Lexi Czar is a 27-year-old young woman from Creston, BC, Canada. She created Lyme disease awareness apparel and is and is thinking about relaunching her brand in the future.

Prior to suffering the extreme symptoms of Lyme disease, Ms. Czar was a full-time student with a part-time job and was involved in many extracurricular sports and activities. She traveled throughout British Columbia and Alberta and was an extremely happy person with a great group of friends.

Ms. Czar struggled with health issues as a child after a bad case of mono, but once she entered college her symptoms became more persistent. She had severe migraines and chronic fatigue which were dismissed and attributed to being a stressed college student.

Unfortunately, Ms. Czars symptoms continued to worsen and expand, including body pain, insomnia, restless legs, bone issues, anxiety, and depression. After contracting dengue fever and being exposed to toxic mold, she was finally diagnosed with Lyme disease when she was 22.

Ms. Czar was bit by another tick and reinfected with Powassan virus, Lyme disease, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever (RMSF), Babesia, and Bartonella after making progress recovering from her initial Lyme diagnosis. Some of the treatment modalities she has used over time include stem cells, kambo, peptides, microdosing (with psilocybin), herbal antibiotics, ozone, light therapy, Rife, the FREmedica WAVE device, and more.

If you would like to learn how a young woman from Canada is using a variety of non-standard treatment protocols to recover from chronic Lyme disease and co-infections, then tune in now!

PS Emma Pikoulas special guest co-hosted this interview with Matt from Tick Boot Camp!

Åsa Rydmark is a 48-year-old woman from Sweden who has traveled all around the world. She’s worked in the medical field as a Registered Nurse (RN), research nurse at a gynecological ward, and for the last two years as a research coordinator at Linköping University.

Ms. Rydmark had many tick bites throughout her life, got a bullseye rash when she was 14, and Lyme came out and wreaked havoc when she was 39 due to mold exposure and environmental toxins weakening her immune system while performing home renovations. At first, she thought her symptoms were due to “sugar addiction” after reading an article in the newspaper about it. Removing sugar and gluten from her diet helped her feel a little bit better.

Ms. Rydmark quickly realized there was more to the picture and saw many doctors, all of which told her she was fine and her tests all came back normal. She was finally diagnosed with Lyme disease at the age of 46.

Ms. Rydmark and her doctors believe she suffers from Acrodermatitis Chronica Atrophicans (ACA), a late and chronic manifestation of European Lyme borreliosis (Borrelia afzelii), which is characterized by red or bluish-red lesions and leads to extensive flaccid atrophy of the skin.

Ms. Rydmark was treated with Doxycycline for a month, but her doctor wouldn’t do any more for her and she only made minimal health improvements. She started researching and came across the Tick Boot Camp Podcast, Dr. Rawls’ work on chronic Lyme, and Dr. Horowitz’s Multiple Systemic Infectious Disease Syndrome (MSIDS) all of which solidified her gut feeling that she was still sick with Lyme disease and needed more help.

Ms. Rydmark started her treatment with Dr. Rawls’ herbal Restore Kit and Gut Revival Kit from Vital Plan, but the international shipping costs weren’t practical so she had to stop despite feeling better and kickstarting her true healing journey. Next, she tried some Microbe Formula products that built upon the improvements started with Dr. Rawls’ products. She also discovered Swedish Fascia Vibes which helped improve lymphatic flow and aided her body to rid itself of toxins more easily. This was a gamechanger for Ms. Rydmark.

If you’d like to learn more about how Ms. Rydmark “found a new complete and whole sense of self and a belief in the power to heal and help others,” then tune in now!

PS Rachel Barnes, a Life, Health, and Wellness Coach, special guest co-hosted this interview with Matt from Tick Boot Camp!

Karen Widaman is a 62-year-old certified dog trainer and owner of a large dog training company from Glendora, California.

Despite working in a high-risk industry, Ms. Widaman was unaware of that her contact with thousands of dogs increased her Lyme vulnerability. In 2015, she began to suffer from stomach, foot, and hand pain her doctors believed to be unrelated symptoms in part because she tested negative for Lyme disease.

Unrelenting symptoms forced to treat with a plethora of medical doctors including internists, neurologists, gastroenterologists, oncologists, and infectious disease doctors. In desperation, she sought out a “natural doctor” who retested her for Lyme utilizing a test from IGeneX.

