Podcast 29 – Lyme Q & A

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In this podcast, we cover:

03:30     Lyme disease, its origin and remedies

08:31     Joette shares her take on Lyme disease

17:37     Treating the symptoms like fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, leaky gut

22:20     Symphytum and Rhus tox for joint pain

24:13     Coinfections, Lyme testing

29:19     Some more Q&A

You are listening to a podcast from joettecalabrese.com where nationally certified American homeopath, public speaker, and author, Joette Calabrese, shares her passion for helping families stay healthy through homeopathy and nutrient-dense nutrition.

 

Paola:  It’s Podcast 29 at joettecalabrese.com. Today, we’re going to talk about Lyme disease. For today’s podcast, we’ve taken a lot of questions that people have submitted to Joette about Lyme disease. So, before we get into the questions, we’re going to spend a little bit of time defining how Joette views Lyme disease — using her lens of homeopathy. So, we’re going to look at Lyme disease and how it’s affected the news and the media. We’re going to look at chronic Lyme disease versus acute Lyme disease. An interesting tidbit: we’re going to learn about where the word Lyme disease came from. Then we’re going to delve into your questions. I think this is going to be a great episode. So, here we go.

Hi! I’m here with Joette. I’m excited to do another podcast with you, Joette. Hi!

Joette:  Yes. I always look forward to these, Paola.

Paola:  Thank you, me too. Today’s topic is a really hot button topic especially this summer. Have you heard about kind of the frenzy around Lyme disease this summer?

Joette:  Oh yes, it’s everywhere.

Paola:  I think the media is saying that this is going to be one of the worst summers for Lyme disease.

Joette:  I have heard of that. But the news says Zika is going to kill every child; that SARS is going to make you cough your guts out; that Legionnaires' is … I mean, they do this every year.

Paola:  Yes. When I was in high school, it was the bird flu.

Joette:  Swine flu, bird flu, Asian flu, we’re all doomed. We’re just doomed. So, I never paid much attention to that. I mean, it’s every single year there’s a scare. I think it happens for a couple of different reasons. We won’t go into that in this particular podcast. But I think there are reasons for all of that.

Paola:  Well, I feel like if anyone here is listening, they might feel like you were right on those other diseases. But they might feel like Lyme disease is a legitimate concern.

Joette:  All of them are legitimate concerns.

Paola:  Oh, okay.

Joette:  Do you know what I mean? When you think about it, SARS, that’s a legitimate concern. People were dying in Toronto, or so they said. We don’t really know. We never really got the end. I don’t mean to say that they’re lying. I’m not attaching myself to a conspiracy theory. But we don’t really know the end numbers to these kinds of things and what really occurred.

Paola:  Yes. They’re not well-reported.

Joette:  No matter what it is, it’s a threat. Lyme is generally not life-threatening, so, we can put that aside. It doesn’t kill people. I mean, could you die from Lyme? I suppose it’s possible. But, it doesn’t have a high mortality rate. It’s more a chronic condition.

Paola:  Yes, more of a life-altering condition.

Joette:  Yes.

Paola:  I have here a number of great questions that our social media team has been collecting in regards to Lyme disease. I want to go through some of these. But basically, I want to review your position on Lyme disease so that our listeners who might be new to you, Joette, can understand. What is your position on Lyme disease as far as treating it with homeopathy? Do we treat this broad, chronic Lyme disease?

Joette:  Here’s the thing: Is it Lyme because someone just got a bull's-eye rash and they just pulled a tick off of their arm a few days ago? Or are we talking about this chronic Lyme that they’re discussing?

Paola:  Okay. Well, let’s talk about acute first.

Lyme disease, its origin and remedies

Joette:  Okay, which is the Lyme that I’ve written about on my blog. I knew that there was such a thing as chronic Lyme, but it wasn’t as big as it has been in the news, et cetera, when I wrote that original blog some three years ago. So, the way I looked at Lyme generally (even though I knew it could go chronic — we understand that) is that Lyme is from a bacteria from a deer tick. And, I know that any kind of insect bite, pretty much, you use Ledum palustre. That’s what I wrote in my blog, Ledum palustre 200C. I would urge people to go to that blog because I’ve got the entire protocol laid out there. Now, I live in the country. We have 15 acres. We’re in New York State. The next state over is Connecticut. Lyme, Connecticut is where it got its name because it became so big in Lyme, Connecticut area.

Paola:  Oh Lyme, Connecticut is actually …

Joette:  A town in Connecticut.

Paola:  Interesting.

