Martha Edmister is a multi-talented 47-year-old artist, entrepreneur, and mental health coach from Baltimore Maryland. Her health journey began after suffering a childhood tick bite, 2 years before Borrelia Burgdorferi was identified as the bacterial cause of Lyme.

Shortly after her childhood tick bite, she developed health issues that were followed for 14 months by the head of endocrinology at DC’s Children’s Hospital. For the next 40 years she battled mental and physical illnesses resulting in multiple hospitalizations.

Prior to securing a Lyme Disease diagnosis, she was medicated for serious mental illness and her physical symptoms digressed to a point where she lost her vision, lost the ability to work, and suffered incontinence.

At the age of 41, Ms. Edmister tested CDC positive for Lyme Disease by a doctor utilizing the two-tier Elisa/Western blot tests. The positive diagnosis liberated her from years of mental health medication and launched a healing journey. Her diverse treatment protocols included two trips to the German Klinik St. George and the Dean Center for Tick Borne Illness at Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital.

On August 24, 2021, Ms. Edmister officially joined the ranks of nationally recognized Lyme disease activists by testifying before the Federal Tick-Borne Disease Working Group.

If you would like to learn more about how Lyme disease taught an artist and activist the importance of pivoting in life and Lyme, then tune in now!