Getting to know the Silent Triggers of Disease: Mold, Lyme & EMFs

You train hard, you eat right, you believe you are doing everything correctly for optimal wellness and performance–and yet, you don’t feel at your peak. Have you ever wondered if hidden forces may be at play, preventing you from feeling your best?  If so, you are already on the right track! While there are a range of negative health influences that are pervasive in our environment.

So what is this “trio of silent triggers of disease” that we are so often addressing?...

…Lyme, Mold, and Electromagnetic Frequencies (EMFs)!  All or none of these topics may be familiar to you from a health and wellness standpoint, so let’s jump in and see if this is YOU!

It might be shocking to think that rarely-recognized factors in your environment may be impacting your health, but becoming aware of them is the first step on the road back to optimal health.

Let’s get started…

Mold Exposure - Mold is found everywhere in our environment and we have lived alongside it since the dawn of man. This organism is an essential part of the food chain, ensuring decaying matter is properly broken down–otherwise the earth would be overrun with fallen leaves and trees or dead plants and animals. However, sometimes mold is a little too good at its job…

The real danger of mold to humans comes from ingesting or inhaling it. Often, but not always, that damage occurs over a long period of time. Common sources of indoor mold exposure include water damaged wood or drywall, dirty air ducts, the soil of potted plants, carpet and rugs which have fibers that trap mold spores. If your roof has ever leaked, your tub has overflown, or your sump pump went out during a storm, there is a great chance mold may be hiding–sometimes in plain sight! Common foods with high levels of mold include grains like wheat, corn, and rice, dried fruit, dairy products, raisins, nuts, and peanuts.

Not only is mold gross, chronic exposure can have severe negative impacts on your overall health. Thankfully, only a handful of mold species are toxic to humans. Mycotoxins from mold damage the body by eliciting a strong immune response including pro-inflammatory cytokines. This immune response is intended to help move the toxin out of the body. However, if you are constantly exposed in your home or office, that inflammatory response continues long term, degrading health and performance.

One downside is that the potent inflammatory chemical byproducts, known as “mycotoxins”, from these few species can significantly damage your body. The toxic ones can cause enough damage to severely impact your health and athletic performance. The other downside is that many of these types of mold love to feed on the same materials that your home, school, and workplace are made out of. If water damage occurs in a building and is not quickly resolved, the moisture facilitates mold growth on cellulose-containing building materials like wood and drywall–perfect food sources for mold!

Walking into a musty house isn’t going to kill you, but high exposures to mold spores and mycotoxins over time will begin to impair the immune system. Rarely, a few specific species of mold are able to colonize within the body, causing dangerous conditions like “Pulmonary Aspergillosis” in those with already-compromised immune systems. 

Up to 50% of all homes in the U.S. & Canada exhibit mold, dampness, or water damage. With mysterious chronic illnesses on the rise, mold exposure deserves much more attention and recognition than it receives.

Electromagnetic frequencies (EMFs) - If you have spent time in the health and wellness space, you have likely heard of the “dangers of EMFs”. The EMF spectrum contains high-energy (high-frequency) and low-energy (low-frequency). Examples of high frequency EMFs include X-rays, gamma rays, and some UV wavelengths (think tanning beds), mid-range frequency sources include the visible light spectrum, radio waves, and infrared light, and low-frequency sources consist of things like microwaves, WiFi, cell phones, and cell towers. 

Certain types and intensities of EMFs have the ability to damage your cells by disrupting energy transfer and essentially stealing electrons. This lowers your capacity to combat oxidative stress, stresses your antioxidant system, and leads to rapid aging and loss of performance. 

High-frequency EMFs are referred to as “ionizing” radiation, as they have the ability to remove essential electrons from your cells. Mid to Low frequency EMFs are “non-ionizing”, but some types emit frequencies which may still disturb the chemical structures of tissue, since a high degree electromagnetic energy absorption can change the electric current in the body.

One thing is for certain, EMFs are a complex topic that we will cover in depth in further articles…However it is important to note, although certain EMFs can be extremely harmful to human health, not all EMFs are created equally–many are beneficial, like the visible spectrum that allows us to see our world in color! The earth has its own electromagnetic field that is beneficial to humans, so get outside and take your shoes off whenever possible! 

Some EMFs originate from nature, while others are man-made. Just because an EMF is “natural”, we cannot simply assume it is safe. Gamma rays from space cause significant cellular damage, just like X-ray waves from man-made medical devices. The sun is essential for vitamin D synthesis, however, overexposure to certain wavelengths emitted by the sun can cause skin to burn–by stealing your precious electrons!

To keep things simple, you generally want to avoid being in close proximity to EMFs for long periods of time, if possible. Even WiFi routers, smart meters on homes, cellular devices and cell towers, smart appliances, and electric cars may be problematic in the future. Think back to your parents telling you not to sit so close to the TV. Now, everyone has high-powered smartphones inches away from their reproductive organs. Reproductive cancer, like uterine and testicular cancers, have been on the rise since the 90s and early 2000s, when wireless cell phones were becoming more available. Coincidence? 

Lyme disease - According to medical literature, Lyme disease is caused by the spiral-shaped bacteria Borrelia burgdorferi, which is transmitted by Black Legged and Deer Ticks. 

While this is true, functional medicine doctors have been discovering that Lyme is more of a “syndrome”, with many factors involved including the presence of Lyme “co-infections”, or pathogenic organisms that are commonly found alongside Borrelia. These include pathogens such as Bartonella, Ehrlichia, and the blood-borne parasite Babesia and more. The presence of multiple of these organisms complicates the treatment of Lyme, and helps account for the vast and vague array of symptoms associated with Lyme disease. Lyme is commonly referred to as “the Great Mimicker”, as the symptoms a person experiences may be associated with a different disease such as Parkinson’s or arthritis. Lyme disease may cause overactivation of the immune system, leading to inflammation, initially intended to resolve the infection, that becomes chronic.

Another factor complicating the treatment of Lyme is lack of scientific understanding regarding modes of transmission, biofilms, and stealth pathogens. Transmission is known to occur via tick bite and animals such as deer and cows can act as reservoirs after being bitten by an infected tick, and may consequently infect any uninfected ticks that may feed off the infected host. What is not well understood is if any other biting insects have the capacity to transmit Lyme and co-infections (we suspect they do). 

In the medical community, antibiotics are generally accepted as the first line of defense against tick-borne Lyme disease. Unfortunately, many Functional Medicine Practitioners receive clients who have gone through many courses of antibiotics to treat Lyme, without any improvement. Fortunately, we have adapted recovery protocols at Vagus Clinic to help you navigate through this.

Shockingly, low levels of Borrelia bacteria have been found in the blood of healthy, asymptomatic subjects, while subjects with a history of tick bites and Lyme-associated symptoms may never show up positive on standard Lyme testing. Borrelia and it’s co-infections may have the capacity to act as “stealth pathogens”, evading destruction by the immune system such as by burrowing deep within biofilms in the body. Mainstream medicine generally denies that Lyme disease can persist chronically and that it is only an acute, short term disease. Lyme is complicated indeed! 

Read our series of articles on these silent triggers. Next one is: Symptoms of Lyme, Mold, & EMF Sensitivity and connecting the dots between them.

Contact Vagus Clinic today using our contact form or call/text (416) 649-6489 to learn more about how we can help you regain your vitality and peak performance. Check us out social media for more great information about Lyme, Mold, EMFs, and how to optimize your health!