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Today's Featured Biography
Kathryn (Kathy) Hunt Stephens
After graduation, I worked at various secretarial jobs in downtown Detroit. I was raised very strictly, so I went wild at all the fun in downtown in the early sixties. I was married from 1966 to 1972. After divorce, I moved to El Paso, where friends lived. I couldn't earn a good living there, so joined the Army. If you remember me as a 98 lb tiny little thing, I still was...but they took me in as a secretary and I was at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in DC where I was promoted many times in 2 years, and I evenually got an Meritorius Service Medal. I also took training at Ft Sam Houston, here in San Antonio, TX, as a medical records technician, where I was promoted for being in top of class.
I loved San Antonio, and at end of 3 years, I was offered a unique position at Brooks AFB, where a tri-service (Army, Air Force and Navy)
cancer database center was set up. I became the NCO of the records section there, and when it shut down two years later, I was sent to Ft Sam Houston to run the out-processing medical station there.
Mind you, I was 98 lbs in basic; when only me and a fellow trainee went over the 6 ft wall and no one else could, the drill sargent's rallying cry from then on became "If Stephens can do it, anyone can!" I was also 33.5 yrs old when I joined the Army, so my maturity also helped me deal with superior and fellow recruits alike, and I loved it!
I got very sick in 1979, and had a pre-cancerous condition, for which I had surgery, but I was medically discharged in June 1980 after 5.5 wonderful years.
Within two months, I was the Manager of a Medical Clinic in progress of growing. It became large, with 11 doctors and 29 personnel which I supervised. I also kept all the Accounts Payable books. It was a great job, but in 1985 I quit and used my VA benefits to begin COLLEGE at age 45! Again, my age was a benefit at Our Lady of the Lake University, where I was in a Social Work degree plan.
After two years, I got a serious viral illness that totally incapicated me for 5 months. I had to quit school when I never recovered to the healthy person I had been. I was diagnosed with Myalgic Encephalomyelitis, and was dismayed to hear it degraded to a stupid name, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, which the CDC added to its "Emerging Infectious Diseases" list in 1986 or so.
Now I am an activist, co-leader of a support group to help others learn how to live with this illness which is very much like multiple sclerosis in the way it becomes neurological and damages the way your brain operates your body.
I am 64 now, with two grandkids, 8 and 17...the 17 y.o. also got ME/CFS 2 years ago, and is home tutored as she is bed-bound 12-16 hours a day. She lives in Michigan, with my youngest daugher, Donna, who is graduating this Dec. from U of M (Dearborn) with an accounting degree.
My other grandson, "Motor-Mouth" is almost 8, and lots of fun!. He and I have a great time in the pool we have here at my house, and playing video games and Monopoly, which he loves. My daugter had him unexpectedly, at age 33, after years of trying a gave up. He has changed their lives in such a beautiful way...they say they never knew how "lonely" they were until he was born! Of course, he's overprotected and Mommy's darling, and once in a while needs Grandma's firm hand in teaching him things.
I hope more people sign up, especially from the JANUARY 1959 CLASS which seems to be the "forgotten 52". Why??? Reunions.com has a few people registered, but where is everyone else? Our 50th reunion is coming up in 4 years, and I'd love to see everyone from my class.
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