Frontline Health

#147 - Lyme Disease And Alpha Gal Explained with Daniel Justice

• Troy Duell

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A single tick bite can change your health for years, and the hardest part is often getting someone to take your symptoms seriously. We sit down with Daniel Justice, a certified holistic health coach who has lived through 13 years of Lyme disease, to unpack why Lyme is so often missed, why the standard testing pathway can fail real people, and what you can do when the answers feel stuck. If you’ve ever been told “your labs are normal” while your body says otherwise, this conversation is for you. 

We compare Lyme disease with alpha-gal syndrome and make the differences clear: alpha-gal is typically an immune-driven food reaction, while Lyme is a complex bacterial infection that can involve multiple co-infections like Babesia and Bartonella. We also dig into chronic Lyme vs post-Lyme, the symptom burden that can look like autoimmune disease, and the practical reality of elimination diets when alpha-gal and Lyme collide. Along the way, we break down ELISA screening, Western Blot banding, and why clinical diagnosis still matters in tick-borne illness. 

From there we shift into support and action steps: how to avoid ticks, what to do if you’re bitten, why saving the tick can help, and how early treatment timing can change outcomes. Daniel also shares an integrative lens on pacing, detox support, gut health, biofilms, and supplements that commonly come up in Lyme recovery, plus his experience with bee venom therapy and the safety precautions it requires. 

If this helped you, subscribe to the Frontline Health Podcast, share this episode with someone who needs it, and leave a review so more people can find trustworthy, practical guidance. What part of the Lyme and alpha-gal puzzle are you still trying to solve?

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Why Lyme Testing Gets Missed

SPEAKER_01

Today on the Frontline Health podcast.

SPEAKER_02

I think Alpha Gal is easier to isolate because it's like there's just antibody testing and that's it. Yeah. That's it. Like that that's the way to the Alpha Gal is is a much more simple process. There's less false negatives, there's less false positives. Um, so so that one's just really there's just an antibody testing method for that. There's not a lot of all these complexities. Okay. Whereas Lyme, there's there's almost this screening process called the Alisa. And it's also antibody testing. However, like you were saying, Troy, prior, it's gauging an immune response. So if your immune system hasn't really reacted to the Lyme yet, most people really show up with nothing on this Alisa screening. And the problem with that is it's kind of the first line. So a lot of times, if people don't pass that, they there's nothing after that. They don't get tested any further. It's like, oh, you don't have line.

Meet Daniel And The Big Picture

SPEAKER_01

Hello, and welcome back to another episode of the Frontline Health Podcast by Centurion Health, where we share health news, tips, and insights to help you take ownership of your health. I'm Evan Patrick. With me as always, founder and CEO of Centurion Health, Mr. Troy Duel. And we've also got a special guest on today's podcast.

SPEAKER_00

We do super excited about having him here with us. Got Daniel Justice, who is with Justice Health Coaching. Uh, the great thing about Daniel is he's a certified holistic health coach, and he has the personal experience to go along with his knowledge that he's built up over the years when it comes to Lyme disease specifically. And that's what we're going to be talking about today. We're going to be talking about two things that are getting a lot of airplay lately, which is Lyme disease and alpha gal diagnosis. To put it in perspective, since 2009, the number, or in 2009, the number of diagnosed patients with alpha gal, we're in the hundreds today. There are roughly 450,000 people. So it's growing quickly. And Lyme is not any different. Lyme grew from about 320,000 in 2010 to about 630,000 individuals suffering from it today. So, and that's growing. And we believe that that number is actually low because it's being misdiagnosed and not diagnosed. So we're excited to have Daniel with us because he's had years of experience with this and dealing with it. And uh really want to start out by just saying thanks for joining us, being a part of it, and tell us a little bit about your experience and where you came from with Lyme disease and kind of your background.

SPEAKER_02

Absolutely.

A Sudden Crash And Misdiagnosis

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I'm really excited to be here at Evan Troy. Thanks for having me. Um, my journey is is roughly 13 years with Lyme. So it's it's had a lot of highs, there's been a lot of lows, but it's all started for me in 2013. I was a sophomore at Auburn, and I just woke up one day and I was not the same person. Pale skin, rashes, fatigue, kind of a constant buzz-like feeling going on in my head. And you know, days go by, weeks go by, months go by, and you realize, hey, I'm not, I'm not getting any better. Something is is wrong. So I went through the medical system in Alabama. At this time in 2013, we were very behind with Lyme disease. We're blessed to have some pretty good practitioners in the area now. But uh, ended up seeing a neurologist. I got misdiagnosed with an autoimmune disease, um, put on steroids, you know, kind of the worst protocol possible with someone with a compromised immune system. So I had bounced from doctor to doctor to doctor. We had ruled out a very good amount of stuff, and it almost became a process of elimination where we retested me for the autoimmune disorder, um, and I was negative. Uh, and then I started wondering, you know, what is this? I started hearing about the controversy of Lyme and how underdiagnosed it was. I ended up ordering my own lab work through primary care, and that's where these bands started to show up, and there was something there. So I went to pretty much the only Lyme literate doctor in the area. It was a Timothy Callahan. He was in Tupelo, Mississippi. I actually just looked him up. He's in Memphis now, and I know he's been on a wait list. Uh he's a he's a great practitioner, Lyme literate. Uh, he was kind of doing the Richard Horowitz approach, who's a big influence in the Lime scene. And uh it was a great start. You know, we got put on a lot of antibiotics. Um, I understood how to take probiotics at night. However, it was kind of a two-year period where I didn't understand pacing and detoxing and how fast to go and when to slow down. I was, you know, a very type A person where I was like, all right, let's take all these antibiotics, let's take them at the highest dose possible. And I wasn't flushing any of this out of my system. So uh 2015 is another yeah, you know interrupting.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, let me ask you a question. So, how long was it between 2013 when you woke up that day and then when you actually found out that, hey, this is definitively Lyme?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, that's a great question.

