Ups and Downs

My niece and I heading out on an E-Mundo adventure.

In late June, seemingly out of the blue, I started feeling quite well. Instead of feeling at-risk, easily exhausted and weighted-down, I began feeling more sturdy, resilient, durable and lighter on my feet. I could feel my entire body switch from fighting off a real or perceived bacterial load to using available energies to rebuild. My friends and family wondered what I attributed the remarkable improvement to. Honestly it is impossible to pick out one or two things I have been doing over the past nine months that led to feeling better. Here are some of the highlights of my self-care: 

In December and January I went to Monterrey to get six weeks of IV antibiotics (after being on oral antibiotics for seven months straight). Wishing I could afford a Panchakarma retreat after my antibiotics, I made up a massage oil brew for my Vata constitution and began to practice self-massage as often as possible. Upon my doctor's recommendation I began to take supplemental iron for anemia and choline to help rebuild my nervous system. In late January I had a week-long stomach flu and while reintroducing solid food to my system I realized that I needed to cut out wheat, corn and oats from my diet. In February, after a experiencing a profound state of self-solidarity, I realized I needed to better align my external realities with my inner-self. This better alignment included braking up with my boyfriend of seven years and moving out of his house. Beyond the psychological and soulful benefits of the breakup, this also served to rule out any possibility of re-infection via sexual contact, which some doctors believe to be a real possibility for Lyme patients. In March and April, knowing the IV antibiotic I have been on several times over the past six years can cause gallstones, I did a parasite cleanse and two gallbladder/liver cleanses, which included eating 'dirt' (diatomaceous earth). As part of this cleansing effort and as a possible treatment for Lyme, I began using the 'Ultimate Zapper' which a friend loaned me. Also, trying to get my Globulin levels up, I took bee pollen and medicinal mushrooms. In May, after four months off of antibiotics and not feeling much progress, I began an herbal treatment protocol which included Lauricidin, Banderol and Cat's Claw. I also added Fish Oil with added DHA and EPA for my immune system, and collostrum (Transfer Factor LymePlus) All the while I have been taking Modifilan (brown seaweed) in the morning for detoxification. Since April I have been juicing and drinking lots of fresh greens and other vegetables and have been eating a mostly vegetarian diet. For exercise I have been practicing hatha yoga regularly, walking a few times a week as much as I've been able, rebounding and riding my E-Mundo as much as I can. Also in June I began to get much needed physical therapy for an impinged right shoulder which showed chronic degeneration in an MRI.

So what of all that actually helped me turn the corner? I think it ALL helped, but mostly it just felt like a divine intervention. Like my soul was simply ready to experience a recovery.

My latest FB profile picture.

But, now I am wondering if that recovery is going to turn out to be an eight-week wonderful (heavenly) blip in my Lyme time-line. A week and a half ago I biked to my dentist in downtown San Rafael for a filling in a gum-line cavity on a lower molar. She gave me a few too many Novocaine shots and after the numbness wore off my jaw felt like it had been punched. The jaw pain has mostly subsided (after 10 days) but the molar remain sensitive to chewing and to hot and cold. My dentist says that this is rare and may continue for weeks or months. Ever since the filling, I have been going downhill steadily. The feelings of resilience, returning strength and lightness have begun to wane day by day. Yesterday I experienced some seriously frightening migrating joint pains and today my brain feels off, clouded ... foggy.

My worst-case fear is that, considering that my entire jaw froze up due to my Lyme infection in 2006, some cyst-form (dormant) spirochetes have been activated by the Novocaine shots. This fear comes from knowing that even minor surgeries, as well as other stresses to the body, including air travel, can cause relapses of illness for Lyme patients.

Perhaps I should just refuse to have a relapse. 

I will add grapefruit seed extract and maybe some oil of oregano to my treatment protocol, offer some heart-felt prayers to the Powers That Be and hope to knock out any infection that may be stirring in my jaw and teeth.

