Blog

Your children can make you cry, they just can, whether they mean to or not, and sometimes they really mean to. Teenagers can be particularly harsh; I have a friend who says sometimes teenagers are just not good people.
I have two teenagers at 16 and 19 and a post-teenager at 21. But any therapist [...]

OPRFHS 2009 graduate Jake Venerable talks about what Coach Mike Powell means to him and why he came back to the varsity wrestling team after leaving for a year. And why this group of teammates who shared “blood, sweat and tears” will be his friends for life.

The more I live, the more I write. I’m not regurgitating experiences or embarassing my friends, children and neighbors. I am trying to make sense of the stories that accurately and effectively articulate exactly what is like to feel, be, live in certain moments.

Brock Friesen graduates in June after four years on the OPRFHS wrestling team. He talks about learning from a coach –Mike Powell– who is more than just talk.

In March 2010 Ellis Coleman, a 2009 OPRFHS graduate, won a bronze medal at the Junior International in Bulgaria as part of the USA National Greco-Roman team. The three-time Illinois state medalist talks in this interview about the impact Coach Powell has had on his life, this sport and his wrestling family.

Why anyone gets cancer knows it is a complicated formula of genetics plus environment plus fate plus who knows what, maybe the perfume my mother wore when she was pregnant or the weed killer my father spread on the backyard lawn.

Evan was born to wrestle. According to his mom, Amy, this North Florida 119 pound champion gave the sport his all and she discovered that yes, there is some crying in wrestling.

Dr. Lauren Streicher has been my gynecologist for 17 years; she delivered Colin. In October 2006, I was diagnosed with breast cancer from a routine mammogram given by my radiologist, Dr. Joan Werber. She and Dr. Streicher are friends as well as colleagues. Hours after I was scheduled for a biopsy, Dr. Streicher called me at home to reassure me I would be fine. After surgery and radiation, I was fine. In December 2007, following disturbing elevated counts on two PSA tests, Dr. Streicher operated on me to remove my ovaries, for fear of ovarian cancer. Luckily, I did not have ovarian cancer. Dr. Streicher talks here about the kind of rapport she has with her patients and why. You will see precisely why I trust her with my life.

The team’s athletic trainer called me at work about 3:30. I needed to get Colin to the emergency room as fast as possible. On the Tuesday after regionals, what was initially thought to be a shin bruise, was now a dark purple, hot, swelling, gross mass, the size of a mango, or a small eggplant.

He is responsible for that moment of intense pride. It wasn’t handed to him, it didn’t land on him when he opened the window. it did not come from me. And it gives me chills to witness the satisfaction he reaps from his own determination.