SPEAKER_00

It was roughly a year, roughly a year, right around a year. Which, if I'm not mistaken, that's actually a pretty short amount of time. And kudos to you for continuing down that path because you know you had a you had a fairly short journey to get there. But what I've read and heard about with lots of people is it's it could be 10 to 15 years for a lot of people before they find out that what has been going on has been Lyme. Absolutely. So and it's a frustrating thing because, like what you dealt with, a lot of them say it's all in your head. It's not this isn't a real thing. You know, we've tested you for this, you don't have anything. And if if I remember correctly, Lyme is one of those that you could test for at one time and it may not be there because it hides in the system. Absolutely. And the next time you test for it, it could be there.

SPEAKER_02

Absolutely. It's it's it's very complicated. Um, it's very at the time was very controversial. And you know, I went through the whole process of it's all on your head. Uh, there's nothing going on, you're just depressed. Um, endless amounts of doctors. The CDC uh didn't acknowledge you know any chronic Lyme at that time. Now they're acknowledging post-Lyme, yeah, but they're not still acknowledging chronic Lyme. And the infectious disease community still won't handle any of the co-infections of Lyme, the complexity of Lyme, really beyond a couple weeks of doxycycline. So um, yeah, blessed by a year in to have ordered my own lab work, to have ruled out all these possibilities, to be under a good practitioner. Um and you know, he was he was hardcore. He went all out. Um, I did end up having um got off to a great start. I was like, wow, we found what's going on. The diagnosis is such a relief, right? You're like, oh my goodness, at least we know something. Couldn't afford all the coinfection testing at the time. So we, you know, we had to make a few assumptions and some clinical diagnoses as well. But yeah, I just I I went too fast. And 2015 happened, and it was that was pretty much the worst year of my life. That's that's where I really started to deal with the mental side of this and and how much it can infect the brain and and how much that can start to affect your physical body, and and vice versa. So it became a uh really a mental and physical battle in 2015. And I think after two years, um it there's a burden after that of wow, I'm worse than I've ever been. We've tried to treat it. Um ended up getting you know well enough to go back to college. Um I, you know, at this point, I'm just supporting my immune system, which I think is what a lot of people are doing right now as well. I was just buying time. I was like, I'm too scared to treat the lime hard because I had the worst relapse of my life. I also don't want to do nothing at the same time. So at this point, I'm just taking a lot of immunomodulatory stuff. I'm taking a lot of stuff that really boosts the immune system. Uh, something else worth mentioning is mono became a pretty big part of my journey.

SPEAKER_00

Really? Um, that is something that is that fairly common with other Lyme sufferers as well.

SPEAKER_02

Yes. Really? The Epstein bar, I'm seeing a lot when people, unfortunately, all these people with Lyme, they have to list like 10 things that's wrong with them. You know, you see the co-infections, you see the Lyme, you see a lot of times pots. Uh, you see, you know, with me, there's we can go into that more, several co-infections, but Epstein bar is on there a lot. I see it with a lot of Lyme patients. And the problem is Lyme tends to kind of trap these viruses, and they tend to replicate and just come back over and over and over again. So it added this complexity of okay, now mono is active. We can't get rid of mono. How do we suppress it? Um, dealt with that through college, was good enough to graduate, got married. Um starting to get my wife and I, we moved out to Oregon at this point. Um I'm treating mildly. I'm treating mildly. I feel like I'm still buying time. COVID happened, and that is where I truly just fell apart. Um, I I think COVID, you know, I'm learning a lot about long COVID now, and you know, acute COVID, and Lyme and COVID do not go well together at all. I thought mono was bad, then COVID came. Now you got mono and covid. Um, and and that was kind of where it was like, okay, there's a potential maybe at this point to um to die. I I think that was the closest I got to, you know.

SPEAKER_00

Um when I I think just hearing that story, I'm sure any of the listeners out there can understand this is a very, very traumatic disease that can have lifelong implications, absolutely, especially if people aren't coming alongside to really help in the medical community. Absolutely

Lyme Vs Alpha Gal Basics

SPEAKER_00

there's much more now than there was. So if if we can just back up just a little bit, what exactly is Lyme disease and what is Alpha Gal? And are they the same? And how are they different?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, that's a great question. So a lot of people with alpha gal do not have Lyme, and a lot of people with Lyme do not have Alpha Gal. Okay, and then there's people that have both.

SPEAKER_00

So so they're two separate diseases that are going on, very separate. Does the same could the same tick have alpha gal and Lyme?

