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A brief synopsis of Doc’s gifts, her hardships in life and how she arrived to this point.
A Creole painter born in New Orleans exactly one hundred years to the day, after French painter Paul Gauguin. She worked professionally as a Doctor, Nurse, Hospital Administrator & Clinic Director & Administrator, Respiratory Therapist, IV & Phlebotomist Instructor, PICC Line Instructor, Flight Line Nurse, Dancer, Dance Instructor, Dance Choreographer, Art Instructor, Nutrition-Fitness Coach, Fencing Instructor, Volleyball Coach, English, Nursing, Anatomy & Physiology Instructor, Ophthalmic Eye Instructor, Fashion, Ramp and Print Model. She learned drawing, calligraphy, photography, watercolor and pen and ink from her Mother and Grand’Mere starting at the age of four. She was left in the museum and Library for four to six hours at a time to copy her favorite artist. Her time was well spent perfecting Van Gogh, Gauguin, Monet, Degas, Renoir and many others. She was self taught in Impressionism, Symbolism, Surrealism, Primitivism, Realism or Abstract art. She took three structured art classes with, Dr. Scott of Xavier and Dr. Young, a UNO Professor and a USF Instructor. They all advised her to maintain her style of art, which was unique, pure, with a kind of primal innovative essence. She read art books extensively and copied the Masters. This was her forte. Thus, educating herself in techniques and theory. Like Gauguin she looks at painting as a philosophical part of human fulfillment and existence. She worked abroad for more than 30 years and traveled the world extensively. Before and after her divorce she did extensive medical & educational volunteering. Constantly learning new ethnic, cultural techniques and styles of art in her spare time. She was given the name Chacha from her dancing colleagues. She always won the Salsa and Chacha contests. Her painting friends started calling her the Chacha painter. Thus, Chachapaintings was born in 1973.
She was inveigled for 14 years by her second ex-husband, which eventually led to these events:
In 1991 while working in Saudi Arabia, she began having symptoms. During work she lost vision in both eyes. Dr. Roselyn Stevens did emergency surgery on her Retinas. Later she required multiple Laser surgery attachments to maintain some sort of vision. Dr. Ahmad Abboud diagnosed her with Lattice Degeneration of the Retina. Then she experienced massive swelling and was hospitalized for blood clots. She was having problems with Raynaud’s and Asthma which caught Dr. William Smith’s attention. He diagnosed her with both Lupus and Sickle Cell Trait of 45%. He believed that the dehydration from work & dancing brought on the symptoms. The findings were given to her husband who was a doctor. He never told her. Instead, he increased her life insurance and started taking her to ski at very high altitudes. Later while living in Switzerland, she experienced a stroke and couldn’t move her left side. Her husband told her it was just her body being cold from the Raynaud. He dressed her. He carried her down 2 flights of stairs to the car. Then drove from Biel to Bern telling her:” We can’t disappoint mother”. He carried her up three flight of stairs. He & his Mother spoke in German then laughed. She said: “You are late and put her on the sofa, so we can eat!” In 2003 he divorced her via Fax. He never gave her Dr. Smith’s diagnosis. He also never gave her Dr. Sperber’s diagnosis that she had Celiac Sprue. That same year, she physically crashed with doctors trying to figure out her diagnosis. She was officially diagnosed with Lupus Vasculitis-Cerebritis in 2005 after experiencing a TIA, by Dr. Michael Franklin.
