posted
I started bee venom therapy in June so it has been about three months from when I started. I *think* I am sleeping slightly less than when I started but it's hard for me to remember.
Fatigue and memory issues are my main symptoms and muscle and joint pain as well. I use live bees. The Facebook group I joined to learn about this gave me a source to buy the bees from, they are very against antibiotics.
And my question at first was would bee venom be strong enough to make a difference for Lyme? Or should it perhaps be used along with antibiotics for a synergistic effect?
However when i mentioned this people said that bee venom and antibiotics together would be too much for my body to handle. They told me that antibiotics just cause the bacteria to go into cyst form and wouldn't be helpful.
However bee venom is purportedly supposed to break open biofilms so that's why I thought that using it alon with antibiotics would really pack a punch in a good way.
Is anyone else using BVT? What are your results? I am wondering if I should keep going. It is difficult to decide because people on fb group are saying that it takes many people a year or more to feel better at all
and I feel like I have wasted so much time with trying various treatments for this disease because I was told that it would take time with each treatment. Lots of time and money wasted, I'm sure you all can relate.
TNT
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 42349
posted
Hey katrinab, haven't seen you in a while. I haven't been here as much, either, so it's possible you've been around and I haven't noticed.
That's awesome you're doing BVT! I've been doing it 5 months now, and I can see definite gains. I have been doing it in combination with ABX as I feel Bart or BLO is my main infection. I did much research on PubMed before starting and I found that of all its antimicrobial properties, bee venom is the least effective against gram negative bacteria.
It has very strong antimicrobial properties against fungus (stronger than fluconazole), apicomplexans (Babesia/Malaria), BIOFILM, gram-positive bacteria, L-forms, and borrelia (probably because of it's membrane-eating properties against the l-form borrelia).
So, because of it's biofilm-busting activity, and the fact that there is not clear evidence that it has action against gram-negative bacteria such as Bartonella or BLO, I decided to continue my ABX for BLO since that is most likely what would be released from my biofilm while doing BVT.
I would encourage you to do what is best for you. Facebook cannot possibly know what that is, because each one of our cases are different. Certain antibiotics do cause the borrelia to encyst, but not all ABX. Penicillins and Cephalosporins are the main culprits.
So, there are plenty of other ABX if this is a concern of yours. For me personally, I'm not worried about the cysts. With continued treatment, the load will eventually lessen since the cysts are not as metabolically active.
I would be more concerned about L-forms than anything, but BVT works great against those.
I do my own blood microscopy, and since I started BVT, I can see a distinct decrease in the number of spirochetes in my blood.
A microscope is an invaluable tool in the fight against these infections. I strongly recommend everyone get one!
Hang in there, and do what is best for you!
Posts: 1308 | From Eastern USA | Registered: Oct 2013
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Jordana
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Member # 45305
posted
Hi katrina. I'm in the same group.
It's kinda like a religion isn't it? Put your faith in the bees and nothing else, no other treatment at *all*.
When I started for some reason all I read about were these AMAZING recoveries, like a person going back to work in two months after being sick five years, somebody else completely fixed in eleven months and so on.
Then as I watched the group I kept seeing people going..well it's been 16 months and no improvements yet, but I have faith. Hmmmm.
I've been off abx for about six weeks doing BVT only. Believe me I have not seen any of these miraculous improvements but I believe the science so I believe it's worth it to continue.
However .
One thing that's bugging me is that while I absolutely believe that bee venom might be the only way to eradicate Lyme and possibly regulate the immune system back to baseline there is no research about the various co-infections. While I was on this ride of BVT ONLY I got some more info about my particular flavor of Lyme and realized that I probably have STARI and all the friends that go along with having been bitten by a Lone Star and not a Deer Tick.
One of my cos is Ehrlichia and it is not gone. According to literature Ehrlichia is treated with four months of a tetracycline plus rifampin with no pulse.
According to BVT people, BVT "probably" works on all the co-infections like anaplasma/ehrlichia.
So after talking to my LLMD I decided that even though I have completely drunk the koolaid on BVT I'm going for the Ehrlichia treatment while I do BVT *even if it slows down my Lyme treatment.*.
I mulled this over for months, but LLMD today said they'd seen people do fine on both and get relief. I'm planning to do the abx for the coinfections and then go back to BVT only because Ehrlichia is pretty dangerous when it becomes chronic. Also possible are tularemia and RMSF, also dangerous and treated with tetracyclines.
Not giving up on BVT but I'm not interested in multiple hemorrhages and an infected immune system while I'm waiting for BVT to "maybe work." Im not even saying it doesn't work but a couple of vague success stories aren't quite enough to take me that far.
Worst case scenario is that it slows down the eradication of the Lyme by a half year.
That's what I decided. Maybe my thought process will help you.
Posts: 2057 | From Florida | Registered: Feb 2015
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Jordana
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Yes that's true, TNT. It's effective in *half* of gram negative infections. Impossible to know at this point which half we happen to have.
Posts: 2057 | From Florida | Registered: Feb 2015
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posted
Jordana, so you are using antibiotics along with BVT? Do you feel it is too much for you? I am afraid I will have unbearable herxes perhaps. Please let me know if you feel better using both.Yes it makes we weary when I hear that people are at 11 months in and haven't seen any real progress.