SPEAKER_02

Yes, correct. Just like these co-infections like Babesia, mycoplasma, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, someone could have also gotten alpha gal. Okay. I've talked to, you know, I I'm not super I need to learn more about alpha gal, but I understand that, you know, it's a very strong histamine response to a sugar molecule. And it's not this bacterial infection like Lyme, though, where you're like, we gotta kill it, we gotta end it. Alpha gal is kind of like we need to modulate the immune system, eliminate these foods that are now setting me off, avoid more tick bites. Um, you know, that can happen. You get bit by a tick again, especially if you live in this concentrated area. So alpha gal, it's really important to be like, okay, we we don't need to be exposing ourselves to more ticks. But then a lot of people are not able to eat all these meats, all these animal fats. Um, and it definitely limits their ability to travel. And I think there's also a psychological element of that where you have to eliminate so much food that you're like, well, what do I eat? So I would say alpha gal is a lot more simple where you're looking at just the immune system, a histamine response, and elimination of foods. People do recover from it. So some you know, a lot of people are intervening with stuff like quercetrin, stuff that you guys make, stuff like lipsomal vitamin C, propolis, much more simple than lime. However, if you have both, not good. Right now, now you're eliminating probably gluten, now you're eliminating probably dairy, now you're eliminating probably all these animal meats. And it at that point it's kind of like you know, how do I eat?

SPEAKER_00

So is lime why you would have to eliminate the gluten? Because I've never heard uh gluten with the alpha gal piece.

SPEAKER_02

Generally speaking, people with lime tend to eliminate sugar, which I think is great for you know most people, other than honey and fruit and dairy and gluten. And I think the gluten is a lot of the chemicals that are being processed in the flour. I don't know how much of it is actually the gluten. I hear people going overseas and then they can eat all the all the gluten they want.

SPEAKER_00

Right.

SPEAKER_02

So, you know, I can eat sourdough bread, so it it's a little complex, but the yeah, the alpha gal is it's a reaction, but it's not this bacterial manifestation that you are now going after and trying to kill. Okay.

SPEAKER_01

So, what's the difference? Go ahead, Evan. Yeah, no, I was just gonna say that list of foods. If someone has both alpha gal and lime presenting in this way, the list of foods that someone can eat gets really, really small because you mentioned dairy, you mentioned gluten, even though it might not specifically be gluten, sugar, and then with the alpha gal, you have the elimination of the red meat. So I'm just imagining that for a second. And um, a couple of things I just want to kind of point out and zoom in on that you mentioned. Yeah. You mentioned uh the difference between chronic Lyme and uh and post-Lyme, which is one thing that you said is becoming more um, I guess, recognized now is the is the post-lime. Is there a difference between those two things or is is it a matter of just kind of how the medical community is defining that?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, that's a great question. Um chronic Lyme, the the problem with it is it's still in the general Western community not being acknowledged. For example, I've been going through this for 13 years. I'm very blessed to be in a pretty good spot now, but there has still been an active infection going on for 13 years. Whereas today, if I go home and I, you know, take a lot of antimicrobials or antibiotics, I am still having a reaction because of an active infection that's been going on over a decade. The medical community doesn't want to acknowledge that that is still going on. Um, so I think that's very important to clarify. When they're defining post-Lyme, which is at least now being introduced, the good thing is they're acknowledging that people are still having symptoms. So I think that's good. However, they're saying it's more the fallout of what this tick did to the body. It's not an active infection, it's not actually live. It's just what did it damage and how are people recovering? But that still creates this giant gap between the medical community and the traditional Western community because some people are being looked at with post-Lyme that still have Lyme. So the best way I can summarize it is post-Lyme is symptomatic treatment only. How do we improve someone's quality of life? What did the tick do that we need to repair? Whereas chronic Lyme is, you know, there's an active infection that still needs to be treated.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, which is not really that big of a surprise because that's what our medical community is really trained on, which is how do we treat the symptoms as opposed to going to the core of the problem? And I think Lyme is probably one of those diseases and infections that has suffered from that pattern the most in the medical history. But you mentioned symptoms. So

Symptoms And Common Co-Infections

SPEAKER_00

people listening, what are some of the symptoms that they might have with Lyme versus the symptoms that you might have with Alpha Gal? So people can start to recognize what's going on.

SPEAKER_02

Absolutely. So with Lyme, Lyme is kind of the great imitator where, you know, hence me getting diagnosed with an autoimmune disorder. It could have very well been that because it looked like it. Lyme can cause, you know, fever, migraines, insomnia, um, night sweats, uh, nervous system dysregulation, you know, disruption of your microbiome. It I feel like you could list about a hundred symptoms because Lyme can almost look like just about anything out there. And a lot of that is because not every case of Lyme is the same. You know, some people have Babesia, some people have Bardanella, some people have Rocky Mountain spotted fever. It's kind of like soda versus Sprite, right?

SPEAKER_00

And help us understand the difference between Babesia, Rocky Mountain fever, and what was the other you mentioned? Barbosia.

SPEAKER_02

Absolutely. Bardanella is something that I've dealt with. It's generally diagnosed through co-infection testing. Okay. And it's diagnosed through your rashes can start to really help limit down what we're dealing with.

SPEAKER_00

So I had these are these are all different metaphyters of Lyme, or are they different bacteria from different ticks and considered different diseases themselves?

SPEAKER_02

They're they're akin to Lyme because they're transmitted through ticks that carry Lyme, but they're there other bacterial organisms that were present in the tick. Okay. We're finding though a lot of people that have Lyme have generally at least one coinfection. Okay.

SPEAKER_00

Um but interesting.

