Am I Getting Better or Worse?

Posted November 9, 2025

In Co-Infections & Associated Illnesses, Holistic Tools & Strategies, Practitioner Training, Understanding Lyme

How to distinguish a healing crisis from a disease crisis.

If you’re treating Lyme disease (or another chronic infection such as parasites or candida), you may sometimes feel worse before you feel better. This is especially common when something new like an antimicrobial, detox, or herbal protocol. This can be deeply confusing and even frightening. You might wonder:

“Is this normal?
Is this treatment actually helping me?
Or is something going wrong in my body?”

These questions are completely understandable. Healing from Lyme, mold, or other complex illness is rarely a straight, smooth line upward. Instead, it’s more like a winding path that includes moments of progress… and moments of discomfort.

To make sense of these changes, it helps to understand the difference between a healing crisis and a disease crisis – two very different experiences that can feel surprisingly similar on the surface.

What Really Happens When Lyme Bacteria Die

When spirochetes (and other microbes) die, they release toxins and inflammatory debris into your bloodstream. This is what’s known as a die-off reaction or a Herxheimer reaction.

If your detox pathways – especially your liver, lymphatic system, and colon – are already overloaded or sluggish, your body may struggle to clear this sudden influx of waste. When toxins build up faster than your body can eliminate them, symptoms can flare dramatically.

Many people actually feel worse from die-off than they did from the infection itself.

So from your point of view, it’s very reasonable to think:

“I feel awful.
That must mean my Lyme is getting worse.”

But often, the opposite is true.

The key is learning how to tell the difference between “worse because healing is happening” and “worse because the illness is progressing.”

Healing Crisis vs. Disease Crisis

They may look similar—but they mean very different things.

What Is a Healing Crisis?

A healing crisis happens when your body is releasing too many toxins at once, usually because treatment is actively killing bacteria or mobilizing old stored toxins. It is a temporary reaction caused by change—not damage.

Common healing-crisis symptoms include:

Headache
Nausea
Low energy
Brain fog
Temporary increase in pain
Skin eruptions
Sneezing or sinus discharge
Ringing in the ears
Irritability
A flare of old, familiar symptoms

These symptoms vary widely because different toxins affect different systems. For example, mycotoxins or Bartonella may trigger neurological symptoms, whereas Lyme-Borrelia toxins often cause pain and fatigue.

A healing crisis is a sign that treatment is releasing and clearing disease factors, not that the infection is taking over.

What Is a Disease Crisis?

A disease crisis, on the other hand, is when the illness itself is progressing. This represents a deeper shift toward imbalance in the body and can indicate that cells, tissues, or systems are becoming more impaired.

A disease crisis is more likely to occur after things like:

Significant stress
Lack of sleep
Poor diet or lifestyle choices
Exposure to a new toxin
Exposure to a new infection
Pushing yourself physically or emotionally beyond your capacity

In contrast, a healing crisis typically follows doing something positive, such as:

Starting a new antimicrobial
Beginning a detox protocol
Adding a supportive remedy
Making healthy lifestyle changes
Experiencing a period of feeling better and a new level of energy

One comes from healing. The other comes from strain.

How to Tell the Difference

Here are some questions you can ask yourself:

1. Did the symptoms begin after starting something beneficial?

If yes, it’s more likely a healing crisis.

2. Do the symptoms come in waves?

Healing crises often flare and fade, sometimes within hours or days.

3. Are the symptoms familiar?

Healing often causes old symptoms to resurface briefly as layers clear.

4. Did you recently experience stress, poor sleep, or toxic exposure?

If yes, it may be a disease crisis.

5. Do supportive measures (hydration, detox support, rest) help?

Healing crises often respond quickly to detox support.

Supporting Yourself Through the Ups & Downs of Lyme Recovery

Your body is a complex, adaptive system – and so are the microbes. Healing from chronic infections is rarely linear, but that doesn’t mean you’re not progressing.

A few things to keep in mind:

1. Expect variability.

Feeling better… then worse… then better again is extremely common when the body is processing toxins and repairing damage.

2. Trust the process when you’re using health-building approaches.

If you’re supporting detox, improving lifestyle choices, using natural antimicrobials, and listening to your body, you are moving in the right direction—even when a temporary flare makes it hard to believe.

3. Detox is as important as killing microbes.

In many cases, the discomfort isn’t from the Lyme at all, it’s from the strain your detox organs are under as they try to clear the toxins.

4. You’re not doing something wrong.

A healing crisis is not a failure. It’s a sign that your body is responding, shifting, and attempting to restore balance.

5. When in doubt, slow down and support detox.

Hydration, liver support, lymphatic support, rest, and gentle movement can dramatically reduce symptoms.

You Are Moving Forward – Even When It Feels Like a Setback

One of the most empowering things you can understand is this:

Temporary symptoms do not necessarily mean the disease is getting worse. Sometimes, they’re a sign that healing is actively happening beneath the surface.

When treatment is grounded in health-building strategies, you can feel confident that you’re supporting your body in the right way, even as symptoms fluctuate.

Your job is not to force healing. It is to support your body and allow the process to unfold.

Your body, the organisms that infect it, and life itself are a convergence of adaptive complex systems.

Lyme recovery takes patience, courage, and clarity. This includes understanding the difference between a healing crisis and a disease crisis to help you navigate the journey with far more confidence and less fear.

Every healing journey is unique. If you’d like individualized support to understand your symptoms and chart a clear path forward, email info@uprootinglyme.com or call 845-687-6211 to speak with our Patient Support Specialist today.