By Esther Lauaki
Art has been a lifelong passion for Melissa Pym – and she’s hoping her art will help her healing journey.
She was diagnosed in 2014 with lyme disease, an infection that started with a tick bite, but had suffered chronic seizures, debilitating pain in her hips and legs, convulsions and migraines for more than a decade.
Ms Pym, a former fire dancer and circus entertainer, said she had exhausted all her treatment options in Australia and had been fundraising so she could travel from her Kurunjang home to the St Georg Klinik in Germany to receive potentially life-saving medicine and therapies.
Some of her pieces will be showcased at Melton’s Shamanic Rain Natural Living cafe.
Sales of the works, including sculptures, drawings, paintings, prints, crystal dreamcatchers and jewellery, will go towards the $72,000 she needs to cover her medical and travel expenses.
“I’ve been into art my whole life,” Ms Pym said. “But there have been years where I’ve been bed-ridden and I haven’t been able to sit up vertically so I haven’t been able to pursue my art. It just depends on what parts of my body decide to work – my struggle is day to day, week to week and month to month.”
She said her disability pension helped her to make ends meet, but money made from her art could change her life.
An online crowdfunding campaign has raised more than $5000 towards the cause.
Donate: gofundme.com/savemel
