I am severely heat intolerant and break out in pinpoint rash thingies from perspiration. (Which is a full time job for me, now that I'm living in florida.)

I break into sweats sitting perfectly still. I have been wearing socks to minimize sweaty hands and feet since I got sick. (I didn't have that before, I was a barefoot type of girl. The last exposure to lyme was from a multitude of flea bites obtained while renting a room infested with mice and fleas in sullivan county NY. I was vaguely ill for years before but this put me over the top.

I've downloaded babs symptom lists from what ever threads I could find off the newbie links. I have all of them except shortness of breath and weight loss (which is minimal).

Suddenly the symptoms the doctors have been telling me, for 12 years, were perimenopausal seem like something else. My doctor called me poster girl for menopausal symptoms. Symptoms I have been neglecting to mention to the doctor because the didn't seem to pertain apparently do.

Any additional info that you might have on hand would be very helpful. I've got my doctor's appoinment on monday and would like to make a coherent case.

(I have to lay down, I haven't slept for a few nights and am really fuzzy. I'll check back in the morning.

How do you do?

Good to meet you! Just don't bother to shake my hand.. you sweaty palm girl! HA!

I KNOW.. I KNOW.. we already know each other.

You mentioned the pinpoint rash... which is sometimes called "prickly rash".. or "heat rash". You also mentioned heat intolerance... hmmmmm...

I'm afraid.. if you are in Florida.. in the summertime.. you are going to have to either cool off.. and/or get use to it. Sorry!

As a native Floridian, I know it well.

Staying cool and DRY works the best. Baby powder (or those stay dry powders) in areas that tend to rub and break out seems to help some folks. Reduce the amount of clothing you wear that rubs the skin. Dry off completely after a shower. Get a de-humidifier. Rinse off several times a day in the shower if possible. I use to shower 3 times a day.. just go to the bathroom.. toss the clothes in the floor.. jump in the shower for two minutes.. re-dress.. and be on my way.

I hope you aren't thinking you must have ALL of the babesiosis symptoms to try to prove you may have it, to a duck?

I'll warn you... Of all the ducks I have been to.. Florida ducks are about the worst. I mean they aren't just bad.. they are rotten and STUPID as the day is long.

If you have a duck appointment.. my suggestion is to try and eat an alligator tail instead... while it is still attached to the gator. You will find that task a LOT easier and more pleasant than trying to get a Florida duck to THINK and/or help you.

But if you do go.. and if you try to prove your case.. think about this...

Having ALL of the possible symptoms of a disease when you walk in the door may make it (you) look weird.. like you WANT to have it. I KNOW you don't.. but I have been to enough ducks to think this may be reason enough for them to totally dismiss you and write you off as a looney toon.

Keeping in mind I have NO luck with ducks...

If it were me.. knowing what I know now... I might walk in and immediately start off with..

"It is a possibility I may have Babesiosis and I would like to be tested. Can you do the test now.. or do I have to go somewhere else to have the blood drawn and sent off?"

That way he would have to REFUSE to test you.. which doesn't look good on him if he is wrong... and he knows it.

Then.. if he questions you.. assuming it is a duck appointment of course... you might follow up with...

I have had a tick bite in an endemic area.. and I have been sick since. I have been having maleria like sweats, severe headaches, blah blah blah." And only name a few "big time" Babesiosis symptoms.

I don't know if that will help.. and I repeat.. I have NO luck with ducks.. but it might be worth considering.

Now.. it appears you went on to bed.. sooooo..

That is where I am headed. Hope you feel better quickly, Ms. Prickley.

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If you get the choice to sit it out or dance...

Now on mepron and still no problem with the heat.

I think heat/sun intolerance can also be the plain old stupid @$$ Lyme.

P.S. I have a fan above my bed.
P.P.S. Get the best LLMD you think you can't afford. I did and do not regret on cent.

Heather

You are cracking me up with the pics!

It's good to smile--Did i tell you Dr. J faxed my doc for kids yesterday? Yes--sometimes the little guy wins.

Menopause was a nightmare, consulted top menopause docs in the country, became an expert on bio-identical HRT, use it now and always will. Don't take hormones by mouth. But I was still so TIRED and couldn't sleep and lots of other menopausal symptoms.

Oct 2003 shattered wrist-2 surgeries to repair-symptoms exploded. Renewed my search for diagnosis.

Nov 2004-positive Lyme Western Blot-thanks to the net, all the good folks who put info on it, not the doctor.

My point- take a menopause symptom list and compare it to a Lyme symptom list-they are easily confused. Fatigue, insomnia, hot flushes, achy, etc.

