Re: TTM: TTM & Lyme Disease

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 7/31/2001 9:09:34 AM Eastern Daylight Time,

bsashakins@... writes:

> I noticed that in an email someone mentioned that they have Lyme

> Disease. My brother and I both have Lyme disease and TTM.

> How many people suffer from TTM as well as lyme disease?

>

>

Dear na,

Hi, I'm a Aida from NJ, & I'm the one who wrote that post.

I and my son both have TTM & Lyme disease.

While Lyme disease has been very closely associated with OCD, I don't believe

that my trich has anything to do with the Lyme.

My father had trich, but my mother didn't.

My only sister does not, but both of her 2 children, a boy & a girl, have or

had trich. I KNOW that in my family trich is heredity, as none of us grew up

together, except, for a while, me & my sister. My father lived in another

state far away, & I saw him only rarely while growning up & didn't find out

that he had trich until about 11 years ago, when he was in his 70's. He hid

it all his life.

This part, I believe is coincidence, but it spooks me: my father died last

week, and I'm almost positive that his illness & death were in part caused by

undiagnosed & untreated Lyme disease, which lead to massive heart damage. He

lived his entire adult life, until his late 40's, in Newburgh, NY, where he

raised & bred dogs as a sideline business, having anywhere between 50 & 100

dogs at any one time. He handled all these dogs & was constantly removing

both fleas & ticks from them.

Wait.... it gets worse.... his main job/career was as a newspaper printer in

Poughkeepsie, NY, and, for those who don't know, Poughkeepsie, NY is located

right in the middle of Dutchess County, which is the most Lyme-endemic area,

not only in the USA, but in the ENTIRE WORLD.

His doctors refused to test him for Lyme, as he retired to Florida, & his

doctors insisted, right up until the week before he died, that " there is no

Lyme in Florida. " I'll never understand why these doctors didn't consider

the possibility that people in Florida may have lived or traveled in other

parts of the country. And, by the way, there IS Lyme in Florida.

Lastly, for those of you on the Lyme remailer who are reading this, TTM, or

" trich " is short for TRICHOTILLOMANIA, which means compulsive hair-pulling,

which some consider to be a form of OCD (obsessive-compulsive disorder).

(I've had both TTM & OCD all my life.)

na, since you ask the question: how many people suffer from both TTM &

Lyme Disease, I think the same question should be asked of those on the Lyme

remailer. Bet it's more than just a few.

Hugs to all,

a Aida