I can't believe it has been so long since I last posted. However, that tells a tale in itself - I have not been well. On Twitter I often update about what "pattern" I am experiencing so I thought it would be a good idea to explain it. I'm not sure if it happens to others with Lyme but being aware of these ebbs and flows and familiar clusters of symptoms gives me piece of mind when that mind is sounding the "you've never felt this sick before!" alarm. It gives me a bullet for my anxiety to look back on what I've written and answer, "Yes, I have, last Thursday I thought I was dying too." They may last a few hours or even days, they may cycle in and out and overlap each other several times in 24 hours, or I might have a wonderful mosaic of a few at the same time. However they choose to manifest themselves, placing them in a category I can identify and predict will go a long way to management of symptoms I may suffer for the rest of my life. So without further ado these are the patterns I have noticed my body goes through. If you have Lyme too you may be able to relate. If you don't, what you're about to read may be horrifying. If you're not sure, you may recognize something that will motivate you to find the help you desperately need.
First, and most commonly, there is the Fatigue Pattern. This pattern causes me to sleep all night and wake up feeling like I never slept at all. It is sneaky and can creep up when I least expect it, and is often very hard to resist. Rather than feeling as if I'm falling asleep, I may have the sensation of being dragged kicking and screaming. Fatigue Pattern's favorite thing is to make me feel lazy over what I can't do and...I yawn ALOT. Sometimes I have yawning FITS. While fatigue itself is almost always there, the Fatigue Pattern is like a living breathing creature from the bowels of hell. When this thing is going on, there's not a damn thing gonna get done in my house.
Contrary to Fatigue Pattern, Insomnia Pattern doesn't care if I'm tired. I can be up all night, completely exhausted, begging and praying for sleep, and Insomnia Pattern just laughs in my face. Sometimes it switches things up and creeps into the daytime as well, or pounces on me after I've slept a little and have gotten out of bed in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom or get a drink. I suspect there are times it even shakes me awake, the little devil, just for kicks. Insomnia Pattern is often peppered with episodes of anxiety, mood swings, and tachycardia.
Up next is the Herx Pattern (named for the "Herxheimer" reaction), which for me has come on like both a lion and a lamb, aggressive or gradual, but always a surprise, nonetheless. Surprising because for me it is an exacerbation of my "typical" Lyme symptoms, along with enervating episodes of Parkinsons-like tremors, extreme brain fog, emotional instability, and just generally feeling like my entire body is about to implode. I rarely run a fever but some have reported a spike in that area, although I do feel as though my temperature is up; glossy eyes, flushed face, chills followed by hot flashes. But lets not get ahead of ourselves. Because these symptoms also cross over into something else, something horrible, and my least favorite pattern of all.
That's right, I'm referring to the Flu Pattern, and this one is like an onslaught of Lyme symptoms and the worst seasonal illness I've ever had. Strangely enough the Flu Pattern doesn't last long, but its vengeance is solid and true. I have noticed in my records it assaults me approximately every two weeks, and each time I am convinced that I am expiring anew. The normal progression of flu over the course of a couple of weeks tends to be that feeling of "coming down" with something, a tickle in the throat to fever, body aches and chills, but the Flu Pattern's hell rushes on within hours. It leaves no time to recover or comprehend, no time to mentally prepare. A typical flu sufferer's symptoms build to a gradual peak, then plateau, then die off, all in a luxurious length of time. Flu Pattern is like a truck hitting, a literal frenzy of illness that strikes and then drops off much like its typical counterpart, leaving that post-feverish, warmed over, finally-just-enough-strength-to-shower feeling. All that and my temperature never gets over 95 degrees.
Last but not least, there is the Well Pattern, and this one can be short and sweet as well. But its consequences can be devastating because of its deceiving, evasive nature. One morning I woke up thinking, No pain, no symptoms, what a beautiful day. It led me to believe that it was possible I could be cured. It made me wonder what I had been bitching about and why life for me had become such a struggle. It slapped me in the face and said "Get over yourself! You're fine!" It made me go back to work and allowed me to get things done around the house. But in the end, it too left me out in the cold. Yet of all the patterns, I have to say I cannot hate this one equally. Maybe it isn't a pattern at all. Maybe it's a glimpse that I can have my life back one day, or, at the very least, a little blessing I should be taking full advantage of when it graces me.
So how about those patterns, huh? Are there any that I missed? I'd like to hear some comments on these, and how everyone else copes with them. And I'd like to know I'm not just overthinking, or in my hope to get control of these, thinking wishfully either.
