Page 18- Ha-Shilth-Sa - April 18, 2013 Celebrating Nursing Week: May 6 to 12, 2013
Nursing for Nuu-chah-nulth-aht is a family tradition By Shayne Morrow with files from Chris Lemphers, CHN supervisor The Nuu-chah-nulth Tribal Council now has two full-time registered nurses delivering community health and home care nursing to communities in the northern region. What makes this unique is that these two RNs are a mother/daughter team, and both spent their early childhoods in remote communities of the Northern Nuu-chah-nulth Nations. Sharon Johnson is now providing community health nursing coverage in Tsaxana and the town of Gold River, while her daughter, Rebekah Johnson, delivers combined community health and home care nursing service in Kyuquot, Nuchatlaht and Ehattesaht areas. For both women, choosing a career in nursing with a focus on First Nations health was a natural progression inspired by the communities they grew up in and the friends they were surrounded with. For Sharon, it was almost pre-ordained. “My Mom Janice (Wood) Bowden became the [Red Cross] Outpost nurse in Kyuquot in 1960, not long after she married my father, Mervyn Bowden. My mom was adopted by the people and was given a very special name, Uuw’aanis, meaning Gentle Healer, by Sophie Jules, a Kyuquot elder in the 1960s,” she said. Sharon was born in Esperanza in May 1961, and has vivid memories of those days in tiny villages on the water’s edge, where most commuting is by boat. “Growing up in Kyuquot, Amai Inlet,
Left: Rebekah Johnson is pictured with Jack Johnson, a community health patient near Gold River at Tsaxana. Below: Jeremiah Mark and Mason Jack join RN Sharon Johnson for some fun time in Tsaxana.
Esperanza and various other small places, including Texada Island, were rich and wonderful experiences. I think if I was ever concerned about living in a remote community it was to feel sad for children who didn’t have all the exciting opportunities that I had.” For Sharon, a nursing career had to wait until her children were well into their own school years. “I thought of becoming a nurse just before I finished high school. I actually applied to attend BCIT, but got my application in late and was put on a waiting list. In the meantime, I wasn’t very good at waiting around to hear about what could happen and made other plans.” That fall, she was accepted into the program, but had to turn down the opportunity due to a shortage of funds. The next year, Sharon married Deane Johnson, who was also born in Esperanza, and whose mother Louise was also a nurse. The couple lived in
Vancouver, with Sharon working in a dentist’s office while Deane completed his teaching degree. Rebekah takes up the story: “My earliest childhood memories are of living in Ahousaht. My parents moved there before I was born. My dad had recently begun his career as a teacher, and he ended up getting a job at Maaqtusiis Secondary School.” That was in 1987. When they moved to Ahousaht, Sharon and Deane already had
two sons. Rebekah was born two years later and still has fond memories of her time in the island community: basketball games and potlatches and learning Nuu-chahnulth culture in the Head Start program above the gym at Maaqtusiis. She also remembers the day the Johnson family loaded their possessions onto a boat to make the move to her parents’ birthplace of Esperanza. Continued on page 19.