Testing positive for Lyme disease offered Ms. Widaman a path forward. The Integrated Natural Medical Clinic began treatment with herbal supplements utilizing the Buhner protocol and ozone therapy followed up with stem cell, nutritional therapies, and SOT therapy.

Today, Ms. Widaman is pain free and functioning at a high level utilizing supportive therapies to reduce inflammation and support for her immune system. If you would like to learn why a professional dog trainer had to leave the old dogs in the medical community to learn new tricks from an integrative medical discipline to heal, then tune in now!

PS Tiara Smith special guest co-hosted this interview with Rich from Tick Boot Camp!

Casey Fillian is a 45-year-old personal trainer, massage therapist, and competitive runner from Marlboro, New Jersey. Ms. Fillian is also a Lyme disease pioneer: during her childhood she was one of the first people in the United States diagnosed with Lyme. After suffering a tick bite while attending a summer camp, she “developed a fever, general malaise… a bad flu, [her] knee blew up to 3 times its size, and [her] torso was covered in a rash”. Although her parents did not believe the “knee swelling was related to the flu”, the family pediatrician “was suspicious of a new disease [thought] only in Connecticut at the time”. “He sent us to Yale University Hospital and the doctors were able to confirm and start me on an oral antibiotic protocol” followed by “admission to Monmouth Medical Center… for IV therapy”. Her childhood experience inspired her to make “fitness and exercise a priority in [her] life”. She pursued a career as a fitness professor and trained for and ran in several distance and marathon events. In 2017 after returning home from a marathon training event, she discovered a tick embedded on her hip. The second/adult tick bite was followed by a bullseye rash, sepsis, and chronic illness. She has since treated with 3 courses of antibiotics via PICC line and herbal supplements allowing her to return part time to work serving the senior population in a fitness facility for people 62 and older. If you would like to learn how a Lyme disease pioneer was twice knocked down by Lyme but got up each time twice as strong, then tune in now!

PS Adina Bercowicz, founder and president of Lyme TV, special guest co-hosted this interview with Rich from Tick Boot Camp!

Grace Anderson is a 21-year-old Lyme disease advocate from the coast of Maine. She's currently studying mental health and human services.

Ms. Anderson first became sick with symptoms of Lyme when she was 12 at a Taylor Swift concert with the following symptoms: dizziness, nausea, swollen feet, excessive sweating, and vomiting. These symptoms quickly subsided, but they came back a month later and never went away with the addition of migraines, fatigue, difficulty walking, full body pain, and body weakness.

Ms. Anderson tested positive for Hashimoto's disease and the rest of her symptoms were dismissed as "just anxiety". Her health continued to decline, and she saw many doctors and specialists, including those at Boston Children's Hospital.

Finally, Ms. Anderson's mother brought her to a naturopath when she was 16 where she was tested for Lyme, and it came back positive. She was also diagnosed with POTS and through trial and errors found a treatment that was very effective at controlling her symptoms.

After making progress with her treatment, Ms. Anderson became very sick again a few years later and was diagnosed with Bartonella and active Lyme disease which likely was from a new tick bite. She used a wide variety of treatments including antibiotics like Doxycycline and Rifampin.

If you'd like to learn more about a young woman who fought back against childhood Lyme disease and is now helping others in their healing journeys, then tune in now!

PS Carly Taylor special guest co-hosted this interview with Matt from Tick Boot Camp!

Rosemeyris Estrella is personal trainer and health and nutrition coach from Pennsylvania. She grew up and spent most of her adult life residing in the urban New York City borough of The Bronx.

Recently, Ms. Estrella and husband decided to offer their 4 children the opportunity to trade city living for the freedom, fresh air, and open spaces offered in rural Pennsylvania. Shortly after moving to their new home, Ms. Estrella discovered she had suffered a bug bite on her left leg after spending time tending to her garden.

Shortly after the bite, she “got a bulls eye rash” at the bite site. Having “no idea about ticks or Lyme” disease, she did not plan to seek medical intervention until a neighbor told her “to go to the ER” where she was diagnosed with a skin infection. Two months later, she woke up with a swollen leg, radiating pain, and swollen lymph nodes causing her to return to the emergency room where she tested positive for Lyme disease.

