Topic: My congenital lyme child has EM rings, no bite!?
bejoy
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 11129
posted
My eleven year old daughter bruised her elbow yesterday. Today she has two 3/4 inch red rings on her arm near the sore elbow. She has never had these before.
To my knowledge she has never been bitten by a tick. It is even less likely that she has just been bitten in the middle of winter in our city yard, (although we do have pets.)
I had lyme when pregnant, although I didn't know it. She has many lyme symptoms, which seem to be taking off in interesting ways during puberty.
We already have a blood draw scheduled for tomorrow with our lyme friendly guy. I'm sure if I took her to the pediaduck she'd get a nice tooba cream for ring worm.
Does anyone else have experience with erythra migrans rash without a tick bite? Does this happen, or is this just my paranoia in the face of an interesting fungus.
bejoy
-------------------- bejoy!
"Do not go where the path may lead; go instead where there is no path and leave a trail." -Ralph Waldo Emerson Posts: 1918 | From Alive and Well! | Registered: Feb 2007
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shazdancer
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Hi bejoy,
Take a picture of them in good light, like outdoors, and show the pics to an LLMD. I wouldn't rule out ringworm necessarily, but I wouldn't rule out a Bb rash, either.
If a duck, er, doc suspects ringworm, make sure he gives you an antifungal cream like ketoconazole, not a steroid cream.
If it's ringworm, it should not expand, and will go away with treatment. If it's an EM rash, you have an outward sign that it's Bb, which might help you get treatment for her if you have to work with non-LLMDs.
Posts: 1558 | From the Berkshires | Registered: Jul 2001
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Cobweb
Unregistered
posted
mythbuster 101-lyme in city back yards ?-true or false
TRUE-We lived in Baltimore City. When I was first diagnosed with Lyme everyone asked me-"where did you get lyme?" I always told them- because I believed it myself, that I must have picked up a devil tick while on a trip to the countryside.
Subsequently my daughter was diagnosed.
And our Vet decided to test our two dogs for lyme and BINGO they both had it. They're house dogs who only went outside to back yard .
Our vet was as intrigued as anyone as to how we humans got lyme-thought she would help in the sleuthing-and VOILA-she showed that it was quite possible we got lyme from our very own city backyard.
I agree- take a picture if possible to show to LLMD. Hope your lyme friendly guy is sending blood draw to Igenex. Lyme friendly doesn't always mean lyme knowledgeable.
I never saw(or felt) the tick that bit me-but I did get a migration of EM rashes.Which were so pronounced even a Duck recognized them-but then treated me inadequately-hence three years later I am on the disabled list.
There is no such thing as being too paranoid when investigating symptoms for lyme.
bejoy
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Member # 11129
posted
Tell me about migration of lyme rashes. Does that mean that you can have a bite rash somewhere on your body, and then get a rash somewhere else?
If so, what has that rash looked like on you? Anybody?
Its still spooky that my daughter experience trauma to her arm, and now there is an EM looking rash. The way she has been babying that arm, I'm sure she would have noticed a couple of ticks on it if they had been there.
I guess it's more a curiosity than anything else at this point, since I'm going to have her treated anyway.
Our insurance is a $7000. deductible per person, and I can't get it switched. We have no LLMD around here. I do have an ND who figured out what I have, (there really is do doubt) and has good connections with lyme literate folks.
We're treating using the natural route unless we run out of progress. Meanwhile I have memorized every lyme protocol known to LLMD-dom. If necessary, I've got family near Dr. J. and others, and we'll be able to go for a visit in the summer.
I'm going to test with CFR, because it makes sense to me to look and see what you can actually find in the blood.
We may also test with IGX after a few months of treatment, to give it a chance for the immune system to kick in on these things. But if we do, its purely for curiosity since there's no point in proving anything to ducks or insurance.
Thanks for your thoughts and response!
bejoy
-------------------- bejoy!
"Do not go where the path may lead; go instead where there is no path and leave a trail." -Ralph Waldo Emerson Posts: 1918 | From Alive and Well! | Registered: Feb 2007
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Cobweb
Unregistered
posted
This all occured over a period of months. First I pointed out a large (silver dollar) spherical rash under my left breast to Duck. Bright pink, well defined. He said Hmmmm probably heat rash. I was suspicious of Lyme because it seemed unlike any "heat rash" I've ever had.
Within few weeks I noticed a dark bullseye rash on my right hip, by dark I mean I almost remember it as black. Thought it was a spider bite, and wondered why it didn't itch like other spider bites I have gotten. It was clearing in the middle except for dark spot in center..several inches across.
