The Esquibel Family

About a year and half ago my sister Victoria got very ill during the summer before she was to start her freshman year of high school. This was an extremely stressful time for my mom. Taking my sister from hospital to hospital and doctor to doctor she acquired lots of debt and no matter how many doctors or hospitals we went to none seemed to be able to help. Very long story short, we were able to find a clinic that diagnosed Victoria with Lyme disease and Black Mold intoxication. This meant a lot of treatment and a lot of monies would lay ahead. All the while my mother tried her best to make sure Victoria got what she needed and making sure that I myself wasn’t put aside. During this time my mom was also dealing with health issues of her own and couldn’t afford to pay for all the treatment Victoria needed.

Victoria has continued to deal with Lyme symptoms due to her serious illness. During this time she has been on home studies and the goal is to get her in a stable place so that she can return to going to normal school.

Just recently my mother was diagnosed with Lyme disease. My moms health is plummeting. The effects of the disease that were crippling her, have finally stopped her. I saw my mother with fear of losing my sister that sadly she neglected herself, obviously causing even more damage. Everyone tried to warn my mom but she was afraid and focused on getting my sister better. My sister has been receiving some care but she certainly still has her bad days and ER visits. My mom on the other hand is beyond struggling.
Some of my moms symptoms are:

• Difficulty breathing
• Sudden Panic attacks (with no trigger)
• Seizures
• Constant Headaches/migraines
• Neck and back stiffness and pain
• Tremors in neck, mouth, chest, arms & hands
• Sudden weakness and the inability to walk ,talk,stand,and move legs
• Numbness on left side of body from face to leg
• Swelling of the neck and tonsils
• Light and sound sensitivity
• Vertigo
• Nausea
• Disorientation
• Hallucinations
• Random face/body Twitching
• Inflammation everywhere.
• Difficulty walking
• Difficulty with getting words together and pronouncing words that shouldn’t be difficult to pronounce.
• Forgetfulness
• Tingling in hands and feet
• Numbness and loss of mobility of left arm and hand.
• Sudden onsets of severe anxiety and depression
• Chest pain and pressure and
• Very jumpy and very easily startled.

Though she has tried different treatments her condition worsens. Her body won’t respond favorably to anything and it has gotten to the point that too often we are taking care of our mother.

We need our mom!

My mom says it’s time for her pain to be her strength no matter how difficult or scary it might be. As she deals with so much, it truly amazes me to see how strong and loving of a mother I am blessed to have, I am extremely grateful for her.

Please don’t let our smiles fool you, we are still dealing with many financial issues to get the right treatment for my family, but we continue to rely on our faith to continue enduring. The night my mom found out she was nominated for such a generous treatment she was truly overjoyed with hope, despite the extremely hard days or should I say years she has had.

I speak on behalf of my awesome mom and my sister when I say, Thank you all so much for all the love and willing support! These funds would be of so much help no matter how small. Thank you!!

Samantha

Pictured left to right: Samantha, Victoria with cane and Yazmin

Esquibel-Family

Tristan, Ready to Overcome His Obstacles

Tristan is almost 4 years old. He is a wonderfully extraordinary son! But everyday he is faced with the great challenges and struggles of Autism.

When he was 1 year old, he knew his shapes, animals, etc. And he could talk in small sentences. He was a spunky, smiling, happy, and loving child.

Just about the age of 2, he underwent an inguinal hernia surgery, and had his regular doctor’s check-up. Ever since that doctors check-up, after receiving the MMR immunization, Tristan has not been the same. He stopped smiling, and stopped using his words. Our happy, spunky boy had disappeared.

At the age of 3, he was diagnosed Autistic. He runs around the house making funny little noises, (which makes me smile, because it’s close to words) plays by himself, and is always lining things up (shoes, toys, books, etc.) If something is out of place, or his schedule gets changed in ANY way, the rest of the day is very rough. He’ll get VERY frustrated and scream and THROW himself on the floor. Tristan pays no mind to what his sister (kalei) is doing to him, and he doesn’t play with his schoolmates.