Joette:  So, my father-in-law had Lyme. They were in Connecticut when he got it some 30 years ago. I said it on a podcast recently, but when I think about it, it was probably closer to 45 years ago he got Lyme. It was not as prevailing as it is today. So, when we look at it as an acute: here’s a tick. Take it off. Collect it. Put it in a bottle. Put it in vodka (in the highest alcohol content vodka you can find). Label it: the date, who you found it on, which family member, where…

Paola:  Where on their body or where in the state?

Joette:  Where on their body. Well, listen if you’re in Allegheny at the time, then you might want to write Allegheny State Park or something like that and make it clear where you were. It helps you to remember what the incident was many months, if not years from now. You’re saving the deer tick to make it into a homeopathic medicine if you choose or even do some research on it.

Paola:  Like later down the line if they actually get an acute condition of Lyme.

Joette:  It turns into a chronic, you have the tick to prove one way or another. You got your evidence.

Paola:  So basically, you can turn that homeopathic remedy into a nosode. Do you have instructions on how to do that?

Joette:  I don’t know. I have it in my Survivalist Guide.

Paola:  Oh, that’s right. That’s right. You do teach us how to …

Joette:  It’s pretty clear there because you can do this with many kinds of insects, et cetera, that can cause trouble. You can learn how to make a homeopathic medicine. So, we won’t go into that now. We could probably do that in another blog. But, I just want you to know that that’s possible.

Then the first thing you do is you give Ledum palustre, 200. 200C is most commonly used these days, but if you only have 200X in your neck of the woods then you could use that. We use it every 3 to 6 hours, 3 to 12 hours. The reason I don’t give exact numbers is because through the years, my family — including our dog, we had goats, our three sons (who are now all adults), my husband, and neighbors, et cetera — have had so many ticks. No one’s ever gotten sick from any of these ticks. Perhaps I’ve gotten a little lackadaisical about it. I say, “Ah, well, twice a day.” But if you’re really worried and most people are very anxious about this, it’s because they’re reading all of the news reports, you could do it every 6 hours for a few days.

Paola:  Yes. My girlfriend Heather, her daughter got a tick. She did your protocol to a tee, every 3 hours. And that made her feel better.

Joette:  Yes. Some people are very comforted by that. You become less worried as you get more experience about certain things and more worried about other things that you know are concerning. Go to my blog and it will give you exactly how to do it.

Paola:  Yes. We’re even updating that blog. It’s June 2017. We’re coming out with an update to that blog to reworking it a little bit.

Joette:  And adding a little more, just building it so that there’s more information.

Paola:  So definitely go and look into that. It was a June 2017 blog. It will be coming out if it’s not out already. So, let’s shift in to kind of a chronic Lyme situation.

Joette:  Let me also step back and mention one more thing: We have deer on our property. We have a lot of deer on our property. We have a big pond. They come and take a little sip from the pond. They go down. They tromp through my tomatoes when I used to have my tomato garden. They go throughout my hostas; they eat them all down. We are part of the trail from the top end of the ski area all the way down to the bottom end of the ski area where we live. So, it’s not as though we are not exposed to this. We have deer everywhere. It’s a wonder they don’t knock on the door and ask what else we’ve got for dinner.

Paola:  Right, right.

Joette:  We have a lot of hunters around us. So, this is a plentiful area with deer. So, I don’t want anybody to think that well, we were just lucky. Our ticks are not from deer and et cetera, et cetera. No. It is prevalent here as it is anywhere else especially in New England and upstate New York area.

Paola:  Right, okay.

Joette:  Now, let’s say somebody got a tick. By the time they hear this, it was a year ago. If they’re not sick, there’s nothing to treat. I wouldn’t even give it a thought. But now, if they’re chronically ill, now, this is where everyone gets stuck.

Paola:  One of the things is, if all these people in your life have been bitten by this tick, it’s almost like it’s not necessarily the Lyme bacteria that are the concern, but it’s the terrain or the health of the person that’s a concern.

Joette shares her take on Lyme disease

Joette:  Yes, I think it is. Look, I’m not an MD. I’m a lay homeopathic practitioner. I’m an educator. I’m a mother. But, I’ve been doing this long enough now and worked with homeopaths from all over the world. I have worked in India for many years, where we see very serious illnesses. I will tell you that in my experience, it seems to me that we’re going through a phase on the internet, on the news, et cetera — I might be completely wrong about this, but if you’re asking my opinion and that’s why you’re here is that you’re interested at least in hearing it — I think this is somewhat some hysteria involved.