Do not go to the doc unarmed-take printed Lyme info and have a plan what you want to accomplish at the visit- for example,you want to walk out of there with a script for doxy and a request for blood work that you think is needed. Be respectful but firm. Expect to have the doc's full attention for a brief time so be concise.

When I first became ill, they blamed those symptoms as perimeno...except, I had one ID doc who insisted that I was to young for that...he was right, atleast one of them was! Of the 33 docs and ducks I visited, only 4 insisted it was not perimeno related. My ID duck, the ID and Rheumo duck who dx me and my precious LLMD.

I have one word to say....Babesia.

The sweaty hands and feet were terrible to control! The night sweats really sucked. At 35 they told me I was perimeno...NOT.

Today I am 40 and am like clock work, as always, and still have no sympotms of being perimeno...

After babs treatment for nearly 2 years while treating for lyme for 5 years, I am symptom free at least from babs! Just a few symptoms left from lyme which I deal with, without meds!

Don't let them label you. Get info, insist and like the Rusty Cup said, you don't have to have all the symptoms! Keep fighting the battle!

(Unless there's another hiding under a rock somewhere, trying to fend off ticks from migrating birds.)

She's the one that tested for the babesia in the first place, she has the results in her office. The test was about 6 years ago and the thought then was it probably would go away on it's own. Well, not on little old autoimmune me. I was retested a few months later and the test was negative, and let it drop.

I didn't know until the droopy drawered one said the Babs tests were as wonky as lyme ones, that maybe it was a problem. (That's not a direct quote, I embellished.)

As for showers and clothes, I do the same. Come into the house whip off whatever I'm wearing, refresh and go on. I'm in competion for the title of "panty queen". (This title is currently held by another and I'm not really sure I want it.)I can do a week's worth of laundry and have 20 pairs in there. You have to have quite drawerful of drawers for that.

In other news, having read through the information about secondary porphyria, it's a much better fit. (I'm sure I have babs, too.)

I did some additional googling this morning. In the info I read there was an unusual amount of sense and the symptoms are dead on. The drug and food triggers are all mine exactly, I mean exactly. Did I mention exactly?

That being a real probability, with a little clever supplementation and actually eating the right things(Oh, and actually eating)

I may find the lyme and/or babs is not as awful as I thought. I'd still treat it but would tolerate the treatment much better if I wasn't starting out toxic.

I realize the danger of self diagnosis and may be putting the cart before the horse. But think of the implications...What if the constant inflammation and peripheral neuropathy were to get better? Wow! that's the most hopeful thought I've had for years.

HEATHER, you crack me up! (I'm serious about the posting pictures lessons.)
The plaquenil was for inflammation and wasn't meant to treat the babs, I hadn't been tested yet, it was a long time ago. It made the inflammtion 20 times worse and I stopped it.

It was up in NY. I'm only in sweaty old FL for 8 years, that's a lot of perspiration, you know. 10months out of the year as oposed to 3 or 4. I hate to be clammy.

I did a month of hrt patches in December and have been messed up ever since it was a very bad idea for me.

(That's what led to the upcoming D and C in 2 weeks, periods every 2 weeks, nah, bad idea.) The gyno says it will stop the abnormal bleeding. I could live with that. I'm fairly nervous; I've never had any type of surgery, even minor.

I had taken progesterone once before (at around 20) and it was the trigger for everything else that's happened since. I was never sick a day in my life prior to that.

quote:

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Originally posted by JJ:
Awwww.......I thought I was the poster child for perimenopause!

I have one word to say....Babesia.

The sweaty hands and feet were terrible to control! The night sweats really sucked. At 35 they told me I was perimeno...NOT.

After babs treatment for nearly 2 years while treating for lyme for 5 years, I am symptom free at least from babs! Just a few symptoms left from lyme which I deal with, without meds!

JJ

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They were not really testing for babesia then (early 1993). I tested positive around 99 or 2000, I can't find the results, in the chaos that is my life ATM, they'll surface and my current doc is the one that did the test. They might have to wade through 2 feet deep of my files but I think I can force that.

I'll get this taken care of, I can do this now that I have an idea what all the pieces I might be dealing with are.

I'll be glad to give up the title as I got an award just last night.

Still trying to find ANYONE out there who has had this happen to them.

I was told the sweats and heat intolerance WERE babs SX.

Sometimes I get just hands and sometimes my whole heiny and legs. That's when I soak thru my pants and look like a baby who wet themselves. Lovely image huh?