to assist in you in your recovery. My technique is perhaps a bit different than what you have already tried. However, I must say that...

* I make absolutely no medical claims at all. *

I peddle no pills or potions, I sell no gizmos or gadgets, nor am I an M.D. I make no guarantees, however I do believe that the right type of therapeutic counseling, along with the appropriate health support and lifestyle adjustments and the changes that you will make to your own mindset, can help to get you back on track.

So that is my story in a nutshell, and just a hint about my approach.

I believe that you can live a happier, healthier and more meaningful life again. When you decide with conviction that no disease or microbe or pathogen or disability or nefarious influence can ever stop you, anything becomes possible, the sky is the limit, and in our sessions we will work together towards that goal.