She remembered during their marriage; they had several joint bank accounts together. For 14 years he would laugh and say how lucky he was, then called her his “Golden-goose!” She never understood the meaning until it was too late. He owed alimony and child support to one of his X’ es totaling 3500$ per month until they reach 18 years of age. Then he was arrested in Switzerland for not paying child support for 2 other children. He had to pay the rears and continue to pay 3,000 Swiss Franc per month until they were 25 years old. She later learned he had another child that he paid nothing to also. He stated he had no remorse for not paying his children anything because they only see him as dollar signs. He was sorry that he listened to her to pay them anything. But now his children can see that he is successful and have money now. This stressed her out daily. He was too pretentious and greedy for money and status. He turned down an Aston Martin from her employer in the Royal Family because it wasn’t new. It had 13000 kilometers on it. Then he wanted to buy a Patek Phillipe watch because his friend who was a Chef had one. This upset him because he was a Doctor and he should have one. So he took her and her son to Geneva to photographically document his purchase. He paid 85,000 dollars for a watch that had a 100 year warranty, that was better than his friends. His selfishness & need for attention inflated. His charmingly coverted narcissistic personality had mushroomed until he had become unbearably toxic. He already had one piano and then suddenly it wasn’t good enough. He then went out and purchased a Grand piano. Because he had misappropriated and confiscated their overseas savings and he only had an American account in both names. He had ballistic yelling scenes when she spent money. She spent 300$ in the University Art Store for supplies and received a tongue lashing and he yelled all the way home. She was spending too much money. He went nuclear when She wanted to open a Creole restaurant. She received money for liquor license from him with a lecture. He controlled the money and the accounts. He thought a 8000 square foot building from the 50’s could be converted for $50,000. When the Electricity, Plumbing and roof all had to be completely redone and updated. He insisted she was spending too much money because it should only cost no more than $150,000. She had no idea that he was sheltering the overseas money and telling me “ you are spending too much, this has to stop!” After the divorce and six years of Chemo. We finally opened. The owner closed them down after a year. He changed the lock on the door. He took all the St Louis Crystal glasses and matching silverware, all 50 of my original oil paintings that were to be auctioned for Charity, all antiques furniture, all Iranian carpets and money and deposit in the safe. He fabricated in Court. Stating she didn’t pay when she had the receipt and cancel checks that the Judge ignored. She asked him why was he doing this. “ There are those who have and those who don’t! Just ask your husband!” We have it and your fucked!” There went the restaurant and the appeals. A nuclear event in my life with no radiation that was a dark time. Realizing that his greedy tentacles were still leeching off me.
Their initial marital goal before she knew about his sorted irresponsible past-was to make one million and retire early. They made 1.8 million and he asked her to kept working. While working in Saudi he lost 4 jobs. He never worked more than 4 days a week complaining about back pain. He played his piano, drank, socialized and watched porn. Meanwhile she was symptomatic, but he told her nothing was wrong, “You just need to rest once in a while.”“I am a doctor! I will see for you if you go blind. Trust me.” She worked 44 H/W at the hospital. 30 H/W for the Royal Family and 58 H/W teaching Ballroom, Ballet, Tap, Gymnastic, Fencing, Nutrition and Fitness, Jazz, choreographing and doing set designs.
She went to Liechtenstein in 2005 after her divorce in 2004. She was hoping to get her portion of their savings from their joint saving account, to pay for her Medical bills and to get started on Chemo. Only to find out that her husband hand closed the account in 1999, 5 years before he divorced her. He put their joint savings in his name only and left her with nothing. The reality hit her that she was just The Golden Goose of a long con.
The Dragon awakens and rises with renewed strength to live through another cycle, becoming uniquely remarkable in her outlook on life. She embraced the Arts as a coping mechanism. She has written several plays with three live on stage readings. Completed one children’s book of a trilogy. When she isn’t writing she is painting or doing photography. This was and is a grueling challenge because her vision is exactly like looking through lattice.
She was started on intermittent symptomatic Chemotherapy treatments from 2006 until 2018 and had to stop working. During this time, she lost her ambidexterity & photographic memory. Therefore, she had to relearn how to paint and write with her right hand.
In 2012 she signed up at USF for a couple of non-credit art classes to help improve her dysfunctional situation. During her rehab phase, friends, classmates and medical colleagues started calling her Doc. They would watch her paint and say: “another Doc painting.” Doc Paintings was soon born.
Chacha paintings initial website & TV commercial went up in 2008. Due to Cerebritis/Vasculitis problems the site was taken down. When her physical condition improved the website was put back up in 2014. The site was hacked and taken down in 2018. Now “CHACHAPAINTINGS” is being sold under “DOCPAINTINGS.”
Ten percent of the proceeds of any painting or photograph purchased goes into a planned future fund for “Lupus patients.” First to a lawyer to set up a nonprofit. Then the funds can go to different autoimmune diseases such as: Lupus, Migraine, Arthritis, Asthma, Sickle Cell and Lattice Degeneration of Retina.
Some days are extremely hard for her to paint, write or photograph. But after going through all the physical pain and torture of not being informed about any of her diseases by her ex-husband. She believes that God left her here to help others and to give beauty into people’s life. She see’s things through a lattice view. So, painting and photography are a true challenge. Her philosophy is “Life is a challenge, meet it with gusto and overcome the challenge. Never identify yourself as a disease. You don’t have a disease. It has you! Never let anything or anyone keep you down! So, paint, write, dance, laugh, love and live!