Resilience Famous Person-Oprah Winfrey

Full Name:

Oprah Gail Winfrey

Birth Date and Location:

January 29, 1954 in Kosciusko, Mississippi

Oprah spent her childhood struggling with a strange upbringing: academic achievement and a dysfunctional home life. She lived with her grandmother until she was six, and, in that time, learned to read.

She then moved to Milwaukee with her mother. The two lived together in poverty. Her mother was less supportive of her growing intelligence; Opera’s mother had to work long hours to make ends meet. She endured physical and sexual abuse by relatives and close family friends during this time. Keeping silent about the problem she soon began to act out, and stealing money. Her mother could not handle Oprah's behavior any longer and sent her back to live with her father in Nashville. At 14, Oprah discovered she was pregnant, though she hid this news from her parents until she was in her 7th month. The day she told her father the news of her pregnancy, she went into early labor and delivered her baby that day -- a boy, who died within 2 weeks of his birth.

Soon after, Oprah's mother shipped Oprah off to her father in Nashville. Her father made education a priority and pushed Oprah to succeed. She became an honors student, won a full scholarship to Tennessee State University, and was crowned Miss Black Tennessee by age 18.

Oprah is known as a philanthropist, who has overcome a traumatic childhood and gained recognition for her work.

She's taken the world by storm, proving that a black woman can make it anywhere if she sets her mind and heart to it. At one point over the years, she was the richest single black woman in the world, who has proved time and again that anything is possible, if you know how to get it done.

The reason why I think Oprah is resilient is because she is able to understand her own feelings and remain in control of them. She had a tough childhood. Being raped and abused by family and close family friend who should have been nurturing her up...