Together We Can!
Hi everyone,
I am Tamra Kinzel-Wood but prefer Tami. I live in a small picturesque mountain town in Oregon of less than 10,000. For those who do not know me yet, this is my standard introduction. I started school (this time) in 2004. I am little intense at times. I have had some extreme situations in my life that gave me a perspective only profound experiences can. I was raised very differently than was conventional since my mother had mental health issues and was everything from a drug dealer to a preacher while I was growing up. We moved 13 times my first year in high school, well; partial year, I quit after high school number four. We were raised in/on the system so have an intimate knowledge of the trials clients face and the difficult economy has not made it better.
Mom could go from Madame to Methodist in 3.5 seconds; biker babe to bubbling babette in the same conversation was nothing to her. It was not her choice or fault but because I did not know normalcy from infancy it taught me to deal well with extremes, evaluate a situation and adapt quickly. It also taught me what it was like to act like the epitome of both respectability and wild hijinks. It taught me what it was like to be "everyman" or "anyman" because I had to be. Each new town I became a new me. What it did not teach me was how to find out who I was or that it was okay to be who/what I was if I could discover it. I could fit in but had no clue what it was like to be who you really were because I was not one but a hypothetical many. It made it very difficult to adjust to stability and building a life based on problem solving skill sets as I grew up.
I felt like I was nothing with no chance to become anything. It was recommended I take counseling to deal with my issues from childhood. I was diagnosed with OCD and a litany of other disorders/syndromes and mental health issues. I later found they together were symptoms of Asperger’s Syndrome. I moved up north and was diagnosed with relapsing/remitting MS. I had a heart attack. I was in a wheelchair and miserable. I felt unable to participate in life. Meanwhile, I had begun to learn about Stephen Hawkings and Howard Hughes. I started listening to Rush Limbaugh and others. I harnessed the many deciding to turn my life to useful pursuits because I wanted to be a success and get off disability. After all, if they could accomplish with the problems they had so could I. I started to get better, tried to get a job but it did not pan out . Then I began school again. I went to vo-tech but did nothing with the certificates for years. At BMCC, I applied myself and began to excel. I was exercising and doing my own physical therapy. I had progressed to a cane. I went from 503 pounds to 264. I had transferred my OCD symptoms to schoolwork and was attempting to use them as a tool. I was on track to get better and pay my own way. Then, I found out I had metastatic throat cancer and had to reconcile all of those people I had been and was learning to corral into good purpose with what they/I had done before I started trying to change and the idea that I might have to answer for it before I was able to completely able to make up for it in my eyes. I could not do that if I did not understand so I was off and running yet again. After all, I might not have much time left. I was "being" all of those people reconciling/making account of themselves. I was feeling all of the feelings each of those very different people had to feel to assess who and what they were and what that meant to me as it related to the one body that may be dying. I even studied death and dying as a subject in a couple of classes. I had the person I wanted to help me pass chosen. Then, I found out I was being given a reprieve. After chemo and radiation, I was cancer free. Moreover, I did not deserve it! I had to reevaluate again. Why was I allowed to live when the 9 year old in the bed next to me in the chemo suite with leukemia who had not had time to make the mistakes I had, learn the lessons I had or DESERVE death like I had died. What had I done or could I do to deserve this chance?
Seeing life and death from the inside as I have makes so many problems seem both smaller and larger than they first appear that it can get difficult not to let it affect my view of my studies and how I believe those studies can affect the world. I am now 5 years cancer free but it changed how I saw everything from family, friends, and god, to school and what a career should do for you and the others you affect. I finally realized that it was important I actually tell people how all of the experiences shaped and changed my views because few had been there and most of the ones who had do not have a voice. Who I was then, how I had changed, what I had learned and what I thought others could do with it could be synthesized, analyzed, and used to teach lessons to others and myself. I could work hard to overcome again then tell my story and give others like me a voice and hope of a better life. I could show others besides my family it could be done. I could make a difference!
