I was the oldest of 9 children, so the role of “little mother” came naturally to me and in “mothering” nursing soon followed. I loved caring for my small brothers and sisters. I also had 2 uncles, Tom and Jim, who were physicians and an Aunt Patty,who was a nurse. I adored all three of them and decided early on to become a nurse. Uncle Jim allowed me to help out in his surgeon’s office on occasion and greatly encouraged me in my career planning.

Following nursing school, I traveled to the big city of Pittsburgh to begin my career, working in a large city hospital and later in the children’s hospital. There, I read the works of Dr Tom Dooley who was working in Viet Nam. His words inspired me to combine my desire to travel with helping in a third world country. In Viet Nam, I taught Vietnames nurses, through the United States Agency for Development, (an arm of the State department). It was the best work of my life. I was given an empty room and charged with turning it into a recovery/ICU, which I did! I will never forget the lovely people I worked with and nursed.

After I married, my husband and I had the privilege of working in an Indian Reservation in Arizona, where I taught Apache high school students to aspire to medical careers. We have also lived and worked in Bogota, Colombia. Most recently, I have worked in public health in Miami, and case management and rehab nursing in Jacksonville. My daughter-in-law is an inspiring nurse and I feel so privileged to be able to proclaim that I am a nurse. Whe visiting London, the higlight of my trip was visiting the grave of Florence Nightingale…the mother of nursing.