The Country Nurse Remembers

The Country Nurse Remembers
Author: Mary J. MacLeod
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 333
Release: 2020-02-11
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 1950691306

From the Bestselling Author of Call the Nurse and Nurse, Come You Here!, the Moving Story of Her Young Life and Her Path to Independence through Training to Be a Nurse—"A Must-Read Suggestion for Fans of the BBC's Call the Midwife" (Booklist) Mary MacLeod's mother died in childbirth when Mary was five, an event that marked for the child a "before time"—a lost joyful time—and after. She was shunted from one relative to another while her father coped with his grief. He married again only nine months later, perhaps to have a mother for his child, but her new mum, harsh and withholding of her love, quickly exerted complete control over her thoughts and deeds, with her father oblivious. Her name was changed to her stepmother's choice of "Julia." Yet the pale, thin, quiet little girl didn't know she was unhappy: things were just the way they were. Narrating from the perspective of the child she was but with the understanding and empathy of the nurse and mother she became, the author of Call the Nurse recounts the moving, intimate, indelible story of her young life, growing up in rural England near Bath, relishing the good times when her stepmother was friendly or she helped her father in the garden, experiencing the world war—air raids and blackouts, the war effort, evacuees, German prisoners—winning a scholarship, leaving home to train for three years as a nurse, and gradually finding her way as an independent woman.

Call the Nurse

Call the Nurse
Author: Mary J. MacLeod
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 245
Release: 2013-04-04
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1611459176

Tired of the pace and noise of life near London and longing for a better place to raise their young children, Mary J. MacLeod and her husband encountered their dream while vacationing on a remote island in the Scottish Hebrides. Enthralled by its windswept beauty, they soon were the proud owners of a near-derelict croft house—a farmer’s stone cottage—on “a small acre” of land. Mary assumed duties as the island’s district nurse. Call the Nurse is her account of the enchanted years she and her family spent there, coming to know its folk as both patients and friends. In anecdotes that are by turns funny, sad, moving, and tragic, she recalls them all, the crofters and their laird, the boatmen and tradesmen, young lovers and forbidding churchmen. Against the old-fashioned island culture and the grandeur of mountain and sea unfold indelible stories: a young woman carried through snow for airlift to the hospital; a rescue by boat; the marriage of a gentle giant and the island beauty; a ghostly encounter; the shocking discovery of a woman in chains; the flames of a heather fire at night; an unexploded bomb from World War II; and the joyful, tipsy celebration of a ceilidh. Gaelic fortitude meets a nurse’s compassion in these wonderful true stories from rural Scotland.

Nurse, Come You Here!

Nurse, Come You Here!
Author: Mary J. MacLeod
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 331
Release: 2015-05-05
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1628725435

From the author of Call the Nurse, come new tales of a London nurse working to help and heal a community on a remote Scottish island. Lively, touching, engaging reading for fans of Call the Midwife and All Creatures Great and Small. "Julia MacLeod shares unique and enchanting experiences as a nurse in rural Scotland. Her stories will ring true with every nurse—or anyone—who has ever cared for a family or a community, whether in Scotland or America. Call the Nurse is a delightful read.” —LeAnn Thieman, author Chicken Soup for the Nurse's Soul Mary J. Macleod and her husband left the London area for an idyllic place to raise their young children in the late sixties, and they found the island of Papavray in the Scottish Hebrides. There they bought a croft house on a "small acre" of land, and Mary J. (also known as Julia) became the district nurse. At the age of eighty, she first recounted her family's adventures in her debut, Call the Nurse, where she introduced readers to the austere beauties of the island and the hardy charm and warmth of the islanders. The anecdotes in this new volume take us to the end of her stay on Papavray, after which the MacLeod family left for California. Once again, we meet the crofters Archie, Mary, and Fergie, and other friends. There are stories of troubles, joy, and tragedy, of children lost and found, the cow that wandered into the kitchen, a distraught young mother who strides into the icy surf with her infant child, the ghostly apparition that returns after death to reveal the will in a sewing box. There are accidents and broken bones, twisters that come in from the sea, and acts of simple courage and uncommon generosity. Here again, a nurse's compassion meets Gaelic fortitude in these true tales of a bygone era.

