Shania Twain Reveals Past Battle With Lyme Disease Amid Painful Divorce

Music icon, Shania Twain has spoken about the hard time she went through as she battled the symptoms of Lyme disease.

The singer came into the limelight with her second studio album, The Woman in Me (1995). It generated eight hits, including "Any Man of Mine," sold over 20 million copies globally, and brought Twain a Grammy Award.

After releasing her "Greatest Hits" album in 2004, which featured three new tracks, including "Party for Two," Twain went on sabbatical, subsequently disclosing that Lyme disease and dysphonia diagnoses had left her voice significantly impaired.

In a new documentary, Twain has now shared more details about the ordeal, her journey to recovery, and her divorce from her then-husband Robert "Mutt" Lange.

Twain shared her struggle with Lyme Disease in her new Netflix documentary, "Not Just a Girl," which debuted on July 26. She described experiencing several "scary symptoms" such as having blackout during her live shows.

"Before I was diagnosed, I was on stage very dizzy," she said in the documentary. "I was losing my balance, I was afraid I was gonna fall off the stage."

She continued, "I was having these very, very, very millisecond blackouts, but regularly, every minute or every 30 seconds."

The bacteria Borrelia burgdorferi, transmitted by the bite of an infected tick, is said to be the cause of Lyme disease, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The illness' many and peculiar side effects are brought to light by Twain's battle with it.

The "You're Still The One" hitmaker confirmed in the documentary that she was bit by a tick while horseback riding back in 2003. However, she could not have guessed that the bite would degenerate into a more complex situation

The chronic illness also caused the singer to develop dysphonia, temporarily losing her voice. Her ability to perform at her best was in doubt, forcing the country-pop queen to take a hiatus from the music scene.

With the issue clearly getting out of hand, Twain would visit several specialists for many years but failed to find a solution not until a doctor finally discovered that the nerves of her vocal cords had been directly damaged by Lyme disease.

"My voice was never the same again," she recounted the painful period. "I thought I'd lost my voice forever. I thought that was it, I would never, ever sing again."

Twain endured many throat operations to repair the damage, which nearly prohibited her from performing again.

Just when she thought this could not get worse, Twain learned that her husband of 15 years, Lange, was cheating on her with her friend and personal assistant, Marie-Anne Thiébaud. The ordeal deeply broke her heart, causing the singer emotional pain in addition to her physical woes.

"In that search to determine what was causing this lack of control with my voice and this change in my voice, I was facing a divorce. My husband leaves me for another woman," Twain said in the doc, adding that she was moved to call it quits on her music career.

After learning of the affair, Twain, who had one son, Eja, with Lange, filed for divorce. On June 9, 2010, their divorce was legally completed. In an odd turn of events, the singer would later date Marie-former Anne's husband, Swiss Nestlé executive Frédéric Thiébaud. On January 1, 2011, the pair tied the knot in Rincón, Puerto Rico.

A year after her marriage, Twain released her first single in seven years, having rediscovered her voice following the throat surgery that promoted her hiatus from the music scene. In 2017, she debuted her fifth studio album, "Now."

Twain's enthusiasm for the acting business has increased since the project's release. She played Terri in the Erwin brothers' Christian love drama "I Still Believe" and Becca in the 2019 sports action movie "Trading Paint." She provided the narration for the Canadian documentary "Anne Murray: Full Circle" in 2021.

Twain will perform alongside Canadian female music icons Lindsay Ell and Robyn Ottolini at this year's Boots and Hearts festival (August 4-7). On August 24 in Nashville, she will also be given the ACM Poet's Award for her remarkable and sustained musical and lyrical accomplishments throughout her career.