SPEAKER_02

You know, Babesia can be a lot of um exhaustion, fatigue, air hunger, whereas Bardonella, and Babesia is akin to malaria. So, you know, it's it's it's treated. There is some overlap with how we treat malaria, how we treat Babesia. Bardnella is a lot more neuropsychiatric symptoms, neurological, gets into a lot more of the mental health manifestations of this. Um, a lot of anxiety, it can be burning foot pain. Those are the those are the two that I have. Those are the two that, as far as we know, I've dealt with Babesia and Bardnella.

SPEAKER_00

Okay.

SPEAKER_02

Um, Rocky Mountain spotted fever can be just a very much more aggressive manifestation. It does, you know, there is generally a very high fever associated with it. I had a buddy, he had Rocky Mountain spotted fever, he ended up getting like IV antibiotics. He was so sick. Um, but that's crazy. You know, it line becomes so complicated because it's it's okay, which of these infections do we have? Do we have the alpha gal? Yeah, do we have um, and and like you were saying, Evan, then you got to be like, well, what do I eat? You know, like high fiber, you know, legumes, um, lots of oils. You're gonna have to get really, really in depth with your diet.

SPEAKER_00

Um,

ELISA Western Blot And Better Labs

SPEAKER_00

so how do you how do you test? Because there's so many different things going on. If somebody feels like they have it, is there a test that they'd go, hey, can you test me for this? Yes. Did you have something? You go ahead, Evan.

SPEAKER_01

No, I was just gonna set just piggybacking onto that. Um, I was asking my wife about Lyme disease. She's in her first year of residency right now, and she's very fascinated in it just because of how complicated of a diagnosis it is. Um, and she was she said that it's a it's a diagnosis of elimination, essentially. You're trying to rule out everything else, but you also mentioned there are all these co-infections that are pretty typical for someone with Lyme disease. And so, yeah, what Troy's saying, like, is there a way to isolate without eliminating other things to get and like test for specifically Lyme and Alpha Gal? So just to kind of kind of I guess frame that for our listeners, that's the way that it's that it's looked at when people go to the doctor and they suspect that that's what they have.

SPEAKER_02

Absolutely. I think Alpha Gal is easier to isolate because it's like there's just antibody testing and that's it. Yeah, that's it. Like that that's the way to Alpha Gal is is is a much more simple process. There's less false negatives, there's less false positives. Um, so so that one's just really there's just an antibody testing method for that. There's not a lot of all these complexities.

SPEAKER_00

Okay.

SPEAKER_02

Whereas Lyme, there's there's almost this screening process called the ELISA, and it's also antibody testing. However, like you were saying, Troy, prior, it's gauging an immune response. So if your immune system hasn't really reacted to the Lyme yet, most people really show up with nothing on this ELISA screening. And the problem with that is it's kind of the first line. So a lot of times, if people don't pass that, they there's nothing after that. They don't get tested any further. It's like, oh, you don't have Lyme. Um, Western Blot would be the next more accurate testing. Now we start to look at these very specific protein bands. Um, there's numbers like 29, 31. Um, I I had a bunch of these pop up when I did tests, but that there's more Lyme specific bands. And the one that we generally do is about a coin flip. So about 50% accuracy. Um, I think now the number might be down to like 40%. So it's like, well, even if someone was negative on a Western blot, they still could have Lyme. So then we get into kind of this third layer of clinical diagnosis, you know, like what have we eliminated? Did the person pass the ELISA? Did they pass the Western blot? Let's say they failed both. They could still have Lyme disease.

SPEAKER_00

So with the the Western blot and the ELISA, are those blood tests or are they okay?

SPEAKER_02

They are they're both blood tests. You could order, um, I highly recommend a lab in California called Iogenics.

SPEAKER_00

Okay.

SPEAKER_02

The reason is they're much more comprehensive. They test for more bands. So you could, you know, not be showing up with the bands with the traditional Western blot, but then you could send this. To IGNix, and they're like, We're going to test for all these other ones. And if you have enough of these show up, you're going to have a positive test. So, you know, I used IGNIX, I trusted them, I talked to them, I read about them. I know Horowitz used them. Um, and that's where all my stuff started to pop up. Whereas on a tradition or Western blot, it was just like, oh, you don't have these few bands, you're negative. But clinical diagnosis is important. You could start looking at someone's rashes, right? Yeah. A bullseye rash. It's like, okay, well, yeah, we're probably dealing with lime here. I had the cat scratch uh rashes, which were Bardonella, but then a lot of people get bit on their head, and you're never gonna, you know, unless they shave their head, and you're never you're never gonna see the rash. And that's a that's a very common place to be bit is in your hairline, and then the tick will eventually just you know um kind of leech off yeah after it's put this infection in you. So we don't even know really when I got line.

SPEAKER_00

Interesting.