Increasing My Range

Even though I didn't quite average one mile per day on E Mundo while I was in Monterey, I am glad I took her with me. Basically she was a beach delivery system. The beach was only a few blocks from the room I rented, but walking even a few blocks was challenging in December and through much of January, and I wanted to save my energy to walk on the beach not the sidewalk. I only once managed to bike the 7 mile round trip to and from my doctor's office where I got IV antibiotics for six weeks. This was about 5 weeks in to my treatment when I had recovered some of my strength and energy. I only did this ride once because I quickly found out that increased blood flow to the brain directly after a dose of blood-brain barrier crossing IV antibiotics is NOT a good idea, unless you happen to enjoy horrendous headaches. The increased blood flow also caused my hand (where the IV was inserted) to bleed profusely. So that was that.

A couple of times I biked to the Monterey Bay Aquarium and towards the end of my stay I finally gathered up the energy to go visit my old yoga studio ('my' meaning I owned it) a few blocks from the Aquarium. It had changed owners again, but was very much thriving. Apparently plenty of people still love to sweat their asses off in a 100+ degree room while doing their yoga. I am no longer one of them. 'You should join us for a class,' urged the new owner. I told her that I was pretty sure I wouldn't make it more than 10 minutes of the 90 minute class without having to lay down.

I have been back in Marin County since early February, although in a new living situation. At first I was bummed that my new house is a few miles farther away from grocery stores, from downtown San Rafael, and is 7-8 miles from Fairfax and San Anselmo which I adore. I thought that maybe I wouldn't be able to use my bike as much for basic transportation as I did when I lived in San Anselmo. But as soon as the weather warmed up last week (for the first time this Spring), I took my car key off my key chain as a symbol that I wanted to be ON BIKE more and IN CAR less, and began to explore the bike routes around my house. I have become determined this Spring to increase my bike range to include 20-25 mile round trips. In the past 5 days I've biked 66 miles, which is about how many miles I rode during my entire 2 months in Monterey.

Last night and waking up this morning, I was certain I was going to give my body a rest and drive to a doctor's appointment to check out a shoulder impingement. Instead, even though I was achy and tired and even though the sky was thoroughly overcast, I found myself putting on my rain gear and setting out on the 11.5 mile (one way) trip. 95% of my route consisted of designated bike lanes or multi-use paths which made me eternally grateful for whoever has demanded these lanes and those who keep pushing for more and more (and safer and safer) bike routes (probably the Marin County Bicycling Coalition, God bless them). 

I used a ton of battery/motor power and didn't pedal the whole way, but was still quite happy when I arrived at my destination after about 50 minutes. I was actually glad that my doctor was running late because it gave me time to lay out and rest on the exam table. I met a woman at the office who has an orange E Mundo and carries her two kids around on it. On the way home I was thinking about my 'bike heroes' -- two friends in my 20's in Boulder who inspired me to use a bike for tranSPORTation, not just for sport. Mostly I think everyone who rides bikes as a substitute for driving cars is a hero, because it is not an easy thing to do. It is not an easy shift to make for most people. Of course having an electric assist motor makes it a whole lot easier, but even still, it takes some effort and re-organization of one's priorities and timeline ... a reorganization of one's consciousness really. One has to learn to value the gas-free, Earth-friendly and open-air journey more than one values however much time one would 'save' by driving a much more speedy automobile. I remember being deeply impressed in my late teens by a carpenter who rode his bike to his gigs, who thought it was silly that many people (such as myself at the time) spend an hour or more a day exercising in a gym or jogging or whatever, when they could be using that same energy to transport themselves via foot or bike.

Anyhoo ... my arms and shoulders are not so happy that I biked 23 miles today, but the rest of me is.

E-Mundo Goes to Monterey

In early December, due to feeling horribly weak and achy despite all my own best efforts and the best efforts my Lyme Literate doctor in Santa Rosa, I decided to spend the holidays and the first months of 2012 in Monterey, California to work with an Infectious Disease specialist who runs an infusion clinic that I had heard of via a few of my Lyme-ridden acquaintances.

Despite feeling like a bag of cement, I could not imagine being in Monterey without E-Mundo, so, my trip preparations included finally taking Jelani Bertoni up on his generous offer of a free tune-up at The Bicycle Works and getting my mother to let me borrow her cavernous 1990 Toyota Previa as a bike-transpo device. Since I have been in no shape to drive anywhere over a 10 mile radius from my home, I also needed to enlist the help a couple of friends to drive me, my car, my stuff, the Previa and my bike down to Monterey. That all went as smoothly as I could have hoped for. My friends and family generously helped me out even though I was abandoning them during the holidays.