Paola:  Or maybe it’s just … it’s a rabbit hole. People are overall sicker with chronic illness, and they’re trying to find the solution and a reason for it. It seems like — I don’t want to minimize it — but kind of the pendulum has swung in the direction of Lyme disease. We’re more and more and more attributing it to that. But Joette, people are getting labs and they’re seeing that they have the Lyme bacteria in them.

Joette:  Yes. I’m not surprised. I think we probably all have Lyme bacteria. I think if we dig around, we’ll find cancer in most people. If we dig around, we’ll find parasites. We’ll find heavy metals. We’ll find overgrowth of yeast. We’ll find everything that people are looking for. If you dig far enough, if you decided you’re going to be Vasco da Gama and start going on a discovery, you’re going to find everything! So, at some point, we have to make a decision and say, “Really? Do I really want to know absolutely every little thing that I’ve got in my body? Do I want to know that I’ve polyps in my colon and go for colonoscopy every year? Do I really want to go this far?”

Because what homeopathy allows us, is the ability to calm down. The reason it does that is because we don’t have to find every little disease, and then become crazy about it — because it does cause craziness, including myself. I was like that myself many years ago, because I started to dig around. I’m like, “Oh my gosh, it’s Epstein-Barr. Holy cow, it’s also cytomegalovirus. Oh, my goodness! It’s also …” And in those days when they were testing me, they didn’t find Lyme probably because they weren’t looking for it. I’ll bet it was there.

Paola:  Right, right. Yes.

Joette:  “Oh, my gosh. You’ve got herpes. Oh, my gosh.” It could go on and on. Of course, you’ve got herpes. I had chicken pox. Of course, it’s going to show up at least in the titers.

Paola:  What you’re saying is in the language of homeopathy, it’s not that these conditions don’t matter. If knowing that you have Lyme helped cure the person, you would be all for it. But in the language of homeopathy, it matters not if you have all these hidden little bacteria or whatever in your system. In homeopathy, we don’t care about the possible theorized root cause.

Joette:  The etiology. What is the cause? Oh, it must be the Lyme.

Paola:  The candida overgrowth.

Joette:  It must be the candida. Oh, it’s heavy metals.

Paola:  Right.

Joette:  Because I get the people for whom those paradigms, I’m not saying it never works by going after it that way. But the way that I see it is I get all the people for whom those paradigms did not act, did not work. So, by doing that, I get the people who say, “Well, I was told I have heavy metals. I’ve been taking these chelated mineral supplements. I’ve been doing these cleanses. My heavy metals are coming down, but you know what? I’m still sick. I still have chronic fatigue. I still have fibromyalgia. I still suffer from brain fogs. So, darn it all, I guess it wasn’t those.”

“Let’s look at this! Oh, it must be the yeast. Oh, it’s yeast overgrowth. Okay, now, we do the yeast cleanse, no sugar and no dried fruit.”

I’ve been through all of these…

Paola:  Right.

Joette:  Personally myself and this is what I hear others describing. So, it comes down to we don’t know the cause of that chronic fatigue. Couldn’t it be perhaps menopause? Couldn’t it be 9-11 anxiety? Couldn’t it be that flu that really brought you down to your knees?

Paola:  Your divorce, those stresses?

Joette:  Couldn’t it be the pesticides that are sprayed around your house? Couldn’t it be the blood pressure drugs you’ve started taking? Couldn’t it be the psychotropic drugs that you take for sleep, Ativan, et cetera? Why couldn’t it be all of those? Certainly, it could be any of these. But, to try to pinpoint exactly which microorganism, exactly which input into the human system it was that triggered this? Oh my gosh — good luck. I don’t know how you could ever figure something like that out.

Paola:  I’ve said this before to some of my study group students. Especially in the language of homeopathy — if you want to understand how to use the language of homeopathy to get to your heath goal — it doesn’t matter. There is a podcast, Podcast Number 24. It’s called Subjects That Bear Repeating where you and I, Joette, talked about a conventional diagnosis and then the theorized diagnosis which are all these things you’re talking about: the candida, the Lyme. So, really, if you listen to this podcast and you’re kind of confused as to what Joette is saying, go to Podcast 24 and listen to that.

Joette:  Here’s the difference. In homeopathy — especially the method that I use, what I call practical homeopathy, much of it based on the Banerji Protocols — I like a conventional diagnosis, a conventional doctor. You go to the doctor and he says generally, “Yes, you’ve got fibromyalgia. Yep, you’ve got constipation. I’d call that chronic fatigue. Yes, yes, brain fog, there’s your diagnosis.” Those are the diagnostics.

