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  • The Power Of Resilience: Bouncing Back From Medical Problems Can Be

    THE POWER OF RESILIENCE: BOUNCING BACK FROM MEDICAL PROBLEMS CAN BE A MATTER OF ATTITUDE
    by Maureen McDonald

    Crain's Detroit Business
    October 6, 2008
    MI

    Mida Giragosian looks up at the clock inside her bustling
    public-relations agency in Royal Oak. It's 4:30 p.m. Time to whisk
    her purse, briefcase, BlackBerry and laptop into her car and zoom
    over to William Beaumont Hospital, just a few miles north.

    Three days a week, slogging through heat waves, wind storms, blizzards
    and whatever the weather may bring, she takes her assigned chair at
    dialysis for life-saving treatments.

    Because of kidney failure, Giragosian's fluid and waste products
    build up and the dialysis machine pulls them out of her bloodstream
    and returns them cleansed, like a dishwasher on heavy-duty cycle.

    She'll munch on pretzels or pasta while writing press releases,
    developing client plans and chatting up the afternoon shift at the
    local television stations -- all the while hooked up to the beeping
    machine for three straight hours.

    "Some of the TV and radio producers I talk with almost every day. They
    have been supportive through my ups and downs," Giragosian, 44, said.

    With good story ideas, she has landed top coverage for car dealerships,
    restaurants, boutiques and salons, keeping her PR agency, Lapides
    Publicity Giragosian in the black. She also coaches 30 unpaid interns
    a year. They learn to pitch by practicing calls by her side. Her cell
    phone seldom stops ringing, even through intermittent emergency trips
    to Beaumont.

    Giragosian rockets forward professionally, while her 145-pound body
    struggles to keep up. She has had 300 surgeries since 1986 -- coping
    with lupus, an auto-immune disease -- mostly to clean blood clots in
    the surgical port that allows dialysis. A kidney transplant in 2001
    freed her from the tether of dialysis, but it failed after a heart
    attack in 2006.

    "Going back on dialysis was one of the saddest times in my life. I
    had freedom for five years with a donated kidney. Then I lost it. I
    took it hard. I had to remember I'm Armenian. My people are resilient
    by nature," she said. She hopes to receive a new kidney in 2009,
    a goal she savors daily.

    Her body bears track marks from IV needles. She has shunts in her
    arms and a catheter port in her chest.

    Giragosian, a Royal Oak resident, diverts attention by wearing
    custom baby-doll dresses from Shapes in Royal Oak, jewelry from
    Marlaina Stone, also in Royal Oak, along with carrying Gucci bags and
    wearing Stuart Weitzman shoes from shops in the Somerset Collection
    of Troy. She walks like a model strutting down the runway during
    Fashion Week. Every step is a celebration of life.

    What is emotional resilience?

    How do business leaders like Giragosian soar when others take to the
    bed in depression and fear? Is it cultural, genetic, personality-driven
    or learned?

    "Emotional resilience is a well-kept secret. Most of us significantly
    underestimate our ability to overcome adversity," said Dr. Peter Ubel,
    director of the Center for Behavioral and Decision Sciences in Medicine
    at the University of Michigan. He wrote the book, You're Stronger Than
    You Think: Tapping Into the Secrets of Emotionally Resilient People.

    Ubel and his research team found that most people were so convinced
    that happiness is a matter of circumstances that they forgot how much
    they were actually able to adapt to their circumstances.

    But adaptation doesn't happen overnight.

    "One reason to encourage patients with chronic illnesses to stay
    engaged is that it feeds their self-worth, it occupies their minds,"
    said Dr. Jerry Dancik, partner of the Michigan Kidney Consultants
    P.C. in Rochester Hills. He is Giragosian's doctor.

    "Someone might miss work intermittently, but they could contribute
    much to the workplace. Most people don't want pity, just support in
    re-entering the cycle of gainful, fruitful employment."

    Like Giragosian, there are other businesspeople who have struggled
    with life-threatening diseases while sustaining the profitability of
    companies. Rod Brown overcame a neuromuscular disease by rekindling his
    will to live and ditching his combative career. Donna Zobel downsized
    her family business, all the while recovering from the first stages
    of breast cancer.

    By freeing up their partners and associates to travel and market their
    respective companies, and by applying their courage to business tasks,
    all three bolster the bottom line.

    Respect the caregivers

    Brown, co-owner of The Shirt Box in Farmington Hills, admits he was
    miserable most of 2000, when he was diagnosed with myasthenia gravis,
    a disease affecting vision, breathing and swallowing. Then working as
    a malpractice attorney, thriving on adversarial relationships with
    doctors and medical professionals, he came to the realization that
    his future depended on the people in white coats and blue scrubs.

    "It was literally a life-altering experience for Rod. He struggled
    with the diagnosis and struggled with all the complications, such
    as double vision, that came after. He had a rocky road. But he got
    through it. It was absolutely incredible to watch," said his physician
    and lifelong friend Dr. William Boudouris, of the Michigan Institute
    for Neurological Disorders P.C. in Farmington Hills.

    After the first round of treatments, Brown, 41, faced a new health
    obstacle. He was diagnosed with a thymus tumor the size of a golf
    ball, and it required chest surgery. He drove home from the doctor's
    office and hit the bed, still wearing his suit, tie and starched
    shirt. He laid there for days -- frozen with fear -- until his dad,
    a manufacturers representative and a two-time cancer survivor,
    insisted he go forward.

    He still remembers his dad's words on days when pain strikes and
    resolve weakens, "I wish I could give you all my strength. I know
    you can get through this," Brown recalls. Happily he did.

