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Massage & Lyme Disease
Does anyone have any experience treating clients w/chronic Lyme Disease? If so, what modalities do you use & how often do you treat? I'm trying to put together a plan for pain management as well as detoxing using a combination of techniques, i.e., Lymphatic Drainage, Swedish, Reiki & Jin Shin Jyutsu, but would like to know if anyone has any experience or advice on this multi-symptom disease.
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Permalink Reply by Laurie on
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I recently contracted Lyme Disease which was effectively treated with antibiotics. So far, lingering symptoms are minimal and improving. Because of my financial situation, I worked throughout the weeks I was ill (fever, joint pains, neck spasms, etc.). To be honest, during this acute phase, I didn't want anyone touching me, but I did a lot of self-massage on my neck and on the affected joints. Diagnosis is the difficult part of the disease. If the bull eye rash is not visible or a tick is not found, the symptoms are common to a variety of other diseases. I was sick for three weeks before being diagnosed with Lyme Disease.
Chronic Lyme is very different than the acute disease. The book, Out of the Woods, by Katina Makris, a homeopathic practitioner, is an excellent journal describing her experience with the disease and her recovery. It is also a source of information on different treatment protocols.
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Permalink Reply by Lee Edelberg on
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Lyme is a tricky disease and there is a lot about it that isn't understood yet.....so beware of anyone who proposes a simple solution!
Even though it's killed off by antibiotics there can be some kind of lingering something that causes symptoms. I have heard from several people who contracted it and treated it promptly that it took them 6 months or a year to recover completely.
Anyway, a close friend of mine (she is an MT) is going through a difficult recovery right now and I give her a session every week. I don't try to do any detox: she is working heavily with herbs and getting acupuncture for that (which helps, though the acupuncture temporarily intensifies the symptoms, the primary one being nasty joint pain, along with some tinnitus). I mostly give her long effleurage strokes (I'm Esalen trained:-), craniosacral-influenced techniques and slow deeper work to encourage muscles that have clenched or are in spasm to release. It doesn't make her Lyme go away but she feels much more in her body and relaxed (this is what she says) and less in pain.
BTW check out youtube or elsewhere for "Japanese Knotweed" and "Lyme". Some very interesting info about this invasive plant and it's use in treating Lyme disease.
Good luck Sharon!
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Hey Laurie, Thanks for the tip about that book. I bought it for my friend, who has a bad case of chronic Lyme (9 months now) and she loves it. She loaned it back to me so I could read it......really useful and a moving story.
How have you been? Still symptom-free?
Laurie said:I recently contracted Lyme Disease which was effectively treated with antibiotics. So far, lingering symptoms are minimal and improving. Because of my financial situation, I worked throughout the weeks I was ill (fever, joint pains, neck spasms, etc.). To be honest, during this acute phase, I didn't want anyone touching me, but I did a lot of self-massage on my neck and on the affected joints. Diagnosis is the difficult part of the disease. If the bull eye rash is not visible or a tick is not found, the symptoms are common to a variety of other diseases. I was sick for three weeks before being diagnosed with Lyme Disease.
Chronic Lyme is very different than the acute disease. The book, Out of the Woods, by Katina Makris, a homeopathic practitioner, is an excellent journal describing her experience with the disease and her recovery. It is also a source of information on different treatment protocols.
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Sharon, how have you been doing with this? I have been working regularly still on my friend and have learned a few things along the way that I could share, and would be interested in hearing about anything you're doing that helps.
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It's been slow going. My client has had Lyme for approx. 7 yrs. It took about 3 yrs. just to get a diagnosis. So, needless to say, there is a lot going on with her. The pain is systemic, w/frequent headaches, as well as nausea, vomiting & diarrhea, which makes it difficult for her to eat at times.