SPEAKER_02

Lived in Virginia, was bit by a lot of ticks.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Um, I think my immune system was going through a lot as a sophomore. So part of me wonders did it just manifest all of a sudden? Was it being a stealth bug and then it just came out?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Wow. That's crazy. Yeah, that's amazing. Troy, I know one of your favorite quotes that you share a lot is uh a Benjamin Franklin quote: an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

Tick Avoidance And What To Do

SPEAKER_01

Um so yeah, and and obviously this is something that is on people's minds right now. News stories all over the place about about Lyman Alpha Gal and the Lone Stark Tick and things like that that people hear about. So, do you have any tips or recommendations for people about how they can um avoid this?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, so I think I think the first thing is be aware of your area. Um, I hear of all these concentrated areas, especially like around where Lyme originated, it's like still the most concentrated area. So if you live in those areas, you have to be like very aware, like, okay, which is what area? Connecticut, yeah. Lyme, Connecticut, and that was around 1970, and there's not worth going into on this. A lot of conspiracy theories about kind of all how how all this went down, and probably some truth in some of them as well. Um, but I think probably a probably for a part two on that. Um, but it it did originate around that time. Of course, it brings up the question why did it come about around that time? I think that's very interesting. Um, but there, you know, now ticks in Alabama, you know, that that was a problem with my diagnosis was it doesn't exist over state lines. You know, there's like a line right against the state, but then you have all these migratory animals, hence, you know, all these infections being spread around. So I I don't know of a state in the US now that has not confirmed cases that originated from that state. So in Alabama, we still have ticks that could transmit Lyme. Yep.

SPEAKER_00

And uh I have heard, I did a little bit of research, all 50 states, including Hawaii, now have Lyme.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Uh, and they found that found them in their tics. So we've talked about a couple of things on how to avoid it. Yeah, obviously being aware of your surroundings. Is there anything else that you can say?

SPEAKER_02

I would say there's a there's a good amount of stuff. Uh one is that they make a lot of sprays now that have very high amounts of like clove oil, they're generally like diluted with sunflower oil, they have geranium, they have some citrus oils. I use them, it makes me feel a lot better because I'm like, okay, if I sprayed myself down, it makes the ticks not want to latch. So if you live in one of these concentrated areas, use those sprays heavily. If you don't, I would I still use them when I go out into the woods. If I go hiking, if I if I do the such, I think that's a good little first line defense. But what if you get bit, right? So so what if that happens? Um, one is you want to use some some really fine tweezers. You want to be sure you very slowly take that tick off. You want to mark the date, the time, you want to take a picture of that area, you want to monitor that area, you want to save that tick too, because igenics will take that tick, and testing the tick is gonna be more accurate than trying to test your body with you know the whole Russian roulette of am I gonna test positive based off, you know. I when I talked to IGNIX, they were like a lot of people test positive only after they've started treatment because then the the you know infection has manifested and started to attack. So I save the tick. I would go ahead and have it tested. You know, I'm at the point where I've dealt with this for 13 years, so I'm like, man, if I could go back day one, why not kind of go through some of the legwork? I know it could be a pain. And you know, if my wife got bit by a tick tomorrow, we would we would be doing all this. I would also recommend to her, if she was bit to probably start taking some astrologus. And there is some cream you can put on the the bite too. The the really popular one right now is called um there's one that has tea tree, it's got all this stuff. I think I actually wrote it down. Go do cream, I think is a good brand of okay, at least we're kind of trying to draw out some of the infection at the area.

SPEAKER_00

So the idea of that cream is you put it on that area where the tick bite is and it draws the the uh wheat bacteria out. Is that what's going on with that? That that would be the hope.

SPEAKER_02

Okay, we don't have proof that there's anecdotal stories, but we don't have proof of like, is there a magical thing to put on to just suck it all right out, right? A lot of people think it's too late. I'm like, why not? Yeah, because it obviously has worked for some people.

SPEAKER_00

Well, and I I think to piggyback on that, what I'd always heard, or what seems to be common now, is if if you have a tick bite and you have the uh the bullseye rash that everybody gets, you're supposed to get two to six weeks of antibiotic treatment. Yeah, is that what you would still recommend if somebody had a tick bite to go in and do that?

SPEAKER_02

Well, one, I think you got to get lucky enough to have the bullseye rash. Right, because it doesn't happen with all of them. And it tests positive. Because if you just go to your general primary care doctor, it's generally gonna be that ELISA test. Now, if you have the bullseye rash, I would imagine they would have the grace to be like, oh yeah, let's go ahead and start Yon Subdoxy cycling. Right. I don't know what more you need at that point. It's like, okay. And some people, um, those two to six weeks, you we have some lucky individuals that they probably didn't have a very complex infection go into their body, plus the benefit of they treated immediately. So that would be my best advice too, is seek treatment as immediately as possible because we know for a fact the earlier you're you hop on this, the quicker everything resolves, the less the long-term effects of all this.

SPEAKER_00

Now, are there are there any uh any ingredients, supplements, medications that you could take that would actually prevent it or get your body in a place to where if you are bitten by a tick, that it would be able to fight it off quicker? Or is that almost a a non-starter?

SPEAKER_02

That's a that's a great question.

Supplements Herbs Biofilms And Pacing

SPEAKER_02

So one I like Stephen Buner a lot. He was a master herbalist, he died uh several years ago, but he he read a lot, he wrote a lot of books, and his whole thing was like herbalism and lime. So he he just studied herbs for ages and really learned about the nuances of Lyme. And a lot of companies have kind of risen up to his challenge and started making his protocols and his supplements. Um, but I do believe that there are certain things that can set up a little bit of a defense mechanism and a shield. I think astrologus root is one of those things where it has it has some of those antimicrobial properties, but it also it's it's one of the best herbs to kind of shield your body if you are bit or exposed to ticks. So I do think there's credence. We we don't know statistically like how often astrologus will always prevent a manifestation of Lyme disease. But if I lived in one of these areas with a lot of ticks, I'm already taking stuff, right? Yeah, but I would be taking astrologus regularly regularly. It's good for your cortisol, it's good for your immune system, it's safe to take long term. So it in my brain, it's like, why not? Because there are cases of people that take this stuff and the infection immediately resolves, and you might have to do that because your primary care might not, you know, they they might not give you any solutions. Interesting.

