Who is Kathy Nicholls

Life, of course, started as a daughter. I was fortunate to have been born to a very strong woman. My mother divorced when I was six weeks old, and for almost the first three years of my life, she raised me with the help of her parents. When I was about four years old, my mother became almost totally deaf. That created some challenges for her in maneuvering in a hearing world, but it is one she accomplished with a lot of success.

My mother was a great teacher. She taught me to be strong and independent. Never one to rely on others for her own success in life, she returned to college when she was 40 years old, and deaf, and still made it through with almost a straight A average. I was a proud daughter the day she graduated.

I wish I could say that all of my time with my mother was a strong wonderful relationship, but that was not always the case. We had the normal mother-daughter conflicts along the way. I think daughters always strive to figure out the conflict of independence from their mother and at the same time seek their approval. That was our relationship. Like many daughters, I was also determined, in my younger years, to NOT be my mother. I wanted the strong, independent part of her, but I didn't want the "wait on a man" part of her that was so typical of those in her generation. I wanted to be the strong woman of faith, without the overbearing part of "religion." Most of all, I wanted her to be proud of me.

I remember being at the hospital with her once, where she was having surgery and we are all afraid she might not make it. Of course, nobody was saying that, we all just held in our emotions and didn't talk about it (that was pretty typical in my family). Her minister's wife came, a young woman who was quite close to her and sat at her bedside and sobbed about how she wasn't ready to lose her. I thought, Finally! Someone is talking about this. When she left, I remember trying to talk to my mother about this. Her response: You just need to turn it all over to God and it will be fine. I was pretty crushed, wanting to be able to share that with her. A couple of years later. we had the opportunity to talk about that time. She told me she just needed me to be the strong one that day and couldn't allow me to fall apart. She knew that my strength would let her handle what she was going through. Somehow, that day, that made it all okay.

My mother passed away in 2006. That was probably the hardest thing I have had to go through so far in life. I miss her terribly and often wish she could see what my life has done since she left us. Yet, somehow, I believe she knows. I was given my baby book when she died. In it, when I was just two years old, she wrote "Kathy is a very precocious child and I hope I can do right with that." If you still have your mom around, call her, go see her, hug her, and never miss the opportunity to say you love her.

So there you have it, an independent child, who was precocious!

My maternal grandmother has always been my best friend, from the time I was quite small. She took care of me as a baby while my mother worked and she and I developed a very strong bond. In fact, I was very close to my grandfather as well. I was also their first grandchild, and the only girl, so that gave me a bit of a special place.

Throughout the years, Gram has always been the one I turned to when seeking advise. I don't know that we see that much in the United States, but having lived two years in Barbados, I saw great examples of how grandparents influence the lives of their grandchildren. Mine were no different. This picture is one she and I had taken together years ago.

My grandmother instilled the belief in me that I can do anything I want to do, no matter how lofty. She simply always believes in me. I am blessed with that as I believe every child needs that person in their lives who always believes in them and accepts them. She hasn't always approved of everything I did, but her love and support has always been unconditional. I have always joked that she could find me standing beside a dead body with a smoking gun in my hand and would still say I didn't do it! :)

My grandmother taught me about unconditional love. She instilled a sense of self-esteem in me and I learned to believe in myself. I am fortunate to still have her in my life. Today, in 2010, she is 95 years old and still managing to get around, although with a walker and oxygen. She was at my house for Christmas and said "You know, I am so proud of you. I just wanted you to know that." When I told her that I was also now unemployed due to a recent layoff, her response was typical Gram: "Well, so what. You can do whatever you want and you WILL."

When I married last year, she wanted so much to be there, but the trip to Barbados was just too long for her. Now that I am back in the States, she has, in her usual Gram fashion, fallen in love with my husband. She is just accepting of people where they are, something I hope I can always be as well.

I cherish the time we have together as I know one day I won't have it. For now, we simply make every day count.

I am a mom, to a furry child. I call Turbo my 80-pound lapdog because he's just that. To others, he is a big dog, a Chow/Golden Retriever mix. To me, he's just "mom's baby."

