In December of 2019 I was prescribed Ciprofloxacin for a suspected UTI. (Our FDA advices that this is the inappropriate usage of this antibiotic- as they have said they should be reserved as a last resort drug due to their potential permanent disabling abilities.) In the following months after taking Cipro, I started to experience cognitive changes that eventually escalated beyond what I knew was normal. I was told my blood work looked fine by my doctors and that I was “just stressed”. At the time I had no idea that these were reported adverse effect symptoms. Over the course of months my symptoms started to worsen into neuropathy and neurological symptoms. I continually saw doctors throughout the progression of these new onsetting symptoms occurring with still minimal acknowledgement of my concerns. It wasn’t until several months later of my symptom progression that I lost my ability to physically walk, use my arms normally, or care for myself at all. I became disabled and bedridden with widespread muscle atrophy, neuropathy, nerve damage, tendon pain, and a long list of symptoms associated with what is Fluoroquinolone Toxicity. This left me in a severely physically weakened state requiring 24/7 care for a year. I stayed bedridden still searching for answers the year of 2021 while only slowly declining more over time. I had been living a holistic and health-wellness lifestyle for well over 10 years previously, and was an active weightlifter for over 8 and this has been the hardest adjustment of my life. I saw numerous physicians (over a dozen) as well as naturopaths, holistic doctors, specialists, a Lyme disease specialist, and more. I was misdiagnosed with Lyme disease (a common misdiagnosis for FQT) based off my symptoms when the other doctors I saw could not come up with a diagnosis for the sudden state of my health. I had mentioned to several of them that I had taken Ciprofloxacin and voiced my concerns over it, but I was told it was likely not causing what I was going through, despite its multiple black box warnings. This left me terrified that I must have some extremely rare and hard to diagnosis terminal disease then. It wasn’t until I discovered someone sharing their own “floxed” journey online of their same experience after taking this antibiotic that ultimately saved my life and lead me in the direction I needed to go. With this discovery, after a year of being bedbound, my husband laid me down in the back seat of a vehicle and drove us out to California where I received treatment from a fluoroquinolone toxicity specialist who decades his career and practice to helping those affected by this drug. I got properly educated on Fluoroquinolone Toxicity and what I had been experiencing in this time. I met numerous other patients in office receiving treatment for their same experience and since then I’ve been on a journey to try to heal from this. But it has been an incredibly challenging journey as my health and life hasn’t looked the same since and I am still left with a multitude of symptoms that limits my physical capabilities daily. In this time I have joined a larger community of those of us affected that I otherwise would of had no idea existed, voiced my story online endlessly to spread awareness and advocate against improper FQ use, and realized how my experience is not unique to me discovering many others going through this, while I continually try to pursue healing.