Despite taking the prescribed 21 days of antibiotics, her health continued to decline kicking off a “journey of researching and learning… about [chronic illness and Lyme] disease”. Her research taught her that the joint stresses of an extreme fitness regimen and the move to a new community were immunosuppressive resulting in vulnerability and illness.

If you would like to learn more about how Lyme disease taught a fitness and nutrition professional the importance of moderate exercise and stress relief for immune health, then tune in now!

Evangelina Vensel is an author, life coach, certified Master PSYCH-K facilitator, Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) practitioner, and certified Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) practitioner from Washington State.

Although she had been symptomatic and ill since early childhood, she was not diagnosed with Lyme disease until surpassing her 40th birthday. She sought treatment with over 20 health care providers and was misdiagnosed with a plethora of mental and physical health disorders including Multiple sclerosis (MS), Parkinson’s disease, dementia, autoimmune disorders, bipolar disorder, ADHD, and fibromyalgia.

After treating with a naturopathic doctor and receiving a Lyme disease diagnosis she “received many, many treatments and protocols… before [she] discovered a path to [a] cure”. By “taking a road less traveled… and treating with a Holistic Dr. in Tijuana, Mexico [she] only needed 9 months to get to full remission”.

In addition to treating at the Mexican health care facility, she “did brain rewriting, subconscious reprogramming, and trauma release… to [emotionally] heal for [her] treatments to be a success”.

If you would like to learn more about how an author and health coach remitted Lyme disease in 9 months utilizing subconscious rewiring and taking the road less traveled to work with a Holistic practitioner in Tijuana, Mexico, the tune in now!

In this powerful return appearance on the Tick Boot Camp Podcast, Dr. Alan MacDonald joins hosts Matt Sabatello and Richard Johannessen for a deep, unfiltered conversation about the research he spent a lifetime pursuing — research that remains controversial, increasingly validated, and deeply consequential for patients with chronic Lyme disease.

Recorded decades after his earliest discoveries, this interview captures Dr. MacDonald in his later years: reflective, candid, and still fiercely committed to uncovering the truth about Borrelia burgdorferi, chronic infection, and neurodegenerative disease.

This episode serves as both a scientific masterclass and a historical record of how far Lyme research has come — and how far it still has to go.

A Pioneer Still “Ahead of the Curve”

Dr. MacDonald, a retired hospital pathologist trained at Columbia University and NYU Bellevue, dedicated his career to diagnosing disease through direct tissue, blood, and molecular evidence, rather than relying solely on indirect antibody testing.

Long before Lyme disease entered mainstream awareness, he was documenting Borrelia in human tissue, identifying alternative bacterial forms, and warning that chronic infection could persist, evade treatment, and drive long-term neurological damage.

Dr. MacDonald recently passed away, but this interview preserves his voice, his science, and his insistence that medicine must follow evidence — even when it challenges entrenched narratives.

Major Themes Explored

Chronic Lyme Disease as a Persistent Infection

Dr. MacDonald explains why Lyme disease cannot always be viewed as an acute, easily treated illness. He outlines how Borrelia survives by:

• Changing form (spirochete, cystic, granular, L-form)

• Embedding in protective biofilms

• Persisting in tissue, blood, and the nervous system

Biofilms and Why Treatment Often Fails

A central focus of this episode is biofilm biology. Dr. MacDonald describes biofilms as organized microbial communities that shield Borrelia from antibiotics and immune attack, making chronic Lyme especially difficult to treat.

He discusses biofilms found:

• In Lyme-related skin lesions

• Circulating in blood

• Embedded in brain tissue

• Within Alzheimer’s disease plaques

He emphasizes that biofilms are a hallmark of chronic infection, not acute disease.

Lyme Disease and Alzheimer’s Pathology

Dr. MacDonald revisits his groundbreaking work identifying Borrelia DNA, proteins, and biofilms in Alzheimer’s brains. He explains how amyloid plaques may function as an antimicrobial response, coating infectious biofilms rather than forming randomly.

Drawing parallels to tertiary syphilis, he argues that infection-driven dementia should not be dismissed — only rigorously studied.

Lewy Body Dementia and Neurodegeneration

Beyond Alzheimer’s, Dr. MacDonald discusses evidence linking Borrelia infection to Lewy Body Dementia, reinforcing the idea that chronic infection may play a role in multiple neurodegenerative conditions.

