Help Kerry get to Germany to treat Lyme disease!

Hi! I'm Kerry, a mental health counselor and expressive arts therapist who works with people who have Lyme disease and other tick borne illness. I’m also a dog mom and crazy cat lady. 

In short, I have late stage, neurological Lyme disease  and I'm trying to get to Germany for state of the art treatment that will help me finally recover from this illness. I need your support in helping me raise the funds for this treatment. Please read below for the longer version of my story! 

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I have been suffering with late stage, neurological Lyme disease and coinfections since 2010, and I’ve spent years trying everything under the sun to get better. This includes boatloads of oral antibiotics, intramuscular injections (that I often call my “butt shots!” Lol), and even six months of  intravenous antibiotics, along with many other protocols and supplements. These medications have helped many of my symptoms improve, and they have prevented my health from deteriorating further; however, whenever I stop taking them my symptoms return and worsen.

In addition to my diagnoses of Lyme and Babesia ,  in 2016, I was diagnosed with optic neuritis  and "white matter abnormalities" in my brain. This led to an MRI which showed multiple lesions along with signs of demyelination in my brain. If you are familiar with Multiple Sclerosis, this looks and sounds remarkably similar. But my doctors (some of the best in the world) actually believe this is from Lyme-induced encephalitis (basically brain inflammation due to the disease crossing the blood-brain barrier), which I've likely been suffering from for years. 
 
When I was first diagnosed, I learned that Lyme bacteria hate the heat and they die in 105 degrees . I began using a sauna, which greatly helped my muscle pain and other symptoms. This led to my discovery of Bikram Yoga --  yoga done in 105-107 degrees in high humidity for 90 minutes - -  my saving grace in fighting this illness.  Heat has consistently been the greatest element in my journey. So when I heard about a center in Germany  that treats Lyme disease with Hyperthermia (heat therapy) combined with IV antibiotics, I was intrigued.
 
I have met over 20 people who have received treatment at Klinik St Georg in Germany for Lyme disease, and the results are nothing short of miraculous. Both my doctors think this is my best chance at experiencing full remission from this disease. 
 
It’s taken me a while to start a fundraiser like this. I’m not dying. I’m incredibly lucky to have a job with flexible hours that allows me to work from home a lot of the time. I have health insurance. I am reminded every day of how lucky I am as I work with patients who have Lyme and are much less fortunate- some have lost nearly everything. I have a sense of purpose in helping them. 
 
Although my situation could be a lot worse, it could be a lot better too. What many people don’t see is the amount of time I still need to rest in between every social event I go to. How when I get home from a full day of work, I often lack the energy or cognitive  ability to make a meal for myself. I have to reserve at LEAST one full weekend day to stay in bed and rest on the couch, and the idea of making any plans often gives me anxiety since I have no idea how I'll feel that day or if it will deplete all my energy.  I still have cognitive issues , which makes  writing this GoFundMe really hard and exhausting. Some days it still feels like I've gotten run over by a mack truck that backed up over me again, and then threw me into a field of cacti to fend for myself. 

There are many life milestones I’ve wanted to achieve by now, and this disease has gotten in the way of my even thinking about them, or grieving the things that I’ve lost all because of a tick bite. 

The most frustrating thing though, is to see so many others like myself suffering, and knowing that far more resources are needed for this population. I have plans to create a non-profit focusing on educating providers about and addressing the mental health needs of this population, as far too many lives have been lost due to suicide from this disease.  I would llove to do more for advocacy and awareness of tick borne illness, and often feel very limited in the amount of energy I have each day.  

I have spent well over $400 a month treating this illness, which adds up to more than $50,000 over the past 8 years. The treatment regimens I’ve taken often make me more sick due to herxheimer (die-off) reactions, and it’s taken me years to get to about 50% improvement in symptoms. This makes the full cost of $35,000 to get this treatment not seem so steep.

I am so fortunate that a generous donor has agreed to sponsor a big portion of the cost in getting this treatment, and just need your support in paying for the rest! 

I believe that going to Klinik St. Georg in Germany will finally allow me to get my life back and to also GIVE BACK to the community of those suffering from tick borne illness. 

To my patients who stumble across this- please do not donate! It is against the code of ethics for counselors to accept such donations. Please take this page as a message from me that it is OK to ask for help, and that asking for support in this way is not something to feel ashamed or embarrassed about. We ALL deserve access to medical treatment and we ALL deserve to heal.

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Offline donations are also welcomes via:
Check:  Mail to Kerry Lang, 150 Rivers Edge Drive, Apt. 278 Medford MA 02155
PayPal:  [email redacted]
Venmo: @KerryAnn-Lang


Learn more about Lyme Disease here: https://www.lymedisease.org/  
Learn about Hyperthermia Treatment from Dr. Douwes (see video ) & Klinik St. Georg (Website )
Other news about St. Georg Klinik 


Other relevant articles to Neurological Lyme Disease and this Treatment: 

New Scan Technique Reveals Brain Inflammation Associated with Post-Treatment Lyme disease Syndrome (Johns Hopkins, 2019) 

Antibiotics and increased temperature against Borrelia burgdorferi in vitro 

The Emerging Role of Microbial Biofilm in Lyme Neuroborreliosis 

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The cost of treatment is as follows:
23.000.00€ + 2.849,70 € room and board (21 nights) = 25.849.70€ ($29,245.53 USD)
This will ALL have to be paid prior to arriving at the Klinik.
*These figures do NOT include travel and other expenses*