SPEAKER_01

And can you sorry, I was just gonna ask since you brought it up, can you dive into some of the things that you supplement with um that may be helpful for people? Or just that you you kind of mentioned some some protocols or things like that. Could you dive into that a little bit more?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. Um, and I think a first to kind of finish that thought, I think a first line with black walnut. I actually see it on the computer here. Wormwood, clove. That is a great supplement as a first resort, right there. I don't know all the ingredients, but I'm looking at a product right now. It says wormwood, black walnut, and clove. Very good anti parasitic coverage, but also very good coverage for Lyme disease in general, co-infection coverage in general. There's an herb I can never pronounce called Androcophus. Uh, great for coinfections. Um, so I would hop on it, you know, and and primarily if you get bit by a tick, iLADS has a database of Lyme literate practitioners. So I would utilize that also if you're bit. So how do you how do you spell that? ILADS? It's capital I L A D S. Okay. They're they're kind of an organization spreading Lyme literacy.

SPEAKER_00

Okay.

SPEAKER_02

I think they've been pretty essential and they they help hook you up with a practitioner. So, like when I was going through this, I contacted them and they were like, Oh, yeah, go see this guy in this area.

SPEAKER_00

Nice. Um one of the things that I thought was interesting, my son just got off the Appalachian Trail and they went hiking for four days, and they ran into uh one of the more earthy ladies, and what she was using was garlic, a garlic clove. She would rub the garlic clove all over her clothes, it would keep them away, but then she would also eat the garlic because apparently ticks don't like the smell of garlic. They don't, which I thought was interesting. And I think she also mentioned something along the the antiparasitic effects of garlic, and it has some some other benefits to it as well.

SPEAKER_02

Garlic does a lot, yeah. There's a lot going on with garlic. Absolutely, even just eating the cloves themselves. That's that's fascinating. I I I wonder how much more effective that is than the sprays.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. You know, it the his buddy who after the first day he had eight ticks on him um from walking because he didn't use any spray. My son did, thankfully, but his buddy didn't. He started eating the garlic cloves and he never had a tick on him the rest of the time. I mean that was interesting.

SPEAKER_02

I I think there's credence to that. I think we should walk away with like if um if that's working, let's let's explore that more. Uh, but as far as general treatments, um, I think Birmingham's a good example because there's kind of a crossroads, right? You you you can go the natural route or you can go the more, I don't even want to say western, but utilizing western medicines, such as traditional antibiotics and antiparasitics, um, and sometimes antifungals as well. I think there's credence to both paths. I know in Birmingham we have certain practitioners that thank God are still they're more Western, but at least they're still treating and they're going after the root cause. There's other ones, and I lean more in the camp now of the natural interventions. The reason being I had, like I was saying, by the year I hit 2015, I went too hard. My liver enzymes were through the roof, my immune system was so compromised. I was taking three antibiotics every day. I wasn't taking days off. So were we attacking? We were very offensive, but we weren't defensive. Going too offensive can have consequences. What I like about some more of these natural remedies is okay, they support the liver, they support the viral load, they support the respiratory system, they support the inflammatory response. So there's more versatility and freedom, in my opinion, of going a little more down the natural route. And there were some studies done recently that you know, Japanese knot wheat mixed with an herb called cryptolepis is more effective than traditional antibiotics for Lyme. Specifically, they were comparing it to doxycycline, but I think based off what we know, it still stacks up against some pretty, pretty dominant forms as well. Um, the other thing I think that's really beneficial about coming at it from a natural standpoint is the biofilm structure of Lyme. So Lyme creates um, you know, it can exist intracellularly, which is a very complex part of it. So it can exist within your cells, it can form cystic, persistent, more dominated forms. Stuff like grapefruit seed extract more treats the um the cystic form of it.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Uh with a very unique compound of grapefruit seed extract. Uh, you got to be careful if you're taking doxycycline because grapefruit seed extract can actually make doxy less effective. So there are there's complexity with all this, but the biofilm is a I kind of think of almost Star Wars, where there's like the Death Star, but there's a shield around it. The the more you you can't penetrate the biofilm with traditional antibiotics.

SPEAKER_00

Interesting.

SPEAKER_02

So, in fact, the more you use traditional antibiotics, the more these biofilm layers of lime, this sludge-like barrier on this fibrin actually strengthens. Uh, so it gets stronger the more you're using doxycycline. That doesn't mean that the antibiotics aren't going after other forms and still doing their job in other ways. But if we're avoiding the biofilm aspect, you're missing a very essential point of the disease. You guys make a product um BT plus. I'm about to start taking it right now. It's got the lumbrokinase in it, it's got the serapeptase in it. Both of those compounds are used very commonly with integrative practitioners with Lyme because they dissolve the fibrin around the biofilm. And you there's 40 milligrams in your BT plus, which is like the highest therapeutic dose for Lyme. So that that supplement really does pack a punch. You got the NAC in there, you got the black human seed oil, I believe, as well. So, so a lot of benefits with that supplement with Lyme. But you there is a crossroads at the end of the day. Do I want to go? And you get to choose your practitioner, right? Do I want to go down this more antibiotic heavy path?

SPEAKER_00

Um, which has consequences on our gut microbiome and does and everything else, which does can lead to a different issue down the road.