DNA-Based Diagnostics vs. Antibody Testing

Dr. MacDonald details why standard Lyme antibody tests fail many patients, particularly those with chronic illness. He explains the advantages of DNA-based detection, including:

• Fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH)

• Direct visualization of Borrelia DNA in tissue and fluid

• Reduced false negatives compared to serology

Parasites, Coinfections, and Lyme Persistence

The conversation explores Dr. MacDonald’s research identifying parasitic organisms in Lyme patients, including evidence that parasites may harbor Borrelia internally. He explains how this relationship could:

• Protect Lyme bacteria from antibiotics

• Contribute to symptom flares

• Help explain why antiparasitic treatment benefits some patients

The Politics of Lyme Disease Research

Dr. MacDonald speaks candidly about:

• Being accused of fraud for publishing pathology findings

• Barriers to publication in major medical journals

• How “standard of care” is shaped by politics rather than patients

• Why clinicians fear treating chronic Lyme

Despite this resistance, he expresses hope that modern science is finally revisiting long-dismissed evidence.

Exclusive Tick Boot Camp Presentation by Dr. Alan MacDonald

In addition to this interview, listeners can also view an exclusive Tick Boot Camp presentation created by Dr. MacDonald.

This special presentation features:

• High-resolution microscope images of Lyme bacteria

• Visual examples of Borrelia in tissue, blood, and biofilms

• Clear descriptions of the various Lyme disease forms

• Visual context for the topics discussed in this interview, including chronic infection, neurodegeneration, and diagnostic challenges

This presentation offers a rare opportunity to see what Dr. MacDonald saw under the microscope — and understand why his conclusions were so difficult to ignore.

A Living Legacy

Episode 300 stands as a testament to a scientist who refused to stop asking difficult questions, even when doing so came at personal and professional cost.

Update: Though Dr. Alan MacDonald has recently passed away, his work lives on — in emerging research, in the patients he helped, and in a growing scientific willingness to revisit infection-driven chronic disease.

As new studies explore Lyme-related neuroinflammation and neurodegeneration, his contributions remain foundational.

Carley Rudd is a 34-year-old second generation artist and Travel Photographer from Portland, Maine. Her work has taken her across the globe and has been featured in Vogue, Condé Nast Traveller, National Geographic, Architectural Digest, and Travel & Leisure.

Ms. Rudd suffered from Lyme disease for 10 years before she was diagnosed in 2021. She balanced her pre-diagnosed symptoms and travel by visiting over 50 United States (US) and international doctors.

Eventually her body said no to her rigorous professional schedule, and she was forced to put her career on pause. Knowing her body was out of balance, she pursued a wide variety of medical diagnostic testing; including, bio-resonance, blood, and clinical.

After locating a diagnosis, Ms. Rudd tapped into her artistic skill set to build a healing plan. She utilized multi-sensory treatment tools such as blue, red, and sun light, diffused lavender oil, 54321 sensory exercises, adaptogen herbs, ozone, parasite and mold cleanses, meditation, Qigong, and energy healing.

Today, Ms. Rudd continues treatment, but she has returned to work and her social life. If you would like to learn more about how an artistic mindset can be used to accelerate healing from Lyme disease, then tune in now!

Dr. Christina Rahm is a medical, clinical and research scientist, entrepreneur, author, Chief Science Officer for ROOT Wellness, and Chair of the International Science Nutrition Society from Brentwood, TN. Her resume includes working for pharmaceutical giants such as Johnson & Johnson, UCB, Bristol Myers Squibb, and Pfizer and she has created multiple provisional patents, proprietary formulas, and trade secrets.

Dr. Rahm’s journey with Lyme disease and chronic illness began when she suffered multiple bites from a “bed of seed ticks” at the age of 19. Within two weeks, she became chronically ill causing her to suffer memory loss, headaches, fever, fainting, and to feel “generally sick all over”.

Driven by a desire to help the patient community avoid the physical, emotional, and spiritual trauma caused by chronic illness, Dr. Rahm managed her own disease symptoms while earning undergraduate and graduate degrees (BA, MS, Ph.D and Ed.D) and post graduate certificates from Ivy League Harvard University and Cornell University.

In her adult life, Dr. Rahm has survived multiple bouts of cancer that she believes were stimulated by Lyme disease.

If you would like to learn more about how Lyme disease has inspired professional, spiritual, emotional, and instinctive discoveries that have granted Dr. Christina Rahm the opportunity to help patients in more than 80 countries, then tune in now!