It’s been one week since I got back home. I’ve had the worst jet lag I’ve ever had in my whole life, coupled with crazy insomnia, and I feel pretty awful. For that reason I am not going to re-score my symptom list yet as I want a true representation.
In the meantime, I’m going to tell you how to get your home ozone setup working. I bought myself a Promolife O3Elite kit which comes with the pieces to perform home insufflations and ozonate water.
That’s it, I’m all done with treatment. I’m sat here in my apartment writing this blog entry, and in just over 4 hours my taxi arrives to take me to the airport.
Not a lot to say here other than that I have continued to herx quite strongly, and in fact last Monday I had probably the worst one I’ve ever had in the 5 years I’ve been trying to treat this crap.
In the meantime, week 2 just happened. It’s been rough, very rough, as the major herxing started and I’ve also had some vein problems – two burst and one collapsed – so extra pain there and added complications finding new veins for the 10 pass ozone.
I thought I’d write a few things down about my current state of health affairs, prior to heading to Cyprus next week. This is partly so I can record “the before” and compare to how I feel when I get back, and partly because I want folks reading this to understand how awful Lyme is on a daily basis. This is important not because I want sympathy, but because it can’t be said enough about how this is a hidden disease. Most people suffering will be trying to hide it, not show it, so they can have some semblance of a normal life.
It seems somewhat fitting that almost exactly 5 years since I became aware that I had Lyme-like symptoms, I’ve made the big decision to travel to Cyprus for intensive treatment as my own home treatment has been good at keeping the worst symptoms at bay but has proven very hard to totally eradicate the infection.
Like many people with chronic Lyme Disease, I’ve struggled to get on top of treating it since it’s a very persistent infection. Antibiotics would work to keep the symptoms at bay for a while and then the inevitable resistance came and the symptoms came back.
Hocatt Sauna
Late last year I discovered how effective ozone treatment is as a replacement for antibiotics. I initially treated intravenously at a local clinic, where blood is removed and infused with ozone and then replaced. This was amazingly effective! I then then followed this up at the same clinic with some sessions in a Hocatt sauna.
The Hocatt was equally as effective for me as the intravenous delivery. The problem though is that this is a very expensive piece of equipment and naturally the clinic charges a commensurate amount of money to use it.
DIY Time!
Because of the expense, I set about recreating my own ozone treatment. It turns out to be reasonably simple and very effective indeed for me. Please note that this is not general medical advice and it may not work for you, I am just explaining what worked for me.
So here’s my kit:
One ozone generator
One portable steam sauna tent
That’s literally it. The Ozone machine was AUD $130 and the steam tent was AUD $80 or so, both bought from eBay. This is what it looks like ready to go.
The ozone machine is bottom left of the picture and the steam generator is bottom right.
I put a fold-up camping chair inside the tent to sit on.
You can see the steam outlet on the floor at the back.
Close up of the ozone machine. The cylindrical object is an air dryer which makes the machine more effective at generating ozone. This one makes 500mg an hour.
I feed the tubing from the ozone generator into the tent via the zip holes meant for hands at the front.
And here’s the boiler that generates the steam. It feeds steam via the tube at the side.
How to use it
The boiler takes about ten minutes to get hot enough to make steam, so set it off and at the same time zip up the tent and start off the ozone generator — I program it for 40 minutes, allowing a ten minute “pre-fill” period and 30 minutes of sauna time for me.
As soon as you hear the boiler boiling, unzip the tent and get in quickly to avoid letting out the ozone gas. It will be a bit smelly, try not to breathe it in, it will irritate your lungs if you breathe too much of it in.
Wrap a towel around your neck and zip up the tent with your head stuck out the top, sealing off your neck as much as you can. OK, now relax for 30 minutes!
Warnings
Really, try not to breathe in the ozone, it will damage your lungs.
Put the sauna tent OUTSIDE, you don’t want ozone indoors.
You need to be able to stand a bit of heat for this to be really effective. If you feel too hot, get out, or open the hand/arm zips to let some heat out.
If you feel faint, get out immediately. Your blood pressure might be too low to stand the heat. If you have a BP monitor, do use it!
What to expect
The first few times you do this, you’ll feel pretty whacked, it’s quite intense. For that reason, it’s a good idea to build up to the 30 minutes over a few sessions, or even leave out the steam initially. The last 10 minutes of the 30 are the toughest, but they are also the most effective, so try to get there gently.
I usually get a herx from this between 1-4 hours after getting out. I do not get in and do another session until 2 days after my previous herx has stopped.
Censorship and blocking those who criticise, of course.
A number of people have posted on his Facebook page (mostly) politely questioning his article’s worth and pointing out errors. As is the usual response of someone who is unable to deal with his own cognitive dissonance, he removed all the posts and blocked those who posted them.
I even got blocked on Twitter for asking for a reply to my question about NATA’s mutual recognition of overseas labs that are returning positives for Australians.
While these scoundrels continue to trot out the tired old lines, we are winning the argument with logic and science.
Lyme is in Australia.
Tech, Photography and Lyme Disease, from Brisbane.