SPEAKER_01

Um I'm curious, you said you went too hard in 2015. Were you just talking about the antibiotics that you were on? Or can you dive into that a little bit more?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I didn't understand. And this is part of the reason I'm getting into health coaching. Um, is I didn't understand pacing. Like, I don't need to take every antibiotic every day. I need to take days off. I need to be taking infrared saunas. I need to be taking like milk thistle to flush my liver. Probably need to be taking binders like chlorella. Uh, chlorella is a great binder over a long period of time. Activated charcoal is is good, but it can become really dehydrating. Uh chlorella, you can still take around other supplements, but I didn't understand with Lyme, it's not just treatment. It's how do I balance this Herxheimer reaction, this immune this inflammatory response? How do I balance my cortisol? You know, how do I balance my stress level? How do I balance my nervous system? How do I repair my gut microbiome? I didn't understand all these other layers. I was only focused on antibiotics and Lyme. And that's what makes Lyme so complicated is you have to be managing the whole terrain of what's going on. So I was ripping apart my gut, I was putting, you know, excruciating amount of stress on my liver. Yes, were things dying? Yes, but slow and steady really does win the race. Um, and and I wasn't going slow and steady. And and now, uh Troy, you go ahead.

SPEAKER_00

No, I was gonna say one of one of the most unique things I've heard you talk about when you talked about your treatment was the bees and yeah, beastings, which I thought was interesting new piece that I had never even crossed my mind with it. But share a little bit of that, and this is obviously not medical advice for anybody, but it is interesting regardless.

SPEAKER_02

Absolutely. So,

Bee Venom Therapy And Other Options

SPEAKER_02

kind of going to the end of my story, 2023 was the turning point for me. And my wife had, you know, at this point, we've traveled, we've tried all these treatments, we've done all these things. Has there been success? Yes, but at this point, I've had concussions, I've had mold toxicity, I've had Epstein Bar, I've got multiple coinfections, I'm starting to develop POTS. So all these things have stacked up at this point that it became very overwhelming. But my wife had read this whole book about this woman who was basically attacked by like killer bees. Uh, she'd got like maybe like a hundred stings. I she could tell the story better than me. You know, ended up going to the hospital, ended up waking up, you know, a few weeks later, and all of a sudden feeling a lot better. So she started to do all this research. A lot of it was anecdotal, a lot of it was, you know, became more clinical over time. Apotherapy kind of came from this. Um, so I was in Oregon, and my wife was really connected with somebody that knew Dietrich Klinghart in Seattle, and he apparently had said if you could only do one thing for Lyme and one thing only, if you're on an island and it's like, well, choose your poison, B venom therapy would be the only thing he would suggest in that situation. So I know there's a documentary on Netflix now. I know there's actually I've been doing a lot of research since I started B Venom, and there is now a lot of research on it. So it's no longer just like, yeah, let's sting you with bees and see if you get better. There's a lot of credence to it being a very shotgun treatment. Uh you know, when I say shotgun, I mean it's doing so much at once.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Um, it can penetrate biofilms, it can, it has a lot of antifungal properties. It's great for Epstein Barr. My body doesn't even show up as ever having Epstein Bar since I've done B venom therapy. Um, but that's what changed the game for me was my wife getting trained by an apatherapist. I did the blood work. No one should just hop into B venom therapy and not get tested for an allergic response to B venom therapy. You should have epi pens around your home when you're doing this. So, you know, I don't think you should just wake up tomorrow and start doing B venom. I think it it's, you know, there's a training aspect to it. There's spots that you should sting, some spots you probably shouldn't sting. Um, but after at the end of the day, it's not overly complex. Yeah, it really is. You're getting stung by bees. And, you know, my goal going into that was we've tried all these other methods. Why don't we go all out and see if there's credence to this? And it's what's it's what's gotten me to the point I'm at, um, along with a lot of other stuff where I'm at today.

SPEAKER_00

Along along those lines, one of the others that I heard that was kind of out there to me when you're dealing with Lyme and uh tick infections, they mentioned putting a fever in fever-inducing therapy. So they'll put somebody in the hospital and they will induce a fever of 107 degrees, which is seems like you would die from it. Uh, it was actually dark Dr. Mark Hyman who mentioned it. Yeah. Uh that he put himself through that at 107 degrees. Obviously, you need to be under medical care, but when you're when you're doing that, he said the body then comes in, and that's the body's mechanism to destroy those infections that are in the body. And wow. He said it worked for his. I think his was uh Bordadella or the Borelia. Borrelia. Yeah, yeah. Um, he he mentioned he had two of them and it wiped it out with just that high feet. Wow. So I think there's so many different treatments out there, just like the different symptoms and everything else. There are, it is an interesting, interesting world of Lyme disease, and I think something we're all becoming more aware of and more accustomed to. So

Hope Team Care And How To Reach Daniel

SPEAKER_00

to me, there is a lot of um despair with people who have Lyme because they go through so much stuff. So, what I'd love for you, and I I appreciate everything that you've shared with us, kind of your heart and everything that's gone on and kind of your story with Lyme itself. But what's one thing you can do? Because one of the things that I think we're about is not leaving people with fear, but instead how do we instill hope for people? And if you can just kind of summarize and say, where is the hope for somebody who's out there right now suffering from Lyme or Alpha Gal? And what can you share that says, hey, there is more to this story than just the despair that we hear all the time?

