This is probably the most important piece of advice here.
There is (I believe) only one type of tick that carries the disease, the deer tick. They are very, very small as compared to other common ticks (dog ticks). We are talking "pin head" small with these.
If you pulled off one bigger than that, like a pencil eraser size, then you will likely be ok. Apparently from what I was told, you can have an allergic reaction to the tick bite. This is what they eventually came up with for my final diagnosis.
Like was stated before, better safe than sorry.