So, you go to an alternative practitioner, and they theorize. “It must be …” And that’s what we’re all talking about. “It must be you have inflammation.” Really? Of course, you’ve got inflammation!

Paola:  I know. I had a girlfriend send me a text message once, “Paola, I think my diagnosis is inflammation.” I go, “For heaven’s sakes, every disease starts with inflammation.”

Joette:  That’s right.

Paola:  It’s what it is. I had to explain to her.

Joette:  Sometimes people come back from the doctor. They say the doctor says it’s stress. Uh, hello! That is the world! Of course, there’s stress. Everybody’s got some stress. When we try to distill it down to, “It must be …” and that’s the answer. It may not even be, to be honest, the message that the naturopath (or the clinical ecologist, the functional doctor, or the chiropractor, or even the conventional doctor) is giving. It might be the way the person is getting that information and saying, “I need to distill this down to one cause.” Then they hear, “It’s inflammation,” or they hear, “It’s Lyme.” Then everything else is blanketed out of the picture. There are blinders put on. All they can think of is — it’s Lyme.

Now, it’s different if you have malaria. Malaria is malaria. That is a conventional diagnosis. It’s different when you have chicken pox. Chicken pox is chicken pox. It’s not hunting. We don’t have to hunt around to find it. When the chicken pox is over, then the virus has receded, it’s calmed down, and the person lives their life. But, with this chronic Lyme, what I get are the people who’ve been on antibiotics for two years … six months … two years … seven years. I always ask, try to say this as gently as I can, “So how’s that treatment going for you?”

Paola:  Right. Well, here’s a little exercise. If you’re listening to this podcast, and you’ve been diagnosed with Lyme or candida, or one of these kind of theorized diagnoses, if the treatment for those problems has cured your symptoms that you’re suffering from …

Joette:  Then we’re done. They’re done. Don’t go any further. You’re done.

Paola:  Right.

Joette:  Consider yourself lucky and go on with your life and become productive. I’m very happy for you. I think that there are people like that. I do think that that is very possible. I think that you can … I’m not throwing out the baby with the bath water. I believe it’s very possible that you could end up with a resolution by following some of these methods.

Paola:  BUT, if you are shaking your head, “No, it hasn’t helped. I’m actually worse off or more frustrated or poorer from all the treatments,” then listen on.

Joette:  Yes. Then we look at it from a different point of view. Had it been looked at from a homeopathic point of view in the first place, someone might not have suffered for as long as they had. Of course, nobody goes to homeopathy first. That’s just the way it is in North America. In Europe, South America, India, it might be different. Sometimes it’s not different there either. Sometimes in India, we see people going conventional medical doctors first because they have the big hospitals, et cetera, et cetera. They have a more ubiquitous presence. So, homeopathy is usually last. Most people don’t know what it is. So, they find out about it far down the game.

Paola:  So Joette, now that we’ve kind of established your perspective on Lyme as far as homeopathy goes, let me get to some of these questions that people are asking on social media.

Here’s a question Joette: “What do you do for established Lyme cases that are old, 10-plus years?” Just in a nutshell.

Treating the symptoms like fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, leaky gut

Joette:  We look at what’s presenting. What does it mean that you have Lyme? “Well, I’ve got fibromyalgia.” Okay. Then we use the homeopathic medicine for fibromyalgia. “I’ve got chronic fatigue.” Okay. Then we use the medicine for chronic fatigue. “I have leaky gut.” Okay. Then we use the medicine that’s also for leaky gut. Now, we’ve got three medicines going. We don’t approach it as giving the Lyme protocol — at least, that’s not the way I think it through. I might use the Lyme protocol if it’s a fresh case. Ten years old? I wouldn’t go there because, again, we don’t need to know what the etiology is; we just want to know how it’s presenting and what the diagnosis is — at this point.

You knew from a naturopath that your blood levels were showing Lyme, but then you went to a conventional doctor and you say, “Okay, give me a diagnosis here.” He’d say “Yes, you’ve got fibromyalgia, alright. Yes, you’ve got chronic fatigue.” So that’s the kind of diagnosis that I want. I don’t want to know which microorganism was the one microorganism that caused this.

Paola:  Right. And this does go back again, I’m going to repeat it, to Podcast 24 where we really picked apart what Joette means by a conventional diagnosis.

