Lyme disease from tick bite leaves young and fit woman struggling to leave the house

  • Yasmin Watling shares her story with ITV West Country

A young woman from Wiltshire says she has to spend hours on a drip nearly every day after being bitten by a tick at the age of 19.

Yasmin Watling, who is now 25, did not see the tick itself but discovered an enormous red bullseye rash on her leg and realised she may have been infected with Lyme Disease.

She went to the GP but says that, unfortunately, she was prescribed the wrong antibiotics and so did not get the timely treatment she needed.

In the years since, Lyme disease has had an enormous and negative impact on her life - leaving her with extreme fatigue, brain fog, memory loss and neck pain among other symptoms.

Yasmin, from Lacock, told ITV West Country: "Back then I was very busy, I was working hard and playing hard in my first year at uni.

"I was very sociable and just felt the world was my oyster, which obviously came crashing down quite heavily when I got the tick bite."

This is the type of bullseye rash which can appear after a tick bite.

She said she went to the doctor as soon as she saw a large rash.

"Unfortunately they prescribed me the wrong antibiotics, so I didn't get the treatment that I needed at the time," she added.

"You are so used to being able to turn up to the doctor and trusting they will do the right thing. I literally didn't think of Lyme disease again for a year because I thought it had been sorted but during that year I got sicker and sicker."

She says her symptoms progressed slowly, leaving her with no idea what was happening.

"I'd get a stiff back of the neck to the point I though I had meningitis and I would get sick all the time," she said. "There was obviously something seriously wrong with my body."

Yasmin Watling before the tick bite.

Yasmin repeatedly went to her GP with a range of strange symptoms but no one discovered the cause until a chance meeting with a student GP who had just had a lecture on Lyme Disease and realised what was going on.

But by that point the Lyme Disease had taken hold.

"The sickest I have been was just over a year ago. My fatigue was so bad I would spend hours in bed and just cooking or showering would be my energy done for the day.

"The thing that was really scary was the brain fog and memory loss - that got really bad. I would be mixing up letter and numbers, I would forget my friends names I got such bad dizziness I wouldn't go out in public as I was worried I would fall over.

"That was a really scary time because that was five years on fro my tick bite and I'm thinking if this continues I won't have any independence left. The NHS couldn't do anything for me, so it was a mentally a difficult place to be in as well."

Yasmin Watling receives medication from America to help treat Lyme Disease.

Having exhausted all treatment options in the UK, Yasmin looked to America for help. For the past year her family have been paying for treatment to be sent from a clinic in Washington, which Yasmin has to administer intravenously herself nearly every day.

She said: "I am much much better but Lyme disease is still there. The hope was that a year on from treatment I'd be reaching remission and I'm not there yet which is sad and scary but I have improved so much and I am continuing to improve.

"I am back to working full time and I am able to socialise a bit. There is still so much I can't do but I focus on the positives and the things I can do."

Yasmin's father John Watling is planning to row 3000 miles across the Atlantic in what is known as "The World's Toughest Row" to raise awareness of Lyme disease.

John said: "When you are a parent of a child that has got a life-changing illness it is not a pleasant place to be, it can be a dark place so to find something that has a positive focus is important. I am very proud to do something for Yasmin and raise money for Lyme Disease UK.

"When you talk to people about Lyme Disease, some people know a lot about it because they have been touched by it but the vast majority know very little. It is important to be Lyme aware."

Ticks with Lyme Disease are found in every county in the UK.

Symptoms of Lyme Disease

Not all tick bites will lead to Lyme Disease - but it is important to be aware of the symptoms. They typically include a red rash about 15cm across at the site of the tick bite, along with flu like symptoms, including:

  • Tiredness

  • Muscle pain

  • Joint pains

  • Headaches

  • A fever

  • Chills

  • Neck stiffness

  • Paralysis of facial muscles, typically only on one side of the face

  • Nerve pains

There is more support available on the Lyme disease UK website.