Ronna Wickersham, one of the owners of Granny’s Place in Eureka Springs, usually has enough energy to work 12 to 20 hours a day. When she came down with Lyme’s disease about 18 years ago, she still managed to work in the store, but could do little else.
“I had the classic bullseye rash and extreme fatigue,” Wickersham said. “It wiped out my energy for about a year. Before I had always had more energy than I knew what to do with. I worked at the shop in the day, but then went to home to bed until I got up to go to work the next day.”
Wickersham is an advocate of natural medicine, but had learned that antibiotics must be taken very soon after the infection in order to be completely effective and, if not, you usually have to be on different antibiotics a long time. So, while the Lyme diagnosis was confirmed by testing done by a local healthcare provider, she instead turned to natural medicine. She used three different naturopathic treatments for a year and got well.
“My naturopathic doctor cured me,” Wickersham said. “He is the most amazing doctor I have ever met. He has been taking care of me for thirty-five years. He has brought me back from death several times. He is always on the leading edge of naturopathic medicine. As far as I am concerned, he is the smartest man in the country. His cures work 99.9 percent of the time.”
ham said her doctor did not want to be identified in the newspaper article for fear of reprisals from the government health agencies that have, until earlier this year, denied that Lyme disease exists in Arkansas. But she is willing to give people who have Lyme disease his contact information if they contact her.
Wickersham was recently re-infected with Lyme by another tick bite, and is currently on a new medication that is inhaled through a facemask.
“Thank God there is something out there that is effective, easy to use, and it costs only $120 to have it drop shipped to your home,” Wickersham said. “That is what I’m going to try for this round. It is a new thing that my doctor brought in from another country. Other countries are more progressive than ours for natural healing.”
Wickersham said it is ridiculous that it has taken the government so long to admit there is Lyme disease in the state. And she maintains is a total nonsense to still claim it is extremely rare in Arkansas.
“I have talked to at least thirteen people here who have contacted Lyme,” Wickersham said. “I have a friend who committed suicide because it got into her brain. It got so bad with her that she killed herself. I get so mad when I hear how the Arkansas Department of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have denied Lyme even exists here. I went to a VA doctor who said, ‘No, you don’t have Lyme disease. It is non-existent here.’ That is total crap. It is out there and it is very real.”
Contracting Lyme disease alone is scary because it is so dangerous. Wickersham said it is shocking when that is compounded by the public health authorities blocking people from getting proper treatment.
“When people get it, if they treat it quickly enough, they can knock it out before it does a whole lot of damage,” Wickersham said. “Regular doctors treat with doxycycline, but that is only effective if you are treated within 48-72 hours. If you don’t get treatment quickly enough, it lies dormant until the immune system is weak, and then it comes out and starts wreaking havoc again.”
Wickersham can be reached at (479) 253-5032.