I Wasn't Strong Like This When I Started Out: True Stories of Becoming a Nurse

I Wasn't Strong Like This When I Started Out: True Stories of Becoming a Nurse
Author: Lee Gutkind
Publisher: Underland Press
Total Pages: 256
Release: 2013-02-25
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 193716313X

This collection of true narratives reflects the dynamism and diversity of nurses, who provide the first vital line of patient care. Here, nurses remember their first "sticks," first births, and first deaths, and reflect on what gets them though long, demanding shifts, and keeps them in the profession. The stories reveal many voices from nurses at different stages of their careers: One nurse-in-training longs to be trusted with more "important" procedures, while another questions her ability to care for nursing home residents. An efficient young emergency room nurse finds his life and career irrevocably changed by a car accident. A nurse practitioner wonders whether she has violated professional boundaries in her care for a homeless man with AIDS, and a home care case manager is the sole attendee at a funeral for one of her patients. What connects these stories is the passion and strength of the writers, who struggle against burnout and bureaucracy to serve their patients with skill, empathy, and strength.

Cherry Ames, Jungle Nurse

Cherry Ames, Jungle Nurse
Author: Helen Wells
Publisher: ReadHowYouWant.com
Total Pages: 270
Release: 2009-11
Genre: Juvenile Fiction
ISBN: 1458744418

Cherry Ames is back, just as you remember her! The books are just as you remember them, retaining the same look, feel, and sense of adventure and patriotism as when they were first published. With fully illustrated color covers and a soft-finished hardcover format just like the originals, these books will transport you back to the days when you were reading about this spunky young nurse. Series editor and registered nurse Harriet Forman was inspired by, and remains a devoted fan of, Cherry Ames: ''...I was going to follow in her footsteps and become a nurse--nothing else would do. ''the United States is still fighting World War II. Cherry Ames is still an Army Nurse, this time aloft--as a flight nurse. Cherry is reunited with her corpsman Bunce--the two of them are in sole charge of ferrying severely wounded men out of the battlefield and to the nearest Army hospital. Much to Pilot Wade Cooper's chagrin, he has been taken off bomber duty to fly the wounded to safety--until Cherry makes him see otherwise. Off duty, the nurses ''adopt'' 6-year-old Muriel Grainger, who has known nothing but war in her short life, and whose mother has been killed by the Germans. Her father is often out on mysterious errands that cause some to label him a ''spy.'' Cherry makes it her risky business to find out if this is truth or rumor.

Healing Wounds

Healing Wounds
Author: Diane Carlson Evans
Publisher: Permuted Press
Total Pages: 274
Release: 2020-05-26
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1682619133

In 1983, when Evans came up with the vision for the first-ever memorial on the National Mall to honor women who’d worn a military uniform, she wouldn’t be deterred. She remembered not only her sister veterans, but also the hundreds of young wounded men she had cared for, as she expressed during a Congressional hearing in Washington, D.C.: “Women didn’t have to enter military service, but we stepped up to serve believing we belonged with our brothers-in-arms and now we belong with them at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. If they belong there, we belong there. We were there for them then. We mattered.” In the end, those wounded soldiers who had survived proved to be there for their sisters-in-arms, joining their fight for honor in Evans’ journey of combating unforeseen bureaucratic obstacles and facing mean-spirited opposition. Her impassioned story of serving in Vietnam is a crucial backstory to her fight to honor the women she served beside. She details the gritty and high-intensity experience of being a nurse in the midst of combat and becomes an unlikely hero who ultimately serves her country again as a formidable force in her daunting quest for honor and justice.

