Lyme disease leaves beauty queen bed bound with debilitating symptoms
13.07.2023 - 18:47
/ manchestereveningnews.co.uk
A former beauty queen says she has been left bed bound and unable “to use her hands” after contracting Lyme disease, Kirstie Haysman suffers from painful swollen joints and hardly leaves the house due to the illness.
The 34-year-old was previously fit and active, doing high-intensity training. She had competed in Miss Great Britain and Miss London City pageants, and was crowned Miss Hertfordshire in 2015.
But in 2015 Kirstie, mum to daughter Harriet, 11, started having symptoms. She claims doctors told her she likely had an infection or auto-immune condition.
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Kirstie, from Watford, wasn’t satisfied with the diagnosis after years of struggling so she went to Mexico for blood tests in January 2023 - where she was told she had Lyme disease. She now wants to raise awareness of the condition and encourage others who are suffering with mystery symptoms to get tested.
Lyme disease is a bacterial infection that spreads to humans through infected ticks and causes high temperature and fever, headache, muscle and joint pain and tiredness and loss of energy. Kirstie, said: “[If the infection had been diagnosed] it could have cleared up in 28 days with antibiotics - now my body is shutting down and my husband has to pick me up to use the toilet and have a bath.
“I was doing high intensity training before, I was very fit and it's now at the point where when I wake up my entire body is weak and hurts everywhere. I pray it gets better so I can walk around – I've been outside twice in last the six weeks, other than that my life is in bed.This all could have been avoided if they’d done a simple Lyme test.”
Kirstie says she first started