And so on the 14th of December, Jelani loaded up and strapped E-Mundo into the Previa and on the 15th, two dear friends escorted me to Monterey. Part of the appeal and logic of coming down here was that I know and love the Monterey peninsula. I owned and operated a Bikram hatha yoga studio here for a couple of years circa 2001-2002. I was in tip top shape and life seemed to flow fabulously smoothly. Not surprisingly, I want such fabulousness back.  I want my fabulously strong body and my fabulous profession back. Most of all, I want to move around and work in the world without feeling the incredible drag of fatigue, weakness and full-body aches.

On the 4th day of my trip (and 3rd day of Intravenous antibiotic treatments), I decided to take E-Mundo down Peacock Hill (where I stayed with a friend for a few days) and to the Bay. I had to hurdle all my internal red flags telling me it would be better to not go ... that I should conserve my energy. The biggest red flag was that if anything malfunctioned on my bike, that I could not get back up the hill on my own ... walking or riding. I knew that if I ran into any difficulties I would probably have a melt down due to the fragile state of my nervous system. Nothing went wrong. It was wonderful seeing the bay and riding along the coastal bike path for a mile or so. My hands got cold despite my winter lobster-claw bike gloves, but other than that, all went well. E-Mundo motored me back up the hill with no problems. But then deep exhaustion set in as I curled up on the couch, confirming that should not have gone out on an adventure.

On the 20th I moved into a sublet that I found on AirB&B. It's a nice private room with a hardwood floor in a spacious and well-furnished Spanish-style house with a garden out back which I chose partly because it is a couple blocks from downtown Monterey and only 2.5 miles from my treatment clinic. 2.5 miles would be a doable bike ride for me if I was feeling higher than 5 out of 10 on the health spectrum (0 being dead and 10 being perfectly healthy). So far, I have not yet attempted the ride to the clinic because I'm feeling more in the 3-4 range. I did manage to take E-Mundo out for a Winter Solstice night ride to Trader Joes (which is 2 blocks from my house) because my food supplies were grim. There was hardly any traffic on my street and Trader Joes was oddly not-busy, so my easily-jarred nervous system was not jarred at all. It was oddly calming to suit up in my winter gear, turn on my bike lights and ride through the chilly night. It helped me feel optimistic about my Mundo-riding possibilities in the days to come.

Then on the 22nd, while trying to take off my sweater, I tweeked my lower back and ribs pretty badly. So now I am feeling more like a solid 3 out of 10, which for me means bed is the best place to be ... no chance of me getting on my bike. I think if I enter into 2 out of 10 territory I will have to call up to my peeps in Marin to get some reinforcements down here to help drive me around and feed me.

Am hopeful that that will not be necessary and I will get back up into E-Mundo riding range in the coming days/weeks.

Here's a couple of pics of Monterey Bay:

E-Mundo on BMX Track

This video of an E-Mundo on a BMX track cracks me up. I've taken my E-Mundo off road ... on various dirt trails in Marin, it's definitely a blast. Though I do think I need to upgrade my tires to withstand the rocks and such. Amazingly I haven't had a blowout yet, but it's only a matter of time. So Kevlar tires and tubes are on my Christmas wish list.



It's hard to describe how fun it is carrying a person on the back of the Mundo. Just yesterday I gave my boyfriend a ride down the dirt fire road from Phoenix Lake to the trail head... Tremendous fun.

Cargo Bikes Out in Force in Fairfax for Biketoberfest 2011

I haven't been riding much these past months, or writing, due to feeling extra crappy health-wise. But today, upon invitation of Jelani Bertoni from The Bicycle Works, I road E Mundo into Fairfax to join other local cargo bike owners in showing off our rides at Biketoberfest Marin. It still amazes me how crappy I can feel and still feel okay going out for a spin. Even my legs feel so weak that it's not easy to get my legs over the frame ... I can still enjoy a few miles of electric-assist biking.