Joette:  Well, and also the other part of this picture is it would be easy for someone to misunderstand what I’m saying, and think that we’re treating fibromyalgia. We’re treating the symptoms of chronic fatigue. But we’re not. We’re using those symptoms to determine which homeopathic medicine is best chosen, and then the body corrects it by using it. So, we’re not treating or subduing symptoms. That’s a completely different modality. That is the modality of modern medicine. It’s not the modality of homeopathy. We use the symptoms to determine what medicine to choose. Then by choosing that, it uproots the condition.

Paola:  Interesting, okay.

Joette:  Not only interesting, fantastico! When you think about it. Really? You’re using my sufferings to determine which medicine is going to be the medicine that’s going to get rid of this? Now look, don’t get me wrong. I’m not going to tell you that we cure. I don’t talk about cure. I don’t use that word. The word that I use is uproot. Because, well, does this mean that the person will never have chronic fatigue again? Probably not. They’ll, probably have some chronic fatigue from time to time. Does this mean the person will never have a fibrous tissue in their body that will hurt again? No, it doesn’t mean that. It means that the body has been stimulated to correct as much as it can. That’s the goal. How far is that? It depends on the person; how old they are; how many drugs they’ve had, et cetera, et cetera.

Paola:  It is beautiful because it’s all that suffering, all those symptoms are not for naught.

Joette:  That’s right. They’re not for naught.

Paola:  Yes, thank you. So, it brings value to those symptoms that we can select the homeopathic remedy.

Joette:  Yes, they’re gifts then. Suddenly, our sufferings become information rather than something that we’re burdened with.

Paola:  It’s almost like disciplining a toddler who’s made a bad choice. You do love and logic. I’m the love and logic parent. If you do love and logic, they say when they misbehave, you need to high five yourself and celebrate because this is an opportunity to show them how to become a better person. It’s almost like the same idea with homeopathy. When you get sick and have symptoms, it’s like, “Yes, alright. This is an opportunity for me to have a better body.”

Joette:  Yes. In a way, I suppose that’s so.

Paola:  Here’s another question: “What do you do for specific symptoms such as — and I have a list — pain in hands, ALS symptoms, MS symptoms, numbness, joint pain?”

Joette:  Wait a minute. MS symptoms? Is it multiple sclerosis or is it just symptoms that are like multiple sclerosis? So, see, this is what this person is doing, this question that came in. Excuse me for interrupting, but what this person is doing is saying, “I have Lyme disease.” All these others are just symptoms of multiple sclerosis. That’s sounds cockeyed to me. Either you have multiple sclerosis, and we use that and we use the homeopathic medicine that’s specific for multiple sclerosis — or we have something else. So, it’s almost as though the acceptance of Lyme is greater than the acceptance of ALS or MS or whatever.

Paola:  Because this list of symptoms to me seems like they are attributed to Lyme disease. So, there’s muscle ache, headaches, Bell's palsy, and hair loss. That was their list. So, I think you’re right.

Joette:  We’d consider each one of those worthy of correcting with homeopathy — regardless of what the microorganism was that may or may not have caused this.

Paola:  Okay. So Joette, can you give us a protocol for one of these symptoms that I listed?

Joette:  Yes, yes. How about the joint pain? Let’s talk about that.

Paola:  Okay.

Symphytum and Rhus tox for joint pain

Joette:  Also, you’ll find this on my blogs. So, if you don’t get this written down, in the little search bar on the website, just put in “joint pain” or you might write “arthritis”. (That’s what joint pain is arthritis.)

The method that we normally use at least what we start with for most people is Symphytum 200. It’s often mixed with Rhus tox 30. That’s taken twice daily. Now, that is a Banerji Protocol.

In some people, I find that Symphytum 200, all by itself, works even better. And then we use Rhus tox — maybe in a higher potency like a 200 — twice a day, as well. And we don’t mix them.

The Banerjis automatically mix them, and in many situations, it’s fabulous. But, in this situation, we might find that in one person’s situation, it might not work as well as in anothers. So, it’s taken twice a day and is taken for many weeks until you see some improvement. Once you see improvement, then you can start saying, “Oh, I see improvement. This is great.” So, you continue going until it’s done. It could take many months. But, for joint pain generally speaking, we do see a shift in about six weeks.

Paola:  Great. Yes, I find that this protocol you just gave is one of my favorite “conversion protocols,” to convert people to homeopathy because it works so well. It’s a really great one. Now, what if the pain is just in your hands, and not all-over joint pain, do we still use this protocol?

Joette:  Joint pain is joint pain. If it’s in the fingers, at the back, it’s in the shoulders, it doesn’t matter.

