Barbara was born at Harper Hospital in Detroit, MI on January 15, 1942. As a child she played a role in a TV show about a girl who had run away from home.  She was so convincing that her grandmother thought the story was true. This concluded her short but successful career as a movie actor.

She met her future husband, Vasily, in a fencing class as an undergraduate at Wayne State University. She dated Vasily against her parents' wishes, and eloped with him in 1970 in Calabasas, CA, where they were married by a judge.

Although not an outdoorswoman at heart, she was fascinated by nature, and delighted in the sight of a swan or an armadillo, or the smell of a fragrant flower. She planned to major in Biology, but changed to finance at Vasily's advice. After receiving her Ph.D. in economics from Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan in 1971, she started her career as an investment manager at the former National Bank of Detroit (NBD).

She had two children, son Yanni (1974) and daughter Tamara (1979).  She reported being ecstatic for days after each birth.

In the early 1980s, she moved to Athens, Greece to be closer to her husband while he worked overseas. During these years, she rebuilt her life in a foreign country, experienced financial hardship (the "lean cow" years, when her children remember a limited food budget), and accepted long separations from her husband because of his work.

She was in Greece for two four-year periods.  Initially she worked at the Citibank Officer Training Center in Athens; subsequently she taught finance at the American College of Southeastern Europe. In between, she moved back to the US with her family and worked in Michigan as a Senior Health Planner for Comprehensive Health Planning Council of Southeastern Michigan (a government agency responsible for overseeing capital expenditures by health facilities.)

She moved back to the US in 1991 with her family, where she taught finance and economics as a professor in the College of Management at Lawrence Technological University until her retirement in December 2008. Throughout her career, she also taught various courses at Wayne State University (in Detroit, Michigan), and California State University (in Northridge, California),

After her retirement in 2009, she again became a student at Wayne State University (WSU) and began taking biology, chemistry, and basic science courses to satisfy prerequisites for a nursing degree. She also took Greek language courses and participated in the local French Club. During this time, she remained in Michigan in order to continue caring for her elderly mother, Ida.

Starting in the fall of 2011, she divided her time between her husband in Kalamata, Greece, her daughter in Daytona Beach, FL, and her house in Grosse Pointe, MI. In 2013 she went on a tour with Vasily to Budapest, Prague, Vienna and Bratislava.

Barbara was an avid reader of fiction, and played a mean scrabble game.  Her favorite TV show was the Big Bang Theory; she also enjoyed Law and Order, nature programs, and almost anything on Turner Classic Movies. Her favorite actor was Robin Williams in his role as Mrs. Doubtfire (he and Tom Hanks were the only two actors she could recognize by name). She was moved by classical music, loved to have her back scratched, and adored chocolate above all else.

When she was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer in March of 2011 (having never smoked a cigarette in her life), her doctors gave her 6-8 months to live. After receiving a course of whole brain radiation therapy (WBRT) and starting on the targeted cancer drug Tarceva, she delighted her oncologist by going into remission for 3 years.

The the WBRT was a harsh treatment that had a gross negative impact on many aspects of her cognitive and neurological functioning (memory, logic, executive functioning, intelligence, coordination, physical strength, etc.), as well as making her very emotional and unusually sensitive to both physical and psychological stresses. But she did not let this stop her from traveling and enjoying her life.

In early 2014, the cancer recurred in her spine. While on vacation visiting her son in Maryland in April, she was hospitalized and underwent emergency surgery to remove the tumor and relieve pressure on her spinal cord.  For several months she worked on rehabilitation to recover from nerve damage caused by the cancer, making slow progress towards recovery. In September, the cancer recurred yet again, and left her paralyzed from the chest down.

Despite struggling with cancer, paralysis, and chronic pain from her disease, she retained her particular brand of optimism. She continued to try and enjoy the days left to her, and almost never complained to her family about her paralysis or condition.