SPEAKER_02

Absolutely. Because I think it's such a great question. I like focusing on the hope, right? It's so easy to go like for an hour on the all the complexities and the dismay and the suffering, but I think my journey is important because it it does show that it's never too late. Right. And and I know it it seems like there's there's an interesting blend of people in the Line community where I talk to a lot of people that they were always type A before they got Lyme. And I think that's very interesting. They were always type A and then their life flipped upside down. So that really does wreck a person to be like, I want to be this perfectionist and this type of person, but I have a a hundred things going wrong in my body. I think where to leave people though is even if you didn't get diagnosed for 15 years, you've got to treat that first day as an as a new beginning. I I do think that people can get so frustrated, they can give up, they can get lost in the complexity. But there's never been more options. There's never been better practitioners. There's never been a more holistic way to approach it than now. Even Birmingham, you know, I'm a I'm a patient at Sparrow, Health and Performance. They're fantastic. They have Lyme literate practitioners. I know uh med help here, medical. They come at it, so you they come at it from a little bit of a different approach, but I think there's credence to what both practitioners are doing. There's more Lyme literate practitioners. Also, I think you the the biggest thing is you really have to set yourself up with a team, right? You need you need to look at this from a emotional standpoint, I think from a spiritual standpoint, from a physical standpoint, obviously. But I think the more you're willing to open yourself up and be like, okay, well, I need the person that can handle the Lyme. You know, maybe I need the health coach to do this. I don't think you need 20 people in your ball court, but I think three, three to five is is actually a pretty good number. You know, maybe you need to be meeting with a counselor. Um, and the more you can get your team to communicate, I think the faster it accelerates this healing process. You know, I I've seen, I've gone to counseling, I've gotten them involved, and you know, I've had practitioners collaborate and communicate with each other. I've worked with the health coach. The more everyone's on the same page, the better your story is generally going to unfold at a more rapid pace. But I really do want to tell people to never give up, to not lose hope. And if they feel like they've tried everything because I've been there, there there might be just something right around the corner that could flip the script. You know, that that's what you know. My wife had to kind of remind that for me. I was like, I I've gotten to the point a few times where I've just been like, what's the point? You know, I've done all this stuff, I'm still here. Um now we're fast forward to now, I'm like, wow, I've gotten 70% of the way healthy. That's a lot. That's a lot from zero percent. But she always kind of was a voice in my ear of, I just don't think we we're on the right track. I think there's something else out there. I think something else, I think there's gonna be another window that opens. I and B venom was that for me, right? It was kind of the Hail Mary of we've tried a lot of stuff, we've had some minor success, we've been just buying time in general, we've been kind of paddling in the deep end. But I think I think there's there can be hope right around the corner for a lot of people. And I think there's so much more awareness that more of these therapies, these treatments, people are being educated on. Whereas 10 years ago, you know, you you didn't have the education, you didn't have the awareness. So you you really might have no options for a decade.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. Well, and Daniel, I I appreciate you coming in, sharing your story with us. And what I'd love is if if there's somebody else out there who's suffering with Lyme or has a family member with Lyme, how can they get in touch with you? I know you're doing your health coaching. Absolutely. And Lyme is gonna be kind of your specialty, but uh, you'll do anything from health coaching. How can people get in touch with you and uh use your services?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, there's a website on the way, it's gonna be justicehealthcoaching.com.

SPEAKER_00

Okay.

SPEAKER_02

Right now you can email me justiceforlime at gmail.com. So it's J-U-S-T-I-C-E F-O-R-L-Y-M-E at gmail.com. Uh should I just give out my phone number? Or is that if if you want to I'm happy to give out myself number two? Yeah, no, I I've got no concern. You call me 205-482-3533. I'm I'm willing to take any call. And the way I frame it is if I knew everything I knew now and could go back to day one, we we'd probably be looking at about a two-year journey completed in 2015. Now, I think there's been a purpose in my story, in the length of it, in the duration, but I really do want to, you know, work with people and get after the root cause and hopefully accelerate this healing process and you know create better collaboration with their practitioners, give them all available options, help them find practitioners that are in their area. Um, but I do think there's hope in healing, and and hopefully I can be a big part of that story in a lot of people's lives.

SPEAKER_00

I'm I'm sure you will. I know no story is wasted, and yours certainly is not, and God will use it for great things. So if you're out there, you're suffering from Lyme, certainly give Daniel a call or an email or get on his uh website when it comes out. Absolutely. Evan, you have any anything else for us? Any questions?

SPEAKER_01

No, just thank you for for coming on here, Daniel. Your story is awesome. Thank you so much for sharing it with us and for sharing all of these amazing insights.

SPEAKER_02

Absolutely. Happy to be here. Thanks for having me. Absolutely.

Closing Take Ownership And Next Steps

SPEAKER_01

Well, thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Frontline Health Podcast My Centurion Health. As always, we want to encourage you to go out and take ownership of your health because you are your best health advocate. We'll see you next time. If you enjoyed what you heard today on the podcast, please consider subscribing and leaving us a review. We would love to hear your comments or questions about anything we've talked about on the show. For more health news, tips, and insights, follow us at Centurion Health on Instagram, Facebook, X, and YouTube. And for safe, effective, and affordable healthcare products made in the USA to help you elevate your health in life, visit centurion.health. We look forward to you joining us next time on the Frontline Health Podcast by Centurion.