Paola:  Okay. So, it doesn’t have to be all over.

Joette:  Pretty much, pretty much. We can be more specific. Sometimes if it’s only in the knee, then we might use something that’s a little different.

Paola:  Okay, alright. So, let me get to another question here: “Can you address treatment for coinfections and associated illnesses like POTS, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, Babesia? …”

Joette:  Yes, Babesia. It’s a coinfection.

Paola:  “… Bartonella, Herx, electric shocks/sparks to skin, foggy brain, sleeplessness, lethargy, forgetfulness.”

Coinfections, Lyme testing

Joette:  Coinfections, we look at exactly the same way as what we’ve just said for the last 10 minutes …

Paola:  Right, the protocol.

Joette:  Yes, we’re not necessarily looking for what was the cause. Which little microorganism caused this or causes this. Homeopathy doesn’t kill bugs. We’re not trying to kill. When the child has a fever, a lot of times the pediatrician will give an antibiotic. Well, that’s like a pesticide or “napalm,” as I call it. We’re not there to kill bugs. We’re there to stimulate the body’s natural ability to bring itself to completion.

We all have a mechanism in us that will correct things when they’ve gone awry. If you eat bad chicken from a restaurant, the next day or that night, you’re vomiting. That’s a mechanism that is intended to correct. Get it out of the system. The next morning, you might have diarrhea, also very important. If you take a drug that forces the stopping of vomiting and diarrhea, you’re going to cause trouble because it’s intended to get it out of your system.

So, it’s the same thing with a fever. A fever is a very positive thing for a child when they’re sick. We like a nice, high fever. It means they’re mounting of defense against the illness. The heat from the fever cooks off the virus. So, we’re looking for that (or perhaps it’s bacteria, but it’s usually virus). So, let’s say it’s an ear infection, and it is a bacterial infection, and you give an antibiotic. What you’re doing is squelching the symptoms by killing the bugs. Well, you can never kill the bugs, because if you’re killing the bugs, you’re killing the person. You’ll never kill all the bugs because we’re made up of bacteria and viruses, parasites, et cetera.

So, it would be similar to organic gardening.

Paola:  Yes.

Joette:  There are three peach trees. Two of them are beautiful and healthy. The other one is limping along. The leaves are looking pretty sad. This gets insects on it. The insects are going to go after that tree because the terrain has been compromised. But, you could douse it with Sevin (S-E-V-I-N) the pesticide …

Paola:  Yes, Sevin dust.

Joette:  Or Monsanto … You could douse it all you want. Yes, it will kill the bugs. But, it won’t kill all the bugs, or it won’t kill the next generation of bugs that will come right back again because it sees how compromised that tree is. Instead, we are stimulating the tree’s ability to do it itself. We give it good compost. We make sure there’s enough water. There’s sunshine. We bring it back to health in its natural way.

Paola:  I have a trick. You also get a watering can and put a little bit of Silicea 6X into the watering can, and you water the tree with it. That has been studied in agrohomeopathy to help the tree uptake the nutrients a little bit better.

Joette:  Well, that’s interesting because I don’t know about that particular study, but I’ve always used cell salts for my plants and my trees. Silica 6X is one of the 12 cell salts. I’ve always found that that helps when I do it for my house plants. I do it for my vegetable garden. I try to incorporate it into anything that I feel needs to …

Paola:  So, you do Bioplasma?

Joette:  Bioplasma which has all 12 cell salts mixed together, the Hyland’s cell salts.

Paola:  But, I have noticed the Silica — a little word to the wise here. You can overdo it. So really like only once a month is kind of — at least for my plants — has been the sweet spot. When I plant them and then a maybe a month later …

Joette:  It’s interesting you say that as well, because when I do it, I’m not out there every morning doing that. I only think about it around that often, so, maybe it’s just kind of a natural response. Interesting, thanks for that.

Paola:  Cool. Let’s do a whole podcast on agrohomeopathy.

Joette:  Yes, it sounds good to me.

Paola:  So anyhow, going back to the discussion, and we’re looking at homeopathy. You’ve said this to me before — so I’m not going to take credit for this — but, you say, “Homeopathy is diplomatic, whereas these other ways of treating coinfections are like war.” So, one is killing the bacteria, whereas the other one is kind of encouraging the body to like, “Let’s get a little stronger and fight this bug.”

Joette:  But then, I must also say that it is not supplementing. People think, “Oh so we’re supplementing.” No, no, no, no. “We’re girding!” No, no, no. Specific medicines will correct specific conditions.