Every day is a struggling fight for Tristan. He fights just to try and tell us what he wants/needs or how he feels. He gets sick VERY easy anymore. (I can’t tell you how many times he’s been sick in the last year!) He can’t tell us if he’s in pain, what’s he’s going through, or what he’s thinking. To this day he has never been able to say:” Mommy, I love you.” I have had many nights in tears and prayer that there could be an answer, a hope, a way we can help him, help him speak his feelings, to help him heal.

Due to this crashing economy, and my husband being sick, (for the last 2 years) and unable to work, there are no funds to work with for trying to get our son the special food, supplements, therapies, and treatments he needs to help him heal. So Please, Help our son Tristan with that hope. That hope to get better and to come back to us.

A Family in need of help for hope,

Paige Moore

Drake Is One Tough Kid

Every day he faces many challenges associated with Autism and Epilepsy. When Drake first started Hyperbaric Oxygen Treatment, he was apprehensive and did not respond well to the staff. His improvements after treatment are exciting, and have included milestones not seen before the oxygen: Looking the staff and Doctor in the eye, having less seizures, recovering from seizures much sooner, improved energy and even growing taller. Every Treatment helps Drake recover faster and helps him to feel better longer. Drakes fight isn’t over yet, though, and because of the economy, a lot of the family’s funds must go to other healthcare costs as well as special education and services for Drake.

Drake needs your help! From the start, although suffering through recovery of seizures, he has always had a spark to him and has always been loving and happy. That positivity stems from the support and generosity of his family and friends. YOU can be a part of Drakes continued healing and be counted as one of his friends.

Jemma, the Little Girl Who Will Succeed

Jemma just turned 5 during the sixth and final week of her first set of Hyperbaric Oxygen sessions. At her birthday party she stood up with a magician we hired and helped him with his tricks, laughing at his jokes and answering his questions with one-word answers. This was a miracle for my husband and I and those who have watched Jemma struggle with every milestone! Jemma was born a seemingly healthy baby but from 3 months old we realized that she had numerous developmental issues that ultimately resulted in huge delays in first crawling, then walking and more recently speech and the ability to connect with her peers and do the same things they do like drawing and coloring in.

Prior to these first dives Jemma had a very limited vocabulary and could only speak in 2-3 word sentences that only we could really understand. She was also not at ease with strangers. Arriving at this point had been the culmination of several years of applying every therapy and treatment we could find at great expense. Throughout all of these years Jemma has proven to be an amazingly stoic little girl despite all the difficulties and unpleasantness she has had to endure. Once she practiced continually for almost 6 months to learn to jump like her friends. She just never gives up! Now she wanted to talk so badly we had to try everything and so we had high hopes for the Hyperbaric Oxygen treatment.

After just 5 sessions we noticed changes. She seemed braver, more confident and words started to come through. We had tears in our eyes and we held our breath praying it would hold. Finally she could tell us her thoughts and tell us what to do! Along with this came a surprising emotional maturity. She became a typical 5 year old in behavior and mannerisms. She knew what she wanted, bargaining with us when she sensed she could. We were shocked and even had to reach for some parenting books. Our child has come alive before our eyes, the staff at the Hyperbaric office and the teachers at her school. Pure joy! Another change we saw was the strabismus in her left eye was improving, this was great as we had thought she might have to have surgery to correct this. Unbelievable healing.

We are desperate to get Jemma back in the tank for the next session of dives to hopefully continue this pace of development. But we have to continue with her other (very expensive) therapies: biomedical, chelation, and explorative surgery on her gut to understand digestive issues that a specialist has identified; all in the hope of further improving her speech. This has by far been the most life changing therapy we have done and we believe Jemma will continue to respond in a dramatic way to this form of healing. Our hope is that one day soon she can communicate in clear short sentences so that she may share with us all her wonderful ideas, thoughts and stories.

Kimo

Kimo has Lymes Disease. The disease has caused him to develop severe nerve damage. He lives in constant pain, which he says, varies from an all out assault with armies of red ants to soaking in boiling oil (on a bad day). Fortunately, hyperbaric chamber therapy could help this condition. Unfortunately, after 3 years of medical bills for Lymes Disease, Kimo is not in a position to afford this beneficial treatment.

