Page 74 - Tattnall County

would have for me to do then. After several attempts at substitute teaching, I tried to think of a feld that I could be involved in that would make me wake up and be excited about going to work – no offense to the teachers!

I was “inspired” to believe that there could be no greater joy than to go to work each day as a nurse and help babies be born into the world. I say “inspired” because looking back, knowing what I know now, and having been through the last four years, I don’t think I could have fulflled this dream unless it had been truly inspired by God. I knew that one day, at the right time, I would return to going on mission trips. If I was to become a nurse, I would have many skills to offer on these mission trips – my sparse singing skills having gone by the wayside years earlier! While in nursing school, my fellow nursing students and I met a very enthusiastic nurse who wanted to tell us about her organization, Nurses for the Nations. It is their mission to take a “bite out of malaria” in the country of Liberia. Her group had made two trips previously to test for and treat Malaria and give away free mosquito nets (Malaria is spread by mosquito bites). This sounded great to me and I was amused by how many times she let slip what “wonderful things God had done” during her presentation in a secular setting. I wondered if it was a Christian organization. Being the busy college student and mom/wife that I was, I tucked all of this information in the back of my mind for later use!

Because I wanted to pursue my nursing degree on a part-time basis, I went to Armstrong Atlantic State University in Savannah. My goal was to graduate by the time I was 50! Due to this part time status, one fall semester I found myself with seven weeks without clinicals. With a small respite from my workload, I began churning over the tucked away information in my mind. One day I was “inspired” to go home and call Mary McMahan and ask if they ever took student nurses with them on their trips. She told me they did, indeed, and they had a trip planned for February, it was a Christian organization, they would also be spreading the gospel and did I want to go? I, of course, got very excited but wondered if it would be the prudent thing to do fnancially and educationally since February would be in my fnal semester which had to be full time. I prayed about it and decided to go and if there were no roadblocks put in my way, then I would see that as an answer. I talked with my husband, Bill, who was in favor of my going and advised that it would be easier to go while in school than later on when I had a job. Of course, his motto is, “If you’re not living on the edge, you’re taking up too much space!” My professors agreed to work with me and to give me credit for three clinical days while I was in Liberia. All of my work would be expected to be done, but fortunately no tests had been planned for the week I was to be gone. So I decided to “live on the edge” and tell Mary I would go. Liberia is a country that was involved in a 20-year civil war that ended about six years ago with the help of UN peacekeepers. The result of this is that they have very little infrastructure in the