Third rash showed up on stomach-first noticed it to be about the size of quarter, looked similiar to first rash. Forgot about it, until a week later I noticed it again-it was much much larger, and I was feeling much much sicker.
Dragged myself to Duck, pulled up my shirt, voila-a fading EM he said, and paraded me around to the other ducks like he had bagged a trophy.Then he got out his IDSA guidlelines and prescribed two weeks of Ceftin.
bejoy
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 11129
posted
Aaaagh, Carol Cobweb, I am so sorry the ducks can be so lame, and wasted so much of your time, money, and life energy!
My kid's pretty little red circles looked like they had been drawn by a fine line marker. Twelve hours later they are faded and almost gone.
bejoy
-------------------- bejoy!
"Do not go where the path may lead; go instead where there is no path and leave a trail." -Ralph Waldo Emerson Posts: 1918 | From Alive and Well! | Registered: Feb 2007
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hshbmom
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Member # 9478
posted
HI bejoy,
I'm sorry to hear your daughter's woes.
Did the rings expand? Were you able to get some photos of them?
I've noticed that my daughter & I tend to get a rash on the skin over a bruise...fine red itchy bumps...never happened before we got Lyme.
Nancy
Posts: 1672 | From AL/WV/OH | Registered: Jun 2006
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posted
don't know what is going on with your daughter but I will add that my daughter had 5 Lyme rings on her body at once and not one had a bite/tick inside the ring - just 5 rings, spread around her body, all different shapes & sizes.
I had ringworm once - did look somewhat like the Lyme rash and it itched like crazy.
ESG
Posts: 424 | From Connecticut, USA | Registered: Nov 2003
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bejoy
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Member # 11129
posted
Thanks for all the responses!
ESG, did your daughter's rash itch like your ringworm did?
How did you distinguish that your daughter had EM lyme ring rather than ringworm?
Just curious really, to find out if these things can pop up under stress at any time and place.
I know several people who were treated for ringworm without seeing bites, and had lyme-type symptoms appear later.
bejoy
-------------------- bejoy!
"Do not go where the path may lead; go instead where there is no path and leave a trail." -Ralph Waldo Emerson Posts: 1918 | From Alive and Well! | Registered: Feb 2007
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posted
Bejoy, Please describe the rings further. The outer red ring, was it rough?
Center of the ring regular skin color of your daughter, or a little pale/yellow?
I had more then 50 round circles that were about 3/4 to 1 inch in diameter.
They appeared all in one day all over my body and itched like crazy.
I looked like a leaper.
They had perfect bright red borders. The borders were rough. (which made me thing ring worm also) The centers were pale and smooth. No seen tick, no bite mark.
At the time (13 years ago) the doctor thought it was an allergic reaction to something, perhaps a a virus. Put me on steriods. UG..
I didn't get sick at the time, but over the next several years I had a little extra depression, and my iron was low.
Then in 2005 I was bit by a tick and had the classic bull's eye.
During my diagnosis and treatment for that, I showed to have babesia, bartonella HGE and lyme.
I suspect, as does my LLMD, that perhaps I picked up some of this years ago.
I will be interested to see what others say about small, perfect defined, no known bite circles.
Von
Posts: 258 | From Washington State | Registered: Nov 2005
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bejoy
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 11129
posted
Von, what you describe sounds like what I am seeing on my daughter, except thankfully she only got two and they are fading.
The marks are two small circles on her upper arm, about 3/4 inch in diameter. The circle edges are raised and red and just a little bit rough or uneven.
Inside the circles the skin is slightly pink or normal. One of the marks is darker than the other.
I looked at photos of erethema migrans and of ringworm. I didn't see anything that looked quite like what she has, but I think they only print the really nasty looking ones.
Her marks do look a bit more like lyme photos than the ringworm photos to me.
Fungus doesn't make any sense to me on the upper arm. Its just not the right enviromnent for it to grow.
It just leaves me thinking that it is possible to get an EM rash without a current bite, or even a bite at all in her case of being born with it.
-------------------- bejoy!
"Do not go where the path may lead; go instead where there is no path and leave a trail." -Ralph Waldo Emerson Posts: 1918 | From Alive and Well! | Registered: Feb 2007
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posted
No , her rings did not itch - they were all different too. I only noticed them because she was running around naked that morning. Don't remember why I suspected Lyme - because I live near Lyme. CT or because my daughter had been terribly ill with a high fever a month earlier, misdiagnosed by pediatrician as nothing of concern. Or because I had been reading Lyme flyers in local MD offices for a while, looking at rash photos.
Funny thing: those info. flyers used to be in MD everywhere & now they have disappeared!
ESG
Posts: 424 | From Connecticut, USA | Registered: Nov 2003
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