Kimo’s professional dream is to “green the grid” with currently viable alternative energy systems. He believes we can realize this vision, and is working towards this goal. But he struggles so much with daily pain that he is not always able to fully apply himself to his passion.

Kimos personal dream is to run again. He speaks with enthusiasm of racing from the Golden Gate Bridge to Muir Beach and back on the weekends (for fun!)- Now he can’t even stand up to do the dishes. His exposure to pain through running has trained him to endure the searing, burning pain of his current nerve damage. His fiancé would really love to see him stand through their wedding ceremony next summer without suffering in pain. If hyperbaric treatments could help, he would run, stand, and work for change as a renewed, grateful and dedicated man.

Sandy

They say life can change in the blink of an eye. That moment came for me thirteen years ago when I became very ill with Chronic Lyme Disease. I went from being a working mother and wife to a sick and crippled woman who laid in bed or on the couch for eight years. In the past five years, I have not been bedridden but have been house-bound due to severe mobility issues. Every other week I get a hundred shots in my knee and ankle joints as well as in the surrounding ligaments and muscles. Unfortunately, I am still in severe chronic pain from arthritis and soft tissue inflammation caused by Lyme Disease. It is only a matter of time before I am in a wheelchair.

My situation is complicated by having ulcerative colitis. This has greatly narrowed my treatment options as I am unable to tolerate oral medications. Because hyperbaric treatment bypasses the digestive tract, it sounds very promising.

Fighting and surviving is something I know well. When I was sixteen, I had chronic back pain and serious neurological leg problems due to a disc that disintegrated. At the age of nineteen, I had a spinal fusion during which I contracted Lyme disease from a blood transfusion. The surgery was not successful and landed me in a body cast and bed for two years. It took an additional two years to rehabilitate from this. A year later, I had TMJ problems which led to two jaw surgeries each requiring extensive rehabilitation. During these years, I attended college, when I could eventually earning an undergraduate degree in psychology and a master’s degree in social work. Because of my health issues, including several not mentioned here, it took me nineteen years to complete my education. During this same time period, I got married and adopted a child.

My husband and I have spent nearly every penny we have on treatments for me. We are currently unable to fund further treatment because we have a special needs child who requires very expensive care. Meanwhile, my illness is rapidly progressing and is robbing me of my vitality. It is also robbing my son of his mother. I beg you to consider that by helping me you are indirectly helping my fifteen year old son, Ryan, who suffers from bipolar illness and Autism. He desperately needs me here to help him navigate this world and monitor his treatments and medications. As things stand now, this is in serious jeopardy.

As my illness progresses, it saddens me to lose my functioning. But my greatest sadness comes from watching my Ryan lose his mother to Lyme disease. If you have the ability to help me receive hyperbaric treatment, I hope you will consider me worthy of your help. It is my last hope to regain my health. But most importantly, it is Ryan’s last hope to regain the fully functioning mother he once had.

Sincerely,
Sandy K

Nancy

Vivacious is how friends and acquaintance often described me in my thirties. In the fall of 1989 that verve and vivacity disappeared. Up to that time I was enjoying my active lifestyle and raising my children. I had used L-tryptophan for a month to help with sleep. After the bottle was empty and tossed, I began to experience flu-like symptoms that never went away. There was also the tremendous muscle pain followed with extreme fatigue and difficulty concentrating. I remember attempting to drive myself to work one day and tears rolling down my face because I was in so much pain. Soon I was bed ridden and unable to work. The worst part of this nightmarish tribulation was the inability of the doctors to explain why I was experiencing these problems.

My answer would arrive in 1991 when I met Dr. Lambert a top Immunologist who understood the damage caused to those who had ingested contaminated L-tryptophan. The damage involved life altering symptoms which involved the Neurological, Immune, Muscular and Gastro-Intestinal to name a few. My insomnia was worst than ever. The effect of a chronic illness results in some form of depression.

Today I still suffer from an immune dysfunction, chronic fatigue, muscle pain, cognitive difficulties, chemical sensitivities, cholesterol problems even with dietary restrictions, periodontal problems and teeth problems even with impeccable dental care. During the spring’s allergy season, I am laid out because my immune cannot handle the attack on my system. After my last residential move I was down for six months! It was just horrible.

