Run for My Buddy

Hi my name is Noelle and I created Run for My buddy after my mom who has suffered with Chronic Lyme Disease for 8 years. That being said, it was not an easy process to get her diagnosed with this disease, a disease that ended up disabling her, making her bed ridden.

Growing up, I was an extremely active kid. My parents had introduced me to soccer at the age of 4. I loved the game, was intrigued by the game; soccer was my game. My favorite moments of soccer were when my mom was coaching my team and when I got to go to games with my dad and watch his team play. On one of the many teams I played for, I got the name chopper. A parent from my team started chanting chopper when I had the ball because of one of the moves I used to get around people. Soccer was my outlet when I was stressed; it was what I was good at.

Starting grade 1 and ending grade 6 at Mc. Bride Public School; it did not take me long for my athletic side to shine. My gym teacher was always amazed at my talent for sports, especially soccer. She would tell the other teachers about my skill and promised them that she would see me playing for Team Canada one day. At recess, I was on the soccer field playing soccer with the guys instead of walking back and forth with the other girls across the school grounds. Soccer just appealed to me more where as the other girls thought I was just being a flirt. No really, I just wanted to play soccer.

I spent grade 7 and 8 at Homelands Senior Public school where it did not take me long to prove my athletic skills. I was on the flag football team, volleyball team, basketball team and soccer team. On top of playing on school teams I was playing rep soccer. Sometimes, I would have 3 soccer practices a week for my rep team, one game a week and on some weekends there were far away tournaments I would go to. My mom would always tell me that I needed to slow down else I was going to burn myself out. I would ignore her because soccer was the one thing that I knew I was really good at. When it came to academics, I was never an A student. It was very hard for me to concentrate in school; I always had other things on my mind. So when I saw my failed math test while my other friends had aced the test, I thought of soccer, thank god for soccer. Soccer was where I shined, where I failed to do so in the classroom.

In high school, I was one of those students who found it hard to fit in. I was bullied for having big legs and soon learned to hate them. I just wanted to be normal, look normal, and having big legs made it hard to do so. I blamed soccer for my legs, for getting teased, and for people not liking me. I thought that if I had smaller legs that it may fix the problem. I went on a diet that consisted of mostly nuts and seeds, salad, low fat salad dressing, chicken for “protein”, and the odd protein shake.  On top of these food restrictions, I was still playing soccer and going to the gym more than ever. I would spend 3 hours a day at the gym, making sure to burn of everything I ate and then I would go to soccer practice. My soccer performance hit a sharp decline and I got really sick. However, I did not just get the typical eating disorder symptoms of fatigue, headaches, lack of energy and no appetite. I got flu- like symptoms, I could not look into the sun light without my eyes hurting, every joint in my body hurt; what had I done to myself? That being said, my scariest symptoms were my neurological symptoms. I felt like I had to concentrate really hard on my walking, it became hard for me to walk. My memory was always bad, but it became extremely worse. I could not go to sleep because my body would not stop twitching and occasionally I would wake up with a huge twitch, I thought that I had a seizure.   

When I went to my doctors and told her about my symptoms she gave me an antidepressant, said I should consider looking into counseling for my eating disorder and last but not least, I had a virus which would pass in the next week. I asked her about my neurological symptoms and she said that anxiety can do that to you. I was broken, this was not in my head, and there is no way I can live a normal life with these symptoms. The flu-like symptoms surpassed her guess of a week and turned into months. I would get fed up, go to the gym and sprint on the treadmill like a maniac saying it was all in my head. I went to school even though my brain would not take in any information what so ever. I worked a par-time job at Tim Horton’s using the coffee to stay awake. I could not learn anything new, but was using the information in my brain that I knew before I got sick.  I was an emotionless robot, and everything I was feeling was all in my head, according to my doctor. I became suicidal and thought to myself that I was too much pressure on my family and was just bringing them down. This is not how I wanted to live and I was at my limits of pretending that everything was okay. My mom was extremely sick herself, bed ridden, with multiple diagnoses of: rheumatoid arthritis, ankylosing spondilitis, fibromalagyia, cardiovascular problems, chronic fatigue syndrome anxiety and depression. I told myself that before giving up, I would find out what was wrong with me, if it was the last thing I did.

Three and a half years after my health crisis I researched doctors and came across Dr.Direnfield.  He had a 6 month waiting list but practiced holistic medicine and was known to be one of the best. Two months later I got a call from the secretary saying I was the 6th person they had called and the first person to pick up the phone. An appointment had opened up due to a cancelation and they had asked if I wanted to take it. Of course I will take it I said, so excited that I may finally get the answers I have been looking for and possibly the chance of getting better.  My best friend Danny came with me the day of my appointment. I waited an hour in the waiting room, my anxiety of the roofs. When I saw him, it was not just the typical doctor appointment. He had asked me about my past, stressors, families health and actually took the time with me that know doctor ever have.  He ran a bunch of blood tests and told me that he would see me in a week with results. When I saw him next, he said he thinks he knows the root cause of my health problems. Dr.Direnfield had showed me a CD57 test that came back extremely low. Dr.Direnfield said that this indicates Chronic Lyme Disease and based on your clinical symptoms I am sure you have it. To be sure I did the Western Blot Test for Lyme disease in the United States that came back with 2 positives. Many people with Chronic Lyme Disease get one positive and one negative, making my result extremely positive.

My option was to go to the United States to see a Lyme Literate Medical Doctor and her name was Dr.Mcshane as Canada does not treat Chronic Lyme Disease. There are however, physicians that risk their licenses to help people with this disease.  The more I researched about this disease; I thought to myself, this is what my mom has.  She has gotten diagnoses after diagnoses, only leaving her bed written. I brought my mom to a naturopathic doctor in Richmond Hill to get tested. Her clinical symptoms were on point but my mom wanted to be tested to make sure. Two weeks later, we revisit Angela and my mom finally after 8 years, got clarity. She was positive for late stage chronic Lyme Disease and that day marked the day we would have to fight together.

My mom calls me her angel; we have always been extremely close. My mom will now be going to New York with me to get treated for Chronic Lyme Disease. The only problem is, it is not covered by insurance companies. I have to work a full-time job despite how sick I feel to be able to afford treatment for myself, but even that does not cover it. My mom has a little bit of money saved up for New York but it is not much. Lyme disease is very expensive and with my mom on disability and me working full-time at a minimum job we will not be able to afford it. We would like to go to Florida as we know people who have done so and have gotten great results, but it would $40,000 for the each of us on average, but it would all depend on how long we had to stay.  Dr.Mcshane is financially the only doctor we can afford, but not for much longer.

This is my story. It has not been easy and there were many times where I felt like giving up. I felt hopeless and I did not want to get treatment if my mom could not. Why did this have to happen to the both of us, but now I know why. If I did not get sick I would not have been able to lead my mom down the path to health. She is my buddy and I am her buddy, we are there for each other no matter what. I know I have lost time, lost moments of happiness; days pass where I could not do anything in that day because of Lyme disease. Then I look at my mom and she has even more days that pass her by because of Lyme disease. This charity is for me and my mom so we are able to get the treatment we need to recover from Lyme disease.

Thank you for reading my story,

Noelle Hooker