Biography

I graduated from Salt Lake Community College as an RN in 1996 and started my nursing career working

in every area of hospitals including working with people with severe mental disorders at the Utah State

Hospital for a year until the 178-mile round trip commute took its toll on my mental health and more

than 1 car. In 2006 when I saw an opportunity to work as a School Nurse/Special Education Nurse I took

it and used my ER, ICU, and Peds experience to work with medically fragile students, some requiring

high tech medical equipment like tracheostomies, ventilators, g-tube feeding pumps, IV therapy pumps,

etc., however, the mental health experience was most handy when working with some of the staff. In

2009 I went back to school and received my bachelor’s degree in 2011. In 2020 when Bridge was looking

for a School Nurse for their brand-new school, I was asked to come be a part of the Bridge family so here

I am. School Nursing has been the most rewarding job but also the most challenging and I have loved

almost every minute of it.

I was married for 33 years to my high school sweetheart before he died in an auto accident that we

were in and we have 3 children (33, 23, and 20), one of which has autism and schizophrenia (the reason

for the 178 mile round trip above), 5 grandbabies, and their plethora of animals including up to 7 horses

at one time but now down to 2, 3 cats, 2 dogs, 2 goats, a snake, and probably more that I don’t even

know about.

In my free time I clean and rebuild my house (UGH), ride my horse, paddleboard, travel, camp, paint

rocks, make epoxy resin creations, write stories and poems, Hawaiian and Hip Hop dance, and spend

time with my family.