Paola:  Right. So, ready for another question?

Joette:  Sure.

Paola:  This one’s kind of obvious. I think the listeners should know by now. “What are your thoughts on Lyme testing?”

Joette:  If it’s fresh and brand new and the person has got the rash, et cetera, and it’s been a month now (it might be a little bit more than a month … usually, it shows up, I’m thinking, at about six weeks), and they’re really fatigued. I suppose, yes, you might want to do that. Then you would follow the protocol that’s on my website for Lyme. Now, that’s a little different. I don’t know that I would call that quite chronic Lyme. If they’re getting a condition of what a bacteria would show — such as fever and fatigue — now we’re talking about active Lyme. Now, that makes a bit of a difference. It’s when it turns into chronic, and now it’s turned into fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue, that’s where I draw the line.

Paola:  Okay. So basically, the way I’m going to call it, by what you mean by “active” Lyme is acute, like an acute case of Lyme.

Joette:  Yes, it’s still acute. That’s right.

Some more Q&A

Paola:  Okay. Joette, I’m going to buzz through some of these questions quickly, and you tell me if I’m correct or if I’m not correct. This is kind of a quiz to the listener. If they’ve been listening, they should be able to answer some of these questions at this point. So, “Alternatives to antibiotics or doxycycline?”

Joette:  Doxycycline, yes.

Paola:  Okay. Thankfully, I don’t know how to pronounce that, right? The alternative is to look at the symptoms and select the proper homeopathic protocol, right?

Joette:  That’s right.

Paola:  Okay, good. So, one point for listeners. Then, “Why is there such a huge rise in the diagnosis of chronic Lyme disease?”

Joette:  I don’t know that I could tell you the reason why. I don’t know that it’s really as widespread as people make it out to be. I think there’s just a lot of attention. I think this happens every year. We get one disease or another. I think we touched on that earlier. That becomes the disease of the year or disease of the season. I can practically guarantee. Give it another year or two, we won’t hear about it anymore.

It’s like blueberries. “Blueberries are fabulous! Everybody should be eating blueberries, absolutely!” The next year: “Kiwi! Everyone should be eating kiwi!” “Vitamin C is the vitamin of all strong people!” “Wait a minute. Hold on. No, it’s Vitamin D is the big one. You got to have your vitamin D checked.” “Wait a minute. Hold it. Now, it’s calcium!” I mean really, I’ve been doing this long enough that after a while, it becomes trite.

Paola:  Well, I was thinking of the acai berry. That’s a big, super food berry.

Joette:  Yes, or blue-green algae. Oh, my gosh, 25 years ago, blue-green algae was the hottest thing around. There are many, many supplements in foods. There are many, many diseases, and things that haven’t been around for a while, come back round. There are a lot of blogs written about them. Then there are products miraculously attached to those blogs. It’s just the way the world runs.

Paola:  I also think that when you live a life without homeopathy, Joette, you kind of live in fear all the time of getting the flu, of getting all these things because you really don’t have something so wonderful to protect you. So then, people have their little ears open for the next big thing. Then it does become a little bit sensationalized. I really don’t want to minimize this for people who are suffering from Lyme disease …

Joette:  That’s an argument for learning as much as you can about homeopathy. Because of all the medicines out there, I believe it’s the best.

Paola:  Right. Okay. So, here’s a great question. “Alternatives to preventative techniques including DEET?” People don’t want to get — like just keep them away from me — the ticks.

Joette:  Oh, I would use essential oils. There are lots of products out there that are pre-made, or you can make yourself and learn a little. But, go online, what are the preventative essential oils that I can spray on myself and my children before we go out into the woods? You wear protective clothing. But, to be honest, after living in these 15 acres, my neighbor has another 20 next to me, and the other neighbor on the other side has another 10 or 20. So, I’m surrounded by green. I can’t even see houses from my house for most of the year. So, there’s plenty of opportunity to be eaten up. I never think to do that. I wear tall boots because it’s mushy outside in the back. I wear a jacket if it’s cold. If I don’t, I wear short sleeved shirt. I might wear shorts. If I find a tick, I take it off. Then I take a couple of doses of Ledum for a couple of days.

Paola:  Here’s another question: “Once treated homeopathically, does the Lyme no longer present in the body or does it remain lifelong?”

Joette:  If the symptoms are gone, then there’s no presentation.

Paola:  So what does it matter?

Joette:  That’s right. So, what does it matter?

Paola:  Okay.

Joette:  If you’re living a life and you’re healthy and you have the freedom that you would expect, then you just move on and forget about that chapter in your life. And you go on to doing the next thing.