Cancer and the subsequent life evaluation has been one of the greatest blessings of my life. It taught me I knew nothing. It made me reevaluate everything. It taught me I had determination. It taught me understanding of renewal and that you can burn off the old replacing it with new growth. It taught me I could fight for what I wanted and that what I wanted did not matter. It taught me to want the things that did more deeply. I learned I did not just want to continue on getting good enough to make my own way and show everyone I could do it. I wanted to do something to make a difference and the only difference that really mattered was my contribution to others and the world.
I gained a triple concentration B.S. I earned my Master’s. I am now a DBA. student. I am addicted to school and success. I want to spread that feeling about. In that vein, I continue to volunteer tutor locally and bring others to the idea that they can be as successful as I am having convinced nine others to enroll in the school of their choice while heading a mentorship program called Together We Can to help bring about life changes through education and freedom of choice! I hope to incorporate some of that research into my thesis if possible.
This school journey started out about money and the ability to get out of my life situation by making the money I needed to support myself and proving to what family I had left we could break the cycle becoming contributing members of society. It was about convincing my sisters, sons and grandchildren that they could build on that success because if I had broken the cycle they could too but now I want to find a way to enable everyone to bring their talents and education, money or lack thereof to help solve the world's problems and to enable everyone they know to understand that they are an important contributing members of a problem solving team called humanity. We all have problems and solutions we deal with or implement both large and small. I want to help people truly know and understand together we can fix any problem we set ourselves to if we keep trying, helping each other, working towards solutions, and be patient with each other when we have to try again. I want them to know we truly can make the world the best it can be. But I need your help, I have two classes and two residencies to complete this journey. I also need a of equipment to do my research…a camera that also takes video with 12 megapixels minimum to record my research interviews because they require the video and audio of the interviews used for the qualitative research portion of my research paper.
I cannot wait to see what the future holds. I wish all of you the same happiness, love of life and learning I have discovered. I cannot wait to hear all what you have to say! Here is to lots of fabulously fun learning how experiences relate to what knowledge I have gained once I complete this last push. Wish me luck finishing this journey, and if I can help you just let me know. Together We Can!
Tami
I am Tamra Kinzel-Wood but prefer Tami. I live in a small picturesque mountain town in Oregon of less than 10,000. For those who do not know me yet, this is my standard introduction. I started school (this time) in 2004. I am little intense at times. I have had some extreme situations in my life that gave me a perspective only profound experiences can. I was raised very differently than was conventional since my mother had mental health issues and was everything from a drug dealer to a preacher while I was growing up. We moved 13 times my first year in high school, well; partial year, I quit after high school number four. We were raised in/on the system so have an intimate knowledge of the trials clients face and the difficult economy has not made it better.
Mom could go from Madame to Methodist in 3.5 seconds; biker babe to bubbling babette in the same conversation was nothing to her. It was not her choice or fault but because I did not know normalcy from infancy it taught me to deal well with extremes, evaluate a situation and adapt quickly. It also taught me what it was like to act like the epitome of both respectability and wild hijinks. It taught me what it was like to be "everyman" or "anyman" because I had to be. Each new town I became a new me. What it did not teach me was how to find out who I was or that it was okay to be who/what I was if I could discover it. I could fit in but had no clue what it was like to be who you really were because I was not one but a hypothetical many. It made it very difficult to adjust to stability and building a life based on problem solving skill sets as I grew up.
