Dr Carla started her college educational process in Holland, MI at Hope College. She was somewhat of a rebel at that time and came to know the Dean of Women on a personal level because of the many visits to her office for minor infractions. It was a short, but memorable time in her life. Shortly after that Carla met and married her first husband in September of 1962. Shortly thereafter, May of the following year, Carla gave birth to a daughter. The marriage lasted four years.

After that Carla became a single, working mom in Holland in the 60’s and this wasn’t a popular thing to be back then. Carla started dating a gentleman by the name of James Riemersma, a self-employed builder in Holland, Michigan. He came from a large Dutch family, and as Carla was an only child, this family development was both interesting and sometimes challenging. They married in December, 1967.

Within one year, their daughter Kimberly was born, followed three years later by another daughter named Dawn. Carla had decided to be a stay-at-home mom until the early 70’s when they had moved into the Grand Rapids area. She started working for an insurance company, Heines and Goebel as a medical biller, receptionist. This career continued on at another insurance company, Benefit Actuaries for another 14 years. It was on December 15, 1989 at 11:00 AM that Carla left this job and re-entered the university arena by enrolling at Baker College for an associate’s degree in Health Information Management.

After obtaining an associate degree while working full time, Carla decided to continue on to her Bachelors Degree at Stephens College located in Columbia, MO. Here she received a degree in Health Information Management.

Since she didn’t really have much else to do other than be a working wife and mother, she decided to continue on with her educational pursuits and enrolled in the Masters program of Public Administration at Grand Valley State University. She continued on to obtain her Ph.D. in Healthcare Services Administration from the University of San Jose. During these years of education Carla continued to work as Medical Record Director at two rural hospitals and also started her teaching career at Davenport College.

The family matured, and her daughters graduated from Hudsonville High School and continued on with their own careers on the college level by choosing to go attend local colleges.

On October 29th, 2000 Carla’s life changed. That was the date that her husband of 33 years went in for a MRI because he had a worsening cough and hoarseness that wouldn’t go away. He was 59 years of age and had smoked since he was 12. The diagnosis from the MRI came back as "questionable mass in lung". From there came the visit to the Oncologist and various other specialists. The biopsy came back as stage three non-small-cell lung cancer. Within a couple of weeks he had started on chemotherapy followed by radiation therapy about three times a week. The family got through Christmas, New Years, and the beginning of 2001. Their daughters, all in the medical field, were well aware of the prognosis for a stage three cancer and that there wasn’t any viable cure rate for it. The expected life expectancy was usually less than a year.

On April 19, 2001 Jim finished his chemo/radiation therapy and was given the report that the tumors had stopped growing and were in remission. On April 23, 2001 Jim was admitted to the ICU unit of Butterworth Hospital in Grand Rapids with Listeria Meningitis. After spending three weeks in ICU and he was brought home to Hospice care. At that time, the cancer had metastasized into the brain and there was nothing anyone could do. Four weeks to the day of his hospital admission, Jim died and Carla was suddenly thrown into a life that she was not prepared for, had never thought about and did not want. "Never make plans for the rest of your life" is the great lesson she gleaned from this experience.

Over the next few months she continued to teach but very little else. It was a time when she had to deal with the fact that she was a widow (a work she still cringes to hear) and had to be responsible for her life of teaching, shopping, paying bills and the whole gamut of things that Jim used to take care of on a daily basis.

She bought and read all of the grief books available and found the four negative ways of dealing with stress were: overeating, drinking, oversleeping and doing drugs. She thought to herself “Three out of four isn’t too bad.” She knew then that the behavior that she was exhibiting (shopping, gaining weight, not socializing), was negative and yet for some time, she chose not to discontinue it. Finally, she got sick and tired of being sick and tired and decided it was her life, and she could change it.

Dr. Carla started to take back her life within a year or so and found ways of dealing with her new life situation. With her new found acceptance of her life came the consideration of re-entering the dating world. Her youngest daughter had met her current husband online so it seemed only natural to consider this as an option. Finally, three years after the death of her husband, Carla entered the online dating arena. Her experiences motivated her to write a book in order to share her experience and information with others. It was not all fun and games, but along with the frustration, anger, and disappointment of the numerous dates, came the formation of a new perspective and a sense of self-actualization. It formed the basis of a new appreciation of the grandchildren, her teaching career and new relationship that have come along in the years since her husband’s death.

Her daughters gave her a German Shepard/Golden Retriever mix puppy shortly after her husbands death because they felt she needed a new friend and guardian. Although Maxwell is a great companion, according to Dr. Carla, he really doesn’t guard much.

Not only did she grow as a person during these years but also learned how to hunt, fish and started running in marathons. Changes don’t come easily but, given time, they do come.

Just ask Dr Carla.