Shania Twain Details 20-Year Battle With Lyme Disease That Led to Blackouts on Stage

glamour.com:

Not Just a Girl, Shania Twain opens up about two of the most difficult moments in her life—contracting and the dissolution of her marriage to her longtime producer and songwriting partner, Robert "Mutt" Lange.After releasing and the album Come on Over, which would go on to become the best-selling album of all time by a female solo artist, Twain was getting ready to go on tour in 2003 when she went for a horseback ride that changed the entire trajectory of her career. “The tick was infected with Lyme disease, and I did get Lyme disease,” she said. “My symptoms were quite scary because before I was diagnosed, I was on stage very dizzy.

I was losing my balance, I was afraid I was gonna fall off the stage… I was having these very, very, very millisecond blackouts, but regularly, every minute or every 30 seconds.” The illness also took a toll on her singing voice resulting in her inability to control her vocals.

The country star explained, “My voice was never the same again. I thought I'd lost my voice forever. I thought that was it, [and] I would never, ever sing again.”And it wasn't just the potential end of her career that Shania Twain was facing in that moment, but also the end of her marriage to Lange.

She and the rock producer had a professional relationship before marrying in 1993. They also had one son together named Aja.