MARILYN'S STORY

What inspired you to enter the nursing profession?
The dream of being Cherry Ames or Clara Barton first attracted me to nursing. Many hours of reading about the adventures and excitement that these and other young attractive nurses had was a fantasy that I hoped would become a reality for me. The stories always portrayed nurses as having fun, doing good, and saving lives, sometimes risking their own life for others. The storybook nurses were my heroes. I too wanted to take care of people in need, save lives, travel the world and have fun. What I had read in books was all I really knew about nursing. I didn't know any nurses so it was easy for book characters to be reality. My great-aunt worked in a hospital and often said that she wished one of her kids would have become a nurse. She became my encourager as I pursued a dream for her.

What has kept you at CHOC?
Storybook fantasies did not become reality but something better did. Pediatrics was my first choice as I graduated and went job hunting more than 25 years ago. Pediatrics provided the opportunity to take care of children and comfort the parents as well. Technical expertise, developing and implementing a plan of care, helping a child to get well and the parents to cope provided incredible rewards. I found that nurses not only provide care but also have the opportunity and responsibility to advocate for the patient. Advocacy for one who can't advocate for himself has always resonated well with me. The nurse is the link for the child and parent to a foreign, scary, unknown world. We interact with people at their most vulnerable moments of life.

I'm no longer the nurse at the bedside. As a manager, I now have the opportunity to mentor other nurses and healthcare staff as they pursue their dreams. The satisfaction now comes in operationalizing a program or system that enables others to provide care with technical expertise and compassion. Advocacy is now focused on groups as well as individuals. I once heard that happiness needs 3 ingredients. Something to do, someone(s) to love and something to hope for. Nursing provides for this in technical skill, people to care for, and a focus on medical advances. For me, nursing is a reality that's better than any fantasy.