Turbo came to my life through a rescue mission. I highly recommend picking your animals from a rescue place and not a pet store. It is so rewarding to be able to provide a forever home to an animal. I happen to be a dog lover because I believe they give you unconditional love. They never expect you to change. It doesn't matter how long you are gone, a dog is always glad to see you come home. Turbo always greets me with excitement, kisses, and a wagging tail. You can read more about Turbo, and follow him on Twitter, on my Lessons from my Dog lens.

Well, actually I've been a wife twice now in my life. My first marriage ended when my husband came out and told me he was gay. You can read that story in my Survival as a Straight Spouse lens.

What's the real story now is that I am married to a wonderful Bajan man and my life is blessed. I had the opportunity to live in Barbados for two years, where we met, fell in love, and married. I even wrote a lens about My Barbados Wedding.

When I first went into the work force, I worked in an emergency room at the local hospital. It was there that I discovered my love for language and for medical language in particular. At that time, there were no schools for medical transcription, but I found out that job existed and went about trying to get a transfer to that department. I believe I simply bugged the supervisor so much she finally gave me a chance. It was the beginning of a wonderful career.

You may be wondering what medical transcription is all about. The easy way to describe it is that anytime you go to the doctor or are in the hospital, your physician dictates a report about your care. A medical transcriptionists listens to that report and transcribes it into a written document that becomes of a part of your healthcare record. If you'd like to know more about that, you can learn get a free report all about medical transcription from the Medical Transcription Training Alliance.

In my time as a medical transcriptionist, spanning almost 30 years now, I have worked in so many different settings. I worked in hospitals, clinics, for medical transcription services, both in an office and from home, I taught school, I had my own business for ten years, and most recently, I created and led an education program for a company. The last part of that venture led me to being responsible for the company's operations in the Caribbean, where I was in charge of training programs in three different countries as well as the establishment of a medical transcription service in Barbados.

I love this profession because it is ever changing. Medicine changes every single day so there is always something new to learn. It is also rewarding to play a role in creating the patient's story in health care.

I have spent many years in the education industry for the profession of medical transcription. I love working with students and watching them learn and grow. In my last role in education, I got to see over 200 new medical transcriptionists on the island of Barbados, which was an awesome experience.

My role now in education is really focused on helping medical transcriptionists maintain continuing education. Because medicine changes every day, and because the industry is rapidly changing with new technologies, it is important that a medical transcriptionist stay up to date on everything. MT Tools Online was created to do just that. It's a small but growing community of medical transcriptionists working together to create great opportunities for growth and I am proud to be involved in that.

I am so lucky to have some awesome nieces and nephews. Watching them grow has been a wonderful experience. My brother has five wonderful children, each very different in their own way, as kids always are. It's been wonderful to watch them grow up and they are now all adults. Here's a picture of them taken with their father, my brother, a couple of years ago at Christmas time.

It's my goal to be supportive of these kids, and where allowed, I try to be that person in their life who always believes in them, no matter what. I am, of course, closer to some than others, but they are all wonderful young adults.

And yes, you can take that any way you'd like. I am a great aunt with great nieces and nephews!

As the kids in our family grew, of course our family grew too. This picture shows all of the kids with my brother at Christmas time. My niece, Megan, actually helped me with one of my lenses, Who is Bobby Jack?. They are wonderful kids and I am enjoying living back in Colorado again where I can be closer to them.

Note: This picture is missing the last addition to our family, and we have another on the way!

Leadership has always been a passion of mine. In the time I have spent in my career, I have found the most pleasure from mentoring others and growing leaders. Leadership, for me, is always about leading with integrity. When we don't have our integrity, we shouldn't be in the role of a leader. In 2010, part of the new story in my life was to start the Nicholls Leadership Institute, where we can talk about what it takes to be a leader with integrity and how to apply that to our lives. Everyone is a leader in some area of their life. I hope you will stop by sometime and join us.