My treatments vary based on how she's feeling, and depending on what she can tolerate, I try a combination of modalities. I do a lot of Manual Lymphatic Drainage because I fully believe in the detoxification, & pain relieving qualities of the modality. It's gentle & relaxing, but, sometime even that gentle a touch can be too much for her. I have also been studying Jin Shin Jyutsu, which has given her some relief, as has work on her feet & hands using a combinatinon of Reflexology, Jin Shin Jyutsu, & just a good old fashioned gentle foot and/or hand massage. I would be very interested in hearing what works for you.
When possible, I also try to incorporate some deep, abdominal breathing, and have taught her some self-help techniques to do on a daily basis.
I would also like to treat her on a daily basis for a few weeks to see whether there might be a cumulative effect as I have read there is in Cancer patients receiving massages. But this hasn't been possible to date.
I would be happy to hear any suggestions that you might have that you have found that works.
Lee Edelberg said:Sharon, how have you been doing with this? I have been working regularly still on my friend and have learned a few things along the way that I could share, and would be interested in hearing about anything you're doing that helps.
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Thanks for the reply Sharon, sorry about the delay in getting back to this. I've been thinking about it though.
I've been pulling out all my tools when I work on my friend/client. Generally her Lyme symptoms are: erratic and frequent physical pain, some mental fog, some depression of course, and chronic fatigue. She has frequent bouts of joint pain so I usually start with the intention of making her feel good with gentle long strokes to help her soothe/settle and let go a little. I also include rocking and moving/stretching limbs for the same reason. One of my Esalen instructors advised going deep since the spirochetes are deep in the body. So I include some fairly deep work, mostly on her neck, shoulders and upper back though sometimes on her hips/buttocks and legs, depending on where her pain and tension are. She responds very well to this. The key for me in making that work is to move very slowly. My sessions are about 75 minutes and I spend at most 15 or 20 minutes on this. She has had a couple of bouts of abdominal pain and cramping, so I have used a deep-abdominal protocol that also she has responded well too. She came to me one day with sharp pains in her gall-bladder area. I put my hand there, somewhat up under her lower rib on the right side, and pressed fairly hard for 2 or 3 minutes. The pain decreased quite a bit from that. So later in the session I went back and did it again, to good effect. A doctor friend of mine told me the next day " we can fix that: just remove the gall bladder "!!! Crazy, huh? A few days later that pain was gone, as the Lyme seemed to have moved elsewhere.
Cranio-Sacral work seems really useful, especially after the heavier pressure. Lastly, I spend time on what I consider chakra balancing. One of the few times I've actually been able to sense them clearly in anyone happened during a session with her a few weeks ago.I could see the wheels and could see that they weren't all projecting the same amount of energy. It was very cool. Afterwards she told me she had been on a journey and had no idea what I had been doing. Is this maybe acting in a similar fashion to Jin Shin Jyutsu. which I know virtually nothing about?
Frequent sessions sound great. Now I'm doing about 3 every two weeks and she tells me she is starting to feel gradual improvement in her flexibility/mobility and less pain at night.
She is doing a ton of other stuff: homeopathy/acupuncture/plant-spirit-medicine. After one of those treatment she usually has a Herx reaction and takes most of the next day off. Meditation helps her, she says.
Lastly, because of that book "Out of the Woods" we are investigating Rife technology though it's not easy to learn about since there has been some kind of government suppression. I don't know why.
Thanks for the information! Let's keep talking........Lee
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Permalink Reply by Therese Schwartz on
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I've worked with an energy healer who specializes in helping people rid themselves of Lyme's disease (she had one of my clients Lyme free in four one-hour sessions, after taking 3 years to get a diagnosis and $15,000 in medical expenses). She's beaten my Epstein-Barr Virus back twice this year. She is remarkable. If you are interested, let me know and we'll find a way to exchange info privately.
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Will do
Therese Schwartz said:I've worked with an energy healer who specializes in helping people rid themselves of Lyme's disease (she had one of my clients Lyme free in four one-hour sessions, after taking 3 years to get a diagnosis and $15,000 in medical expenses). She's beaten my Epstein-Barr Virus back twice this year. She is remarkable. If you are interested, let me know and we'll find a way to exchange info privately.
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