Paola:  Because you’ve said this before in your class, the symptoms don’t lie.

Joette:  Right. They never lie unless you’re taking a drug. Then, what we’re reading instead of symptoms are side effects. I don’t call them side effects. I call them effects.

Paola:  Right, right, okay. Here’s another great question: “What is the connection between EBV, MTHFR gene mutation, and Lyme disease?”

Joette:  I don’t know. I don’t know why someone would go that far. Why would you need to go through all of that? If we go back to what we’re talking about in the beginning, it is that you use the symptoms — not only the symptoms — the name of the actual conventional diagnosis. You treat it correctly, and you forget all about all these connections.

Paola:  Right, okay, very good. “Does homeopathy offer remedies to boost immune system based on IgG, IgA, IgE?”

Joette:  No, it doesn’t boost. It corrects.

Paola:  Right.

Joette:  That’s what I teach in my course, Allergies. Because it is all about correcting the disease, not supporting the immune system.

Paola:  So, do you ever care if their IgG, IgA, IgE numbers, do you care if those are off? Does that help inform you?

Joette:  No. Because why would the person go to the allergist in the first place? Because they have eczema, because they have food intolerances, because et cetera; they have allergies; they can’t breathe, et cetera, et cetera. If those symptoms are gone, we wouldn’t need any more information than that.

Paola:  Okay, very good. Here’s a really good question: “I’m currently using herbs which are working well to treat my Lyme disease. My naturopath suggested waiting until the healing is further along before switching to homeopathy. What do you think?”

Joette:  I don’t know. I’m all about speed. I don’t know why someone would wait other than it might confuse the naturopath as to what’s acting and what isn’t. But, naturopaths, generally speaking are more about supplements and vitamins and herbs. Homeopathy is more on the backburner for many of them, probably because homeopathy is considered to be too complex — although the method that I teach is really not that complex. So, I think that’s just that particular naturopath’s preference. I don’t see how that is necessarily a good or a bad idea.

Paola:  Alright, very interesting. Next question: “Could antibiotics be compounding symptoms or making them worse?”

Joette:  Here’s what’s interesting about this question is that this must be someone who’s kind of new to all of this, this way of thinking. Because antibiotics are napalm. I’m not going to tell you that you should never use antibiotics. They have been very useful in our society for 100 years or around that time. But, we have something so much better now without side effects. That’s of course homeopathy.

Antibiotics will absolutely compound the problem because they are killing bacteria. We start with this conversation by talking about how important bacteria is to the system and that it be in perfect harmony. It’s a symphony. If you kill one kind of bacteria, that allows the virus to do something else. That allows other aspects, parasites, et cetera, to overcome the system, and it throws a sabot into the works to say the least. (Sabot is the word for shoe. It’s an old French Revolution saying during the Industrial Revolution.)

Paola:  It throws a shoe into the works. How fancy. You’re so fancy, Joette! Here’s a good question but I think the listeners should be able to answer this one, too. “How can a homeopathic treatment plan for Lyme exist if each person’s backstory is different? The reason it manifests is different for each person. So how could a true homeopathic treatment be offered to everyone without considering the backstory of each individual?”

Joette:  Well, I think we’ve covered that.

Paola:  It’s a good question, but I think, yes, we’re looking at their symptoms and we do the protocols.

Joette:  Exactly. That’s why it’s individualized in that way because everyone is different.

Paola:  So, I really hoped that our listeners, if you’re concerned about Lyme, I hope that this podcast helped them understand the homeopathic perspective. Joette, thank you as always for opening up your brain to us.

Joette:  Yes, it’s always fun, Paola. We’ll probably follow up on this. Certainly, as you said earlier, we’ve got articles coming out. So, there’s written discussion on this as well. So that folks — if they don’t catch it the first time — they might catch the information they’re looking for the second time around.

Paola:  Very good.

Joette:  Yes. Thanks, Paola.

Paola:  Thank you.

You just listened to a podcast by joettecalabrese.com where nationally certified homeopath, public speaker, and author, Joette Calabrese shared her passion for helping families stay healthy through homeopathy and nutrient-dense nutrition. Joette’s podcasts are available on iTunes, Google Play, Blueberry, Stitcher, and TuneIn radio.

Thank you for listening to this podcast with Joette Calabrese. If you liked it, please share it with your friends. To learn more and find out if homeopathy is a good fit in your health strategy, visit joette.com and schedule a free 15-minute conversation with Joette herself.