There were quite a few Yuba Mundos at the festival, as well as Surly Big Dummys,  Extracycles, CETMAs and other designs/brands I had never heard of.

 

The Bicycle Works & Yuba Bikes set up their tents side by side.

 

 

This 4 person solar-electric-peddle powered vehicle was built by this kid
and his dad (who is not pictured) for a school project.
For more pics and info see: The SOHH project.

Good Times!!!

I also ran into Liz Canning, cargo bike owner and author of 'Like Peanut Butter and Chocolate: Electric Assist and the Cargo Bike' and she alerted me that the trailer of her documentary (in progress) is up on her website. Click HERE to see it.

E Mundo makes the News!

E Mundo and I are mentioned in Liz Canning's article, 'Like Peanut Butter and Chocolate: Electric Assist and the Cargo Bike', as found on pages 6-8 of Marin County Bicycle Coalition's Pedal Press's Summer 2011 newsletter. The whole issue is on cargo bikes in Marin, California. What a great front cover:

Open publication - Free publishing - More bicycle

Losing My Seat ... literally

I haven't been riding E Mundo much so far this summer ... some short errands and visits to nearby friends, but mostly I've been feeling too crummy. Last Friday, my Lyme literate MD put me back on antibiotics once again and I biked to my local drugstore to pick up the prescription; but since then I've been herxing from that, and also threw out a floating rib. After a week of turtle-like movement and limited ability to twist to the left, yesterday (Friday July 1st) I got up the nerve to bike to the post office and bank, thinking: 'Biking doesn't require much in the way of upper body movement.'

As always, it felt liberating to get back in the saddle. Somehow when I ride my bike I feel like all is well. Whatever challenging mood may prevail before riding, is quickly erased or largely mitigated when I begin MOVING. I feel light instead of heavy, mobile instead of stagnant, expansive rather than contracted.

But this time, a mere .3 miles from my house, I heard a loud crack ... an explosion really, which I could not readily determine to be related or not to my bike. Thankfully my immediate instinct was to stand up on my pedals and come to full stop, and thankfully I was on a flattish segment of my .75 mile descent into San Anselmo. Upon dismounting I saw that my seat was gone. My next gaze was to the road where I saw my seat and a few metal parts flung across the asphalt. The all-important 1.5" bolt holing the seat to the post had shattered into three pieces. My next thought was, 'How did I not end up on the pavement with those pieces and parts.' It was either pure divine intervention or pure instinct, and I am entirely grateful for which ever it was.

I am also grateful that this bizarre equipment malfunction did not take place at the bottom of my hill or further along in my errands because I would have been unable to walk the bike up the hill back to my house. But as it happened, it was easy enough to walk the bike back home, using the throttle/motor so that I didn't have to push the bike uphill. The bike actually pulled me.

I have ridden A LOT in my life, and ridden bikes hard ... but have never broken a seat bolt. I did not know this was even a potential danger. It's not like I weigh 200 lbs. And to boot, I ride E Mundo like an old nag, not a bronco.

I do not really believe in random coincidences or circumstances. Rather I feel like my consciousness is in constant cahoots with my environment as well as with larger fields and macrocosms of consciousness. The past couple weeks of my life have been quite out of the ordinary. It's been a 'we're not in Kansas anymore' kind of tornadic adventure that shows how weak one's structures are, and how strong the foundation. So to loose my seat while moving at 15 mph, without getting physically injured or even inconvenienced much, in a way, makes perfect since. I am fundamentally and essentially okay, despite things falling to pieces around me, even despite my own body feeling like it is falling to pieces.

A few minutes ago, while writing this post, I heard the unmistakable crack and thunderous boom of a big tree falling very close by. I went out to investigate, but since it was no longer moving and since there are tons of fallen trees adjacent to my house, there was no clear evidence of what tree fell. I heard creaking above my head and ran, thinking the tree had not fully settled ... maybe it had further to fall.

So that's how it is. That is the conversation I am having with my environment. Not surprisingly, this 'conversation' is mirrored in the cosmic surround, as Uranus (sudden, comprehensive and shocking change) transits within a couple degrees of my progressed Sun in Aries (the sign of new birth, new creation). It is certainly keeping me on my toes.