Advisory Committee Member: Debbie Parrett

from Debbie

My motivating events which evolved a passion for wellness were my personal affliction with a recurring and at times, debilitating case of Lyme disease, acquired in 1989. The other event was witnessing the gradual and painful decline of my parents during the last years of their lives here at St. Leonard. I never wanted again to witness suffering of a loved one or experience it myself.

As a result of my experiences, I became a strong advocate for healthcare information on the internet, which opens up real possibilities for people that had not been accessible beyond mainstream, peer-reviewed literature. It was my discovery of an online Lyme disease support group in 1995 where I met people who led me to information that allowed me to become fully functional today.

Healthcare advocacy has become a lifelong mission that began when I headed the Lyme Disease Association of Ohio, which involved patient and professional education, political lobbying and publishing of my editorial on the present state of Western medicine in the New York Times in 2000.

Although my activism had been low-key during my parents final years and as my children have grown up, it continues through acting as a wellness role model in whatever ways I can. My motto has become “It’s not the days left in my life that are important, but rather them life in my days that matter most.”