On Life's Journey with Oprah

As Oprah Winfrey counts down the moments to the end of her historically innovative television show, revisiting her more poignant guests and topics, I can’t help but look back at the role she has played in my own life.

Everyone has an Oprah episode they can’t forget – Oprah wheeling 67 pounds of fat on stage and ripping off a roomy robe to reveal a svelte shape in her Calvin Klein jeans. Oprah spontaneously revealing she had been a victim of sexual abuse as a child, thereby giving permission to all victims to speak up about their own shame. Oprah as she endlessly struggled with her weight before the unforgiving eyes of television cameras. Oprah, facing down members of the KKK, wearing her black skin as a shield against their hatred. Oprah standing before her international audience and announcing, 18 months ago, that she was ending her award-winning, game-changing, culture-altering, incredibly powerful The Oprah Winfrey Show. What will we all watch now?

Twenty-five years is no small feat. And Oprah Winfrey has been present in our lives throughout. She has changed, but so have we all. I was 16 years old when I first spotted this jovial, African-American woman with a contagious personality and a compassion that bled out from the TV set. She seemed real and eager, like we could be friends and hang out. She looked as amazed by her show as we were to see her on it. I didn’t know who Oprah was that day in 1986, but I watched and soon, I was addicted.

Today that is called the Power of Oprah. She has, by virtue of recommendation, or praise, changed entire companies, altered whole industries, and elevated single authors to super stardom, all the while guiding our purchases and even our votes. Oprah has that IT factor that has been described by people who’ve been in the presence of Elvis Presley and Michael Jackson. It’s that surreal feeling of knowing someone intimately, without ever having met them.

I quote Oprah-isms often in my life – my favorite being her Maya Angelou-inspired: “When you know better, you do better.” I can’t say how often those words have allowed me to express compassion before criticism. I try to avoid “The Ugly Cry” whenever possible. I now know the magic of a great fitting bra. Thanks to Dr. Phil and Dr. Oz, I know how to care for my mind and body equally. I know that learning never ends. I also know to be thankful and to know that I am part of a universe greater than myself and that my actions affect the world as much as they affect me.

Endings cause people to reflect. I am no different. I have evolved and I know she has been a key part of it. Oprah has been there for my life’s stages – some good, some bad, but all lived through.

When I fell ill at 18 and a dialysis machine became my reality, Oprah would make an hour of my treatment vanish with her wisdom, kindness and her always interesting programs. Instead of crying for four hours, I cried for only three. And if Oprah happened to have a guest whose life was more challenging than my own at the moment, it gave me great perspective and taught me gratitude. If she had on a celebrity, she was as star struck as I and that made her seem so real. Did she not know that she was Oprah Winfrey?

When I was kidney transplanted – not once, not twice, but four times – she made long hospital recoveries less taxing, by giving me the tools of hope, dreams and laughter one afternoon at a time. When I felt defeated, like the unluckiest girl on earth, she would come on and (as if on cue) show me that I was special and unique, just as God made me.

When I was well enough to go to college, she was instrumental in my decision to pursue communications and journalism. That decision led to many wonderful experiences in my life and a couple of scholarships to boot. And while I didn’t follow it as a career as intensely as she has, I never regretted my choice because it allowed me to meet my future husband. By Oprah sharing her past of promiscuity and poor choices in men, she gave me the strength to expect only the best. Choosing my husband - a man of great integrity and noble feelings who treats me well, respects my mind and encourages my dreams – is also Oprah’s doing. As a young woman with a chronic illness, it was easy for me to fall prey to a dilapidated self-esteem and to choose someone who would not love me as Oprah said I deserved to be loved. She has given girls and women all over the planet the power to stand up for themselves.

Oprah has tackled every subject that has, at some point, affected me personally. When I lost my mother, I gathered strength from guests she featured on her show, who’ve dealt with grief on every level. It helped me to take each day as a gift and that it was okay to love and care for me, in spite of my sadness.

My husband and I battled infertility, as our peers happily procreated. Oprah has featured experts, couples and success stories that continue to give us hope.

In 2007 and 2010, our home in New Jersey catastrophically flooded. We took the loss and moved on. I remembered Oprah touring New Orleans, ravaged by Hurricane Katrina. Remembering the strength and perseverance of Katrina victims gave me the fortitude to look ahead and know that this too shall pass. Oprah coming on daily at 4 p.m. and sprinkling tiny bits of wisdom and enlightenment give me a greater appreciation for all the blessings I do have.

Of course the over-the-top, super fantastic, always enjoyable, extremely emotional Oprah's Favorite Things episodes are in a class all there own (just when you thought she could top herself, she did). To watch the jubilation and pure insanity of her audience reaction to the event is nothing short of mind blowing. But for me, of all of the things I love and will miss about The Oprah Winfrey Show, I think the Book Club and its recommendations, tops the list.

I was always a voracious reader, even when it wasn’t fashionable. Oprah made it more than that, she made it a right, a privilege and a necessity to read and to learn and to become more than you are today. My love of books is as immense as my collection of books. I followed her recommendations and added more of my own. I have lost count of the books I have read, but I know that no matter the format, or how the industry changes, I will always be somewhere in the middle of a great read because the joy I get from reading is boundless.

When Oprah brought us O, The Oprah Magazine I was probably third in line to subscribe and have happily done so since then. I guess when I need the O Fix going forward, my monthly magazine will have to suffice.

I could literally write a book about how Oprah has affected, changed, added to, inspired, molded and participated in the unfolding of my life, but for now I’ll just say this: Thinking back on it, I think what Oprah has meant to a fan like myself is this: A lesson does not necessarily need to be sought in a classroom, nor does it need to come from a book, nor does it have to be finite. A lesson (or countless lessons, such as she has left us with) can be had in the form of a television show led by an inspirational woman who came from nothing and changed everything. I know without a doubt that she has been put on this earth as a great teacher for all people and all times.