I have always been of the mind that if live gives you lemons make lemonade. However, even positive thinking cannot overcome a lower level of functioning, constant and extreme fatigue, body pain, teeth problems and cognitive difficulties. It is difficult for me to be upbeat and smiling when I am downright exhausted. My world feels unsteady! Such uncertainty means not being able to hold a job. At the end of my rope after living in severe isolation, I returned to school part time. It is a real push but a necessity for me to remain sane. I am enlisted at the college through the Disabled Students Program. Even my mental capacities can be drained and exhausted fairly easily. What is left? I don’t want to live as a vegetable.

It is difficult for me to maintain my friendships and to be present for the usual family functions so essential to my quality of life because of my health problems. I had to give up classical dancing and that was so utterly devastating for me. What keeps me going is HOPE! Hope is what has gotten me through each day and each year. I want my life back! I believe from what has been presented to me by a researcher-writer and by the Advanced Hyperbaric Recovery Center that with HBOT treatment I can be healed! Others have been restored to health through such therapy and I believe I can too.

Kurtis

Kurtis suffered a Traumatic Brain injury (TBI) on March 6, 2009.

He was 22 at the time, attending college in Lake Tahoe, where he also worked at a hotel. He is an avid snowboarder and plays both the saxaphone and drums in a band. Kurtis was well on his way to an accounting degree.

Mary, Kurtis’ mother, is a single parent working hard to pay for Kurtis’ rehab. Kurtis’ older brother, Kyle, died ten years ago at the age of 16. He was killed by a drunk driver while wakling down the street. He didn’t get the second chance that Kurtis has.

Kurtis’ TBI is multiple. While horsing around with a friend, he fell, hit his head, was deprived of oxygen and two days later his brain swelled. Kurtis faces a lengthy recovery. The good news is a young brain is resilient and with the right therapy (such as Hyperbaric Oxygen) can heal.

Kurtis embraced the world. The injury has not stopped his happy, loving spirit. Hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) has helped Kurtis in many ways so far. When Kurtis started HBOT, he wasn’t very alert to his surroundings, he was fixated completely on his right side, and he had trouble sleeping, moving his limbs and responding to requests. After a round of HBOT, however, Kurtis can focus on people in any direction, he sleeps better, and responds to requests using simple sign langauage and appropriate movements. Kurtis has progressed to the delight and surprise of physicians (one of which said he would remain comatose) and he still has more symptoms to conquer. Kurtis and his family need your help to restore his independence, and provide his body and brain with the healing oxygen it so desperately needs. Kurtis has recently regained the ability to smile, and he wears that smile often– let’s help him keep it on!

Helene

Hello, my name is Helene. I have been a full time, public school art teacher in a K-8 school for over ten years in Marin County. I am also a practicing artist of photography, ceramics and drawing and painting. I am inspired by, and am in love with, the natural beauty of Marin. I use to run and hike in the hills of Mt. Tamalpais.

That was before I was diagnosed with Lyme disease back in July of 2000. I had been struggling for years to regain my health and finally needed to take a medical leave of absence in 2006. I tried to return to teaching the k-5 art program in 2007 but went back out medical leave in January of 2008 through June of 2010. Healing has become my full time job. My doctor feels, as do I, that I have reached a plateau with antibiotic therapies and suggested investigating hyperbaric oxygen therapy. I believe that the hyperbaric oxygen therapy will give me another modality to better my overall health and help to increase my stamina so that I can renew my passion for teaching art to my wonderful students and to continue living the life I am meant to be leading.

I am planning to return to the classroom part time in just a few weeks. I know that the first two weeks of hyperbaric oxygen therapy are the most difficult for Lyme patients so I needed to start today in order for the school year to get off to a good start. The protocol for Lyme patients is forty-two dives over eight weeks. This HOPE Institute has graciously granted a sliding scale but I may not be able to complete all forty-two dives even at the discounted rate.

To be given a second chance at a life, even remotely similar to the one you once had, is a treasured gift. This is my hope, my dream, my ache.