War, Through the Eyes of a Child

War, Through the Eyes of a Child
Author: Violet Apted
Publisher: Strategic Book Publishing
Total Pages: 55
Release: 2013-07
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1625164246

Imagine if you will, living through World War II in England. The times were traumatic and terrifying. Now imagine that you are seeing the war Through the Eyes of a Child. Author Violet Apted describes what her life was like as a young girl in Ashford Kent in the years 1939 to 1945. Experience her perception of the events, as well as the restrictions placed on her and the effects this had on her life. British children during the war years experienced a vastly different childhood from today. They witnessed the deaths of family and friends, and faced the reality that their own lives were in constant danger. Yet the naivety and boundless innocence of a child weaves its way throughout this heartwarming story. Violet and her childhood friends were never sure if there would be a tomorrow. You will feel this young girl's fears and share her hopes, as she remembers the horrors and dangers that no child should ever have to know. Perhaps if we take Violet's story to heart we can learn from history's mistakes, and no longer will we know War, Through the Eyes of a Child. Violet Apted's mother used to say she was born with a pen in her hand. Now retired, the author lives in Moreton Bay, Queensland, Australia. War, Through the Eyes of a Child is her fourth book. "This is the book I always planned to write." The fifth is underway.

The Island Nurse

The Island Nurse
Author: Mary J. MacLeod
Publisher: Random House
Total Pages: 262
Release: 2012-04-12
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 1780572743

Life on the remote island of Papavray in the 1970s was a world away from Mary J. MacLeod’s urban existence in the south of England. And this peaceful environment was just what she was looking for. While indoor toilets were still something of a luxury, and ‘teleeffissions’ could produce terror in some of the older residents, the glory of the mountains and the sea combined with the warmth of the island people meant she had found a haven for her family. Mary’s post as district nurse gave her a unique insight into island life, and her stories of the troubles, joys, drama and comedies endured by her patients make this a charming and humorous account of community life on a small island in a bygone era.

Enduring What Cannot Be Endured

Enduring What Cannot Be Endured
Author: Dorothy Dore Dowlen
Publisher: McFarland
Total Pages: 204
Release: 2017-07-06
Genre: History
ISBN: 0786450185

Dorothy Dore was born in the Philippines to a British father who served there in the Spanish American War, and to a Filipina mestiza mother. This young woman was attending an exclusive private school when Pearl Harbor was bombed on December 7, 1941. The Japanese Imperial Army made a swift invasion of the Philippines, and Dorothy's life became a nightmare. As recounted in this moving memoir, Dorothy studied nursing so that she could support the United States Armed Forces Far East (USAFFE). She spent the war years on the run, working for the USAFFE when she could, but abandoning those duties when her family was in need. Dorothy recalls the sacrifices of her family, the brutal treatment of civilians by the Japanese, and the vainglorious actions of some of the USAFFE guerrilla leaders. It is a compelling story of love, loss, family, courage, and survival during an especially horrifying time.

The Remember Balloons

The Remember Balloons
Author: Jessie Oliveros
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 46
Release: 2018-08-28
Genre: Juvenile Fiction
ISBN: 148148916X

A 2019 Schneider Family Award Honor Book! What’s Happening to Grandpa meets Up in this tender, sensitive picture book that gently explains the memory loss associated with aging and diseases such as Alzheimer’s. James’s Grandpa has the best balloons because he has the best memories. He has balloons showing Dad when he was young and Grandma when they were married. Grandpa has balloons about camping and Aunt Nelle’s poor cow. Grandpa also has a silver balloon filled with the memory of a fishing trip he and James took together. But when Grandpa’s balloons begin to float away, James is heartbroken. No matter how hard he runs, James can’t catch them. One day, Grandpa lets go of the silver balloon—and he doesn’t even notice! Grandpa no longer has balloons of his own. But James has many more than before. It’s up to him to share those balloons, one by one.