Jackie Murdock woke up one morning last December feeling terrible. She had all the symptoms of a bad case of the flu, so she called in to her workplace and asked for the day off. Then, on New Year’s Eve, the feeling had only gotten worse so she checked herself into hospital and told the doctors about her persistent nausea, debilitating fatigue, muscle pains and twitches and heart palpitations.
She was sent home and told that she likely had a sinus infection. But the symptoms didn’t stop there. Over the following few months she began to experience blurred vision, dizziness and finally tingling and numbness in various parts of her body.
“I knew I didn’t just have the flu,” she said from her Elmira home. “It just didn’t add up.”
Then, after a series of tests including three MRIs, two CT scans, a lumbar puncture and extensive balance testing, Murdock asked her doctor if she could be tested for Lyme disease which she had read about on the Internet. Her test came back positive in July, nearly eight months after she began feeling the effects.
“I have been off work ever since,” she said of her past employment at Leisureworld Caregiving Centre. “I had just come off of maternity leave and couldn’t take any more sick days so I had to leave.”
Lyme disease is caused by a bite from an infected tick. It is a bacterial infection that without antibiotics can cause serious, chronic illness often mistaken for arthritis, lupus, chronic fatigue syndrome or multiple sclerosis.
“A tick can be as small as a poppy seed,” explained Murdock. “A common belief is that when you get a tick bite you will see a bull’s-eye shaped rash, but I didn’t see that. I don’t have any memory of being bitten by a tick.”
The hesitancy from medical professionals to diagnose Lyme disease comes from the reliance on outdated information from health authorities that suggests the ticks that carry the disease generally don’t migrate this far north, said Murdock.
“They say that you can’t get the disease in this region, but I haven’t travelled more than an hour and a half from here. The disease is something that doctors in Canada don’t seem to know much about,” she said of her drawn-out diagnosis. “Patients get tested for all kinds of things and when the tests come back negative, they are sometimes treated like they are crazy or like it’s all in their head.”
There were, however, 79 reported cases in Ontario last year, though patient advocates, including Murdock, believe the rates of infection are far greater than that. Though there is a standard test for Lyme disease in Canada (ELISA, or enzyme-linked immunosorbent serum assay), Murdock and other patient advocates believe it’s not rigorous enough and often inaccurate.
“I am sure that there are more people out there who are suffering with symptoms and they aren’t getting the answers from their doctors. It’s important to get the word out to people that it is here, and to be aware of the signs and symptoms before they get worse.”
Since being diagnosed, Murdock has been put on antibiotics which she has been told will take between six months and a year to take effect, if not longer. Still unable to work, Murdock experiences blurred vision, a ringing in her ears, insomnia, joint pain, muscle weakness, dizziness and fatigue.
When she wakes up in the morning, she takes her prescribed antibiotics, takes a shower and gets dressed. Those activities alone are enough to tire her out and she needs to sit down or even have a nap.
“My son has to go to a babysitter every day because I don’t know if I will be alert enough to take care of him,” she said. “It’s sad and very frustrating.”
Murdock hopes that she can come together with other Lyme disease sufferers to talk about their experiences and work towards getting more accurate information out to the public about the disease. She and other patients in the Waterloo Region plan to meet every second Tuesday of the month at the Church of Holy Saviour in Waterloo and form a support group. The next meeting is planned for Nov. 9 at 7:30 p.m.
“I am so looking forward to the day when this is in the past,” she said. “I can’t wait to get back to work, to be able to do things with my son and to just live a normal life again.”
To contact Murdock about her experience or where she sought treatment, email fightlymedisease@hotmail.com. For more information about Lyme disease in Canada, visit www.canlyme.com.
