Helping Hoopa

Karl Fisher.

20-Year Psychologist Dies from Rare Brain Tumor

By Allie Hostler, Two Rivers Tribune

Hundreds of people in Hoopa knew Karl Fisher behind closed doors. Or, perhaps it was the other way around. Some of the Hoopa people’s deepest secrets weighed heavy on his heart and mind.

“The complexity and goodness of the people here have struck me with even greater impact than the problems,” Fisher wrote in an article that published in the TRT three years ago in which he lamented about his battle with a meningioma brain tumor.

After nearly five years battling the tumor, Fisher succumbed to it on Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2012.

Fisher found Hoopa by way of a job announcement in the San Francisco Chronicle after he completed his doctorate degree at Pacific University back in the early ‘90s. He and his wife, Kathie wanted to raise their children in a rural community. Hoopa fit the bill.

“Karl was disappointed that we couldn’t find a place to buy in Hoopa,” Kathie said about her husband. “He loved the valley and thought it was the most beautiful place, and I share that same feeling.”

Karl met Kathie in 1980 in the Bay Area. They were married in 1985 and have two children together, Alanna and Kris who have grown into young adults. Many in the community remember Alanna as her dad was active with her endeavors as a Campfire girl. She is now pursuing a developing career in ballet and her brother Kris is a senior at Trinity High School.

Carl’s years of service in Hoopa as a counselor have given him countless opportunities to work with a variety of ages and problems on a physiological level. He started his career as a licensed marriage and family therapist, later becoming a licensed psychologist.

When Karl developed a meningioma—a tumor that grows between the layers of tissue on the outside of the brain—he began to feel outside of himself. This type of tumor is not typically malignant, is supposed to be slow growing and fairly easy to remove, but Karl had an A-typical type of meningioma that was stubborn, recurring even after several surgeries.

Karl talked about his experience being ‘Handicapped’ in a story he submitted for publication in the TRT nearly three years ago.

“Some clients I’ve seen have had certain society-designated handicaps. These have included serious mental illness, degrees of cognitive limitations and very ingrained substance abuse problems,” he wrote. “In the past I’ve put myself on the other side of the fence from these so-called handicapped people. I guess I considered myself a step ahead, more emotionally and cognitively healthy than the majority of them. Now, however, I feel as if I am on the same side of the fence. I will never be quite the same as normal.”

He carefully explained his emotions after his diagnosis and surgery and how interactions between him and others transformed. “Some avoided me, as if they didn’t quite know what to say,” he wrote. “A few have related with a somewhat syrupy sentiment, perhaps feeling sorry for me. Others have scrutinized me, looking carefully for changes or potential problems. There have been, to be sure, some people who have been curious and empathic, who talk to me in a direct way—and these people have felt the best to me…Although it is a miracle I have survived in a such a relatively unblemished way, I also often feel lost and different from others.”

Despite his feeling different, and naturally so, his coworkers held him in the same professional high regard. “He cared so much about the people he worked with,” Marilyn Fox, another counselor at the  Hoopa Tribe’s Human Services Division said. “He was very sincere and tried hard to help and improve this community.”

Fox said he gave a lot of heart to his clients, many of them long-time clients who stuck with him throughout the years.

His wife said he was an extremely ethical professional never once breaking the bond of client confidentiality. “I never knew who he was working with,” Kathie said. “People would come up to me in the grocery store, and begin talking as if they knew me, but I wouldn’t have the slightest idea who they were. I would tell them that I would give Karl the message.”

Kathie explained that Karl did not wish to have a public memorial service or funeral, so the family has chosen to honor his wishes. But, because of the hundreds of lives he touched in the Hoopa community, the Human Services Division has arranged a remembrance get-together to be held on Friday, February 24 at noon at the Community Center (formerly Church of the Mountains) on Loop Road in Hoopa.

“When I began my job here, I was the typically naïve ‘white man’ type of person,” Fisher wrote. “I had a very different life experience than many of the Hoopa people. But once trust was established and doors were gradually opened over time,

I discovered much about myself. I have probably helped a number of people, some a lot and others not very much. However, I can say without hesitation that the greatest learning experience has been mine, not what I may have provided others. People here have contributed much to me over time—emotionally and culturally. There is a high quality of life here, which I have observed repeatedly, that has seemed to fill-in many of the missing gaps in my own life. It is hard to verbally explain.”