7 minute read
Bug bite sickness turns into
FROM SICK TO STAR
MEDIA HOW LYME DISEASE GAVE SEAN GURNSEY A VOICE
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CHLOE CHAPDELAINE cchapdelaine@cjournal.ca
After After getting bit by ticks and physically carry him to the car and then developing a myriad of strange actually drive him home, and then carry symptoms that resulted in him him from his car to his room so he could lie losing his livelihood, Sean Gurnsey was down and try to just wait out the cramps diagnosed with Lyme disease. Despite and just wait out the locking of muscles,” how difficult it was to get that diagnosis, he says. Gurnsey eventually received treatment Gurnsey’s symptoms also affected his and found a new path for his life as a voice brain. He developed brain fog, which made actor. it difficult to remember things like names,
It all started after he returned home in places, and at times he would forget where 2012 from a paintballing trip to Oklahoma he was. where Gurnsey had unknowingly “It really diminished how I was able to contracted some ticks. do any of the work that was put in front of
“I picked them off and really didn’t think me physically, and then the mental work too much of it,” he says. was really being diminished too because
However, over the next two weeks, he my brain capacity wasn’t there anymore,” started developing symptoms, starting Gurnsey says. with a bumpy rash. Ultimately, the symptoms impacted
“It looked like bugbites really, which I more than just his body. Despite previously assumed it was, and they were there for being happy as a program director at Joe’s probably two weeks and then disappeared. Place, a youth centre in Moosejaw, he was I didn’t think anything of it, and then a forced to give up his job in January 2017. few months later, I started getting really “I watched my resume get stripped fatigued.” line by line. I looked at everything that
Gurnsey’s I thought I symptoms got could do, and worse with time. really none of it He developed headaches and “I watched my resume get was applicable anymore.” fatigue, which progressed to stripped line by line.” Adam was by his side during the point where his changes, and doctors were adds, “To see him investigating whether he had > Sean Gursney go from being this active guy who a stroke or brain just connected tumour. with the youth at
However, the the youth center symptoms suddenly stopped on their own. to days where he couldn’t walk, he couldn’t Gurnsey continued life as normal, until a move, he couldn‘t hardly think, your heart year later when they returned. goes out to him and it just hurts to watch
Dr. Rebecca Risk, a doctor of chinese him.” medicine who also has Lyme disease, “I was wondering if I was going to even says this isn’t uncommon for someone in survive 2017,” says Gurnsey. Gurnsey’s position. Amidst his myriad of bizarre symptoms,
“It could turn into a relapse down the Gurnsey refused to give up hope and was road, it could be caused by stress, or just determined to find out what was wrong be coming out on its own and for some with him. people that doesn’t happen and some “I went and got checked out again, and people it does,” says Risk, who is also a they didn’t really know what it was, they registered acupuncturist and supplement were looking all over the place,” he says, consultant who has clients with Lyme after receiving various testing like MRIs and disease. CT scans.
When Gurnsey relapsed, his symptoms After realizing that the tick bites could were much more intense. be the culprit for why he was having
“My face, my eyebrows, and my lips symptoms, Gurnsey conducted his own were kind of like sagging and drooping research on Lyme and was finally given on my left side like a palsy,” he says. This a diagnosis after getting in touch with a progressed to the point that he needed to doctor through the Canadian Lyme Disease walk with a cane, and on bad days would Foundation. However, it didn‘t come end up in a wheelchair or not able to move without challenges. at all. “It was hard to find treatment because
“On some days it would be like I was so few doctors knew anything about Lyme. fairly normal and then halfway through the My own doctor had said they ‘skimmed day, I would fall apart.” over it’ in med school,” says Gurnsey.
Jesse Adam is one of Gurnsey’s friends “My GP was willing to refer me, but the and was there to witness these changes. infectious disease doctors didn‘t want to
“There came points when we’d have to accept the Lyme diagnosis.”
Gurnesy underwent various forms of treatment, including IV injections, in order
to help his Lyme Disease symptoms. PHOTO: COURTESY OF SEAN GURNSEY
> Julianna Lantz
It was after returning home from a paintballing trip in Oklahoma that Gurnsey first realized he had been bitten
by ticks. Although they were picked off, he still contracted Lyme disease. PHOTO: COURTESY OF SEAN GURNSEY
According to Risk, this is something she’s experienced during her own battle with Lyme disease.
“Doctors don’t look at this as a possibility for the weird symptoms you’re having. And in my case, and in a lot of other cases, you actually get labelled as having anxiety or as crazy,” Risk adds.
Risk puts part of the blame for the situation on the public healthcare system for not actively sharing updated information on Lyme with doctors.
For example, in June 2020, Alberta Precision Laboratories informed health professionals that a small number of ticks infected with Lyme causing bacteria were collected off dogs through an on-going passive surveillance program across Alberta, yet the Government of Canada did not update their website to reflect this.
“It’s really hard for somebody who’s sick to be treated that way, and I think we need to start educating not only the doctors, but higher up. ”
In addition, in a province such as Alberta where most ticks don’t have Lyme disease, Risks says finding treatment centres and doctors educated about the infection can be difficult.
However, Gurnsey was able to look outside of his province and finally receive help. After getting in touch with Dr. Ernie Murakami, a big name in the Lyme world, he was able to track down a doctor for treatment in Calgary.
“Interprovincial care was a bit of a gong show process,” he says. “I ended up doing a variety of antibiotic treatments, as well as weekly IV injections through a naturopath.”
Because of this process and his inability to work, Gurnsey and his family were struggling financially.
This is when Adam, who was a voice actor, suggested the idea of voice acting.
“He said, “You need to try and do this, even if you’re in a wheelchair and having a rough day, if you can read, then you can audition. And who knows, maybe this’ll turn into something for you,”” says Gurnsey.
Gurnsey took that advice and built a studio in his basement to work from.
“I got onto voices.com, it was probably only a month in, and I had already landed my first job. It was an amazing turnaround and it all came out of not being able to do anything,” he says.
Within a month, he was able to land his first jobs, with one of them being a voice for Nintendo. This job made up for his lack of income in the last year. From there, his profile expanded to working with clients like Budweiser, Marvel, video game companies, children’s toy characters, and more.
“These are all these bucket list items that I never knew I had,” says Gurnsey. “Oh my goodness, I have been exceptionally lucky to have been able to work with some of the companies that I worked with.”
Julianna Lantz is also a voice actor on voices.com, and commends his ability to make the most out of a difficult situation.
“He did a great job embodying all the things you need to do to be a freelancer and also as a voiceover artist,” she says. “What makes his story so unique is his ability to triumph over something that he could have let take his life.”
As Gursey’s voice acting career took off, his health improved alongside it, and now he is able to do the things he once wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to.
“I‘ve been able to get back out hunting, and hiking, hanging out with youth as youth pastor, and even been able to work on building our family a house! Hard to believe only a few years ago it was a huge victory to walk with the aid of a cane to the bridge by our house and back,” he says.
Gurnsey has not had any relapses since, and hopes things stay that way.
“With every day that I am able to do something, there is also a gratitude that comes with it,” he says.
