45 Books Like Recovery from Lyme Disease

This is one of the first books I recommend to Lyme patients who email me for advice about getting better. It’s a sad fact that most people with chronic Lyme disease don’t have “just” Lyme disease. Their condition is complicated by toxic mold exposure, environmental chemicals, other infectious bacteria and viruses, and/or a highly sensitized nervous system.

Whether they’ve been diagnosed with Lyme disease or not, I think anyone with complex health problems that they just can’t resolve could benefit from reading this book.

Anxiety, depression, and other mood disorders are on the rise globally. And although this book's title specifies young people, I think Dr. Bock’s message can apply to just about anyone at any age. He presents case studies of children and teens who came to him after being on a laundry list of psych meds—with no improvement and often getting worse.

Many of these kids turn out to have thyroid problems, or low Vitamin D, or celiac, or yes, Lyme disease. And after he treats them for these underlying issues, often their supposed "psych" symptoms improve. If you or any member of your family struggles with mental health issues, I particularly recommend this book.

Fred Diamond has never had Lyme disease himself, but someone he loves has suffered with it for many years. When he began educating himself about the complexities of life with this illness, he realized there were no books focused on helping partners, family, and friends understand what their loved ones were going through. So, he wrote this one. He also started a popular podcast, Love, Hope, Lyme, which expands on many of the same themes in the book. 

If you had 16 nails sticking in the bottom of your foot, removing only one of them wouldn't fix your problem, would it? That's the question posed by Dr. Richard Horowitz, one of the top Lyme-treating doctors in the world.

In his “16-Point Differential Diagnostic Map” for evaluating chronically ill patients, he looks at many different factors that can prevent you from getting well. Lyme is a complex illness and you might not even realize there is a connection between different things you are experiencing. His book is a good reference manual for many symptoms and physical disorders.

I am recommending this book because it’s a must-read for every single person who has something in their life that needs to be recovered and healed. I became friends with Amy after finding her books and she is truly the real deal. A young woman who had end-stage Lyme disease with no more hope of surviving it, went to India for a possible life-saving stem cell treatment that had an equal chance of killing her as it did of saving her. She takes us with her through India and through her treatment. When she went through all of this, she was not yet a writer, she was just trying to save her life. Now she shares with the world everything she had to learn in order to do that. Her story is heartwarming, terrifying, hilarious, and also heartbreaking. If you or anyone you know is faced with some sort of… show more.

I love The Yoga Effect because it is based on the cutting-edge findings of NIH-funded studies at Boston University School of Medicine and shares poses and breathing techniques that are proven to help the body and mind release fear, worry, and sadness. Not dissimilar to my book, The Yoga Effect offers a customizable prescription for maintaining centeredness, confidence, and balance with short, well-rounded practices that include breath work, visualizations, and clear explanations of how yoga contributes to emotional wellness.

Dr. Offitt invented one of the most important vaccines introduced in recent years, against a common childhood illness rotavirus, that was deadly in developing countries. In this engaging and sometimes very funny book, he takes on the alternative medicine world and makes a strong case for relying on the scientific method. This is a fact-based book you can share to help people assess false claims.

What would happen if instead of throwing people into jail-like mental wards and hammering them with tranquilizing drugs, we instead welcomed them into home-like settings and spent time listening and caring, patiently giving them time and space to explore the emotional roots of their crisis? Psychiatrist Loren Mosher did just that in the Soteria House research project in the 1970s and 80s, and the results were clear: people do better without medications and with listening and caring in a safe environment instead.

Mosher was the first chief of the Center for Studies of Schizophrenia of the National Institutes of Mental Health but you’ve probably never heard of him – his innovative project proved that psychosis can be healed more effectively without medication and outside of  hospitals, but came at a time when biological and pharmaceutical solutions – and the profits they generate – came to dominate psychiatry, so he was… show more.

My biggest problem with old-school PTSD books is that they are uni-dimensional and focus on a single big trauma. However, both as a therapist and just as a human, I understand that trauma is a multi-dimensional experience. There are different sizes and impacts, and it lasts from inter-generational trauma to systemic, ongoing trauma to inter-group and familial, as well as personal and current trauma. I’m on a big reading kick for Complex PTSD resources.

There’s also a dearth of culturally integrated and informed mental health books. Natalie’s book is fantastic because she has the knowledge and experience as a licensed mental health professional and the roots and wisdom of how to use reflection, narratives, and ceremony to de-program shame, imposter phenomenon, and all the baggage that weighs down historically marginalized readers. There’s a damn good reason Natalie has thousands of Instagram followers- she is relatable, bold, wise, and a kind… show more.

If you have a child who suffers from OCD, this is the only book you really need. Dr. Chansky is one of the nation’s experts in pediatric OCD, and this book is the most informative and practical book I have read on the subject. This book with help you understand OCD (how it presents, what causes it) and how to help your child overcome this disorder.