I felt like I was nothing with no chance to become anything. It was recommended I take counseling to deal with my issues from childhood. I was diagnosed with OCD and a litany of other disorders/syndromes and mental health issues. I later found they together were symptoms of Asperger’s Syndrome. I moved up north and was diagnosed with relapsing/remitting MS. I had a heart attack. I was in a wheelchair and miserable. I felt unable to participate in life. Meanwhile, I had begun to learn about Stephen Hawkings and Howard Hughes. I started listening to Rush Limbaugh and others. I harnessed the many deciding to turn my life to useful pursuits because I wanted to be a success and get off disability. After all, if they could accomplish with the problems they had so could I. I started to get better, tried to get a job but it did not pan out . Then I began school again. I went to vo-tech but did nothing with the certificates for years. At BMCC, I applied myself and began to excel. I was exercising and doing my own physical therapy. I had progressed to a cane. I went from 503 pounds to 264. I had transferred my OCD symptoms to schoolwork and was attempting to use them as a tool. I was on track to get better and pay my own way. Then, I found out I had metastatic throat cancer and had to reconcile all of those people I had been and was learning to corral into good purpose with what they/I had done before I started trying to change and the idea that I might have to answer for it before I was able to completely able to make up for it in my eyes. I could not do that if I did not understand so I was off and running yet again. After all, I might not have much time left. I was "being" all of those people reconciling/making account of themselves. I was feeling all of the feelings each of those very different people had to feel to assess who and what they were and what that meant to me as it related to the one body that may be dying. I even studied death and dying as a subject in a couple of classes. I had the person I wanted to help me pass chosen. Then, I found out I was being given a reprieve. After chemo and radiation, I was cancer free. Moreover, I did not deserve it! I had to reevaluate again. Why was I allowed to live when the 9 year old in the bed next to me in the chemo suite with leukemia who had not had time to make the mistakes I had, learn the lessons I had or DESERVE death like I had died. What had I done or could I do to deserve this chance?
Seeing life and death from the inside as I have makes so many problems seem both smaller and larger than they first appear that it can get difficult not to let it affect my view of my studies and how I believe those studies can affect the world. I am now 5 years cancer free but it changed how I saw everything from family, friends, and god, to school and what a career should do for you and the others you affect. I finally realized that it was important I actually tell people how all of the experiences shaped and changed my views because few had been there and most of the ones who had do not have a voice. Who I was then, how I had changed, what I had learned and what I thought others could do with it could be synthesized, analyzed, and used to teach lessons to others and myself. I could work hard to overcome again then tell my story and give others like me a voice and hope of a better life. I could show others besides my family it could be done. I could make a difference!
Cancer and the subsequent life evaluation has been one of the greatest blessings of my life. It taught me I knew nothing. It made me reevaluate everything. It taught me I had determination. It taught me understanding of renewal and that you can burn off the old replacing it with new growth. It taught me I could fight for what I wanted and that what I wanted did not matter. It taught me to want the things that did more deeply. I learned I did not just want to continue on getting good enough to make my own way and show everyone I could do it. I wanted to do something to make a difference and the only difference that really mattered was my contribution to others and the world.
I gained a triple concentration B.S. I earned my Master’s. I am now a DBA. student. I am addicted to school and success. I want to spread that feeling about. In that vein, I continue to volunteer tutor locally and bring others to the idea that they can be as successful as I am having convinced nine others to enroll in the school of their choice while heading a mentorship program called Together We Can to help bring about life changes through education and freedom of choice! I hope to incorporate some of that research into my thesis if possible.
This school journey started out about money and the ability to get out of my life situation by making the money I needed to support myself and proving to what family I had left we could break the cycle becoming contributing members of society. It was about convincing my sisters, sons and grandchildren that they could build on that success because if I had broken the cycle they could too but now I want to find a way to enable everyone to bring their talents and education, money or lack thereof to help solve the world's problems and to enable everyone they know to understand that they are an important contributing members of a problem solving team called humanity. We all have problems and solutions we deal with or implement both large and small. I want to help people truly know and understand together we can fix any problem we set ourselves to if we keep trying, helping each other, working towards solutions, and be patient with each other when we have to try again. I want them to know we truly can make the world the best it can be. But I need your help, I have two classes and two residencies to complete this journey. I also need a of equipment to do my research…a camera that also takes video with 12 megapixels minimum to record my research interviews because they require the video and audio of the interviews used for the qualitative research portion of my research paper.
I cannot wait to see what the future holds. I wish all of you the same happiness, love of life and learning I have discovered. I cannot wait to hear all what you have to say! Here is to lots of fabulously fun learning how experiences relate to what knowledge I have gained once I complete this last push. Wish me luck finishing this journey, and if I can help you just let me know. Together We Can!
Tami
Organizer
Tamra Kinzel-Wood
Organizer
Baker City, OR