    Healing required a career change. So to move from adversarial to
    helpful, he took a deep pay cut to become the co-owner of the men's
    clothing shop. The dividends were life-affirming. He found he relished
    coming to work each day. Customers flocked to him for wardrobe advice
    for job interviews, courtship or family celebrations. He initiated a
    program to give gently used clothes to low-income job-seekers through
    Neighborhood Service Organization of Detroit.

    "What I don't make up in money from my legal career, I earn in quality
    of life. I traded the Saab for a minivan. I didn't take the family on
    vacations to Europe. I'm no longer a killer in the courtroom. Instead
    I'm selecting killer ties for my clients. The culture at Shirt Box
    isn't just sales and bottom line. We develop relationships with
    customers. That wakes me up with a smile each day," Brown said.

    After eight years, Boudouris says Brown has overcome myasthenia gravis,
    but Brown is more comfortable with the word remission because he
    still has small but daily reminders of the neuromuscular disease,
    including pulses, twitches and a nine-inch scar down his chest.

    Don't overestimate illness

    It takes a Herculean effort to overcome nagging fears, according to
    Ubel. "People overestimate the long-term emotional impact of illness
    and disability, imagining that kidney failure or a spinal-cord injury
    will make them miserable, when, as we have seen, the majority of
    people with kidney failure and spinal cord injuries are happy."

    The Michigan Institute for Neurological Disorders runs monthly support
    group and disease awareness meetings. Ubel finds Internet research,
    without face-to-face communication, can unnecessarily scare and depress
    patients. Veteran nurses and doctors can put problems in perspective.

    The late Norman Cousins, editor of the Saturday Review and author of
    the 1980s breakthrough book Anatomy of an Illness, wrote about his
    battle with acute arthritis and the power of Marx Brothers movie reels.

    "I made the joyous discovery that 10 minutes of genuine belly laughter
    had an anesthetic effect and would give me at least two hours of
    pain-free sleep."

    How do you get happy?

    "Rent funny movies, read funny paperback novels," said Zobel, 48,
    president of Myron Zucker Inc. in Sterling Heights, a manufacturer of
    industrial motors and components for assembly lines. She is a breast
    cancer survivor. Through the lumpectomy, chemotherapy, radiation and
    recovery, she read Janet Evanovich detective stories.

    "I didn't have time for anxiety," she said.

    Zobel, a former director of global research at Pfizer Inc., left the
    pharmaceutical firm's Ann Arbor office in late 2003 to take over the
    family firm upon the death of her father. It was bleeding gallons of
    red ink.

    Within the next year, she pruned the company of dead weight, expanded
    its reach to lumber mills and wastewater treatment facilities
    and outsourced certain tasks. She authorized a move from an old
    35,000-square-foot plant to a nimble 8,000-square-foot building in
    an office park.

    "We focused on priorities, we didn't horse around with suppliers and
    customers that didn't produce sales," Zobel said.

    In three years, the company went from under $1 million in sales and a
    loss of $250,000 a year to more than $1 million in sales and a slight
    $72,000 profit after bonuses.

    "Employees worked hard to make our turnaround happen," she said.

    A month before the company's big move in 2004, Zobel found a cancerous
    lump in her breast. She was still an unfamiliar face at the company,
    but she had an MBA from UM and an aim to keep people employed. She
    called a companywide meeting and asked for help.

    "I was able to delegate a lot of things. People wanted to do more;
    I just needed to give them responsibility," she said.

    Following surgery she planned her chemotherapy cycles for
    Thursday-Sunday. After treatments she drove to a duplex she owned
    in Ann Arbor, hooked into her computer and responded to calls
    and e-mails. Then she collapsed into bed and turned on the DVD
    player. Funny movies refreshed and rejuvenated her soul.

    "You have no control over cancer -- but you do have control over how
    you live your life," Zobel said. "The stuff that made you wound up
    and irritated is a total waste of time."

    What brings vigor?

    Giragosian brightens up when client and good friend Adrian Tonon,
    owner of Ristorante Cafe Cortina in Farmington Hills, delivers a quart
    of handmade gnocchi with heirloom tomatoes to the dialysis unit of
    the hospital.

    As she eats, he watches the sparkle return to her eyes. Marketing
    ideas pop into her head along with topics for new cooking shows where
    Tonon can showcase his culinary miracles.

    "Mida is very special," Tonon said. "She's a fighter. She's a very
    strong woman and very focused. She's like family to us."

    Giragosian said she can't stay neutral about her own happiness.

    "If I wasn't in public relations, I wouldn't meet all the fascinating
    people that I do. I love feeling how the tenacity of my labor produces
    really great results."

    Business partner Lisa Lapides Sawicki, who hired Giragosian 17
    years ago after a productive internship, made Giragosian a full
    partner in 2006, based on her uncanny ability to generate press
    coverage. Giragosian takes the lead in broadcast coverage for all
    accounts and specializes in fashion, food and automotive clients,
    while Lapides Sawicki handles small-business owners.

    "Mida is the star of the agency. She's amazing. She doesn't miss a
    beat, even through surgeries. When she goes to the television station,
    she brings bagels and donuts. When a reporter wins an award, she sends
    a note or card or flowers. She has true compassion and boundless joy
    for people."

    Giragosian works from a zebra-print chair, surrounded by fresh flowers,
    pictures of her nieces and thank-you notes from clients. Nearly
    every item in her wardrobe is a gift or purchase from a merchant she
    represents. When she orders lunch, she knows nearly every restaurant
    owner by name and asks about their families.

    "I get excited by my clients, by the possibilities of what I can do
    for them. Let me take you to lunch at Cafe Cortina. The owner is just
    awesome. Can I tell you more?"

    With that, Giragosian is up and running, working her list to build
    awareness, drive customers to clients. Her tenacity to succeed keeps
    her resilient.
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