Posts: 723 | From boston,ma | Registered: Jan 2011
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Jordana
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In my experience, yeah, the herxes are worse. I was able to manage them by basically being a zombie all summer long. But I was doing abx while I was ramping stings up to 10 - I was at 6 stings when I stopped taking them.
10 sting herxes are just as bad and they come out of NOWHERE.
I don't think there's anything you can do about herxes and frankly *every* chronic Lyme treatment takes at least a year and a half to really work.
I don't know what your body can handle but if I were you I would ask an LLMD if your FB group is right about you. If you don't have one at the moment I can tell you my LLMD said they didn't see any problem with doing both together in terms of being able to handle the herx. If you can handle abx, or BVT -- separately, in my (nonmedical) opinion you're strong enough to do both.
But if you don't want to do both and you only want to do one...look up to where TNT says the microscope is showing BVT is clearing Lyme. If I weren't so worried about my gram negative co-infections I would pick BVT only for the next two years.
Posts: 2057 | From Florida | Registered: Feb 2015
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Brussels
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Member # 13480
posted
I disagree that nothing can be done about herxes.
Herxes were basically the only thing that could delay me from healing. I easily found herbal combinations (Buhner, Cowden or Chinese) ...
..or homeopathic combinations (nosodes or other substances like Arnica, bee venom homeopathic, etc)...
...or essential oil combinations
...or still different rife frequencies (in my KMT, Rife or zapper) to kill different sorts of pathogens.
that was not a problem. My problem were that herxes prevented me from taking killers non-stop. I couldn't, I simply collapsed.
Once I could tune my binders (different binders, which varied constantly in amount and type), my life changed completely.
I even didn't feel I was really too ill, just because the perfect combination of good killers + good binders allowed my body to recover, slowly, but surely.
Days passed with less ups and downs, nights went on without anxiety, my energy stayed more or less stable during the day. Everything depended exactly on the amount of binders and timing.
I had to take binders 6 times a day. It usually consisted of chlorella, bear garlic and MSM powder, but it could vary depending on the pathogens killed.
If I took binders just 3x a day, I would feel sick for a couple of hours a day. If I took binders 6 x a day, I barely felt sick.
Herxes are toxins in movement, they are neuro toxic, they affect basically all life functions: digestion, sleep, mood, even breathing.
they clog your gut, your liver, your gall bladder, your lymph. How can someone expect to even survive in this condition?
I don't think healthy people without infections could survive with all main detox organs clogged and working at minimum conditions.
In my case, there was no way out. Killers just made me feel worse, UNLESS I took huge amounts of binders.
Since I changed the whole way of treating lyme disease from killing-only approach to binding-mostly approach, is when my health started coming back.
Not only that, I even stopped being so bothered about being ill. I was ill, but I didn't feel that much ill anymore. Every time I stopped binders, my hell re-started and I had to back my killers, so I lost improvement.
Even taking so many binders, it took me more than 3 years to heal, on constant killer-remedies and balancing supplements and homeopathics.
But I am sure that if I didn't take all those binders every 2 or 3 hours every single day, I would still be ill with lyme today.
Posts: 6199 | From Brussels | Registered: Oct 2007
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bluelyme
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posted
I am at 10 months and doing herbs and abx and am seeing some slight gains ...twiching down ,depression down energy up. ..i did iv ,silver ,herbs, bvt and it was too much .
i agree with brussels ..build and kill and build is the game ..my rife guy wouldt treat me because the ketes are hiding ..tnt what bart meds are you taking ?
-------------------- Blue Posts: 1539 | From southwest | Registered: Dec 2015
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me
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Member # 45475
posted
TNT, Are you doing live stings? If not, what are you doing? Thank you.
-------------------- Just sharing my experiences, opinions, and what I've read and learned. Not medical advice. Posts: 1431 | From USA | Registered: Mar 2015
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TNT
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posted
quote:Originally posted by me: TNT, Are you doing live stings? If not, what are you doing? Thank you.
Yep, live zingers! I love those little critters (except when they get loose and dive-bomb me!)!
Blue, along with BVT, I'm doing Levafloxacin, Tetracycline (not Doxy) and Nystatin. Herbs and supps, too. And, a contact Rife device now and then.
Posts: 1308 | From Eastern USA | Registered: Oct 2013
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TNT
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 42349
posted
quote:Originally posted by TNT: Certain antibiotics do cause the borrelia to encyst, but not all ABX. Penicillins and Cephalosporins are the main culprits.
Sorry, I must have been tired when I wrote that. I'm not sure if certain ABX cause conversion to cystic form more than other ABX, but it's the Penicillins and Cephalosporins that cause the conversion to L-forms.
So, I guess either way- whether the ABX cause the ketes to convert to cysts or l-forms- BVT should eventually eradicate them.
Gram-negative bacteria are another story. At least it appears that way from the medical & scientific literature. Again, that's why I personally decided to cover those organisms with ABX WHILE doing BVT.
Posts: 1308 | From Eastern USA | Registered: Oct 2013
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