I went back to school and became a nurse at age 40 - my children in junior
high school and high school (my oldest graduated from HS the same year I
earned my cap!)

I was the oldest student - but not by much - because this was a community
junior college and the students were working their way through school.  

However, as I was working through the classes the instructors learned that I
was an IBCLC and by the time it was the OB rotation, the instructor just
asked me to give the breastfeeding section!  It's much easier to provide
"anticipatory guidance" rather than correct an instructor during a session.


I had developed a rapport with my instructors, and brought in some of the
textbooks I had studied to become an IBCLC so they could see that I was
using evidence-based practice and not my own opinions as an ex-breastfeeding
mother. (This was in 1989 - when there was a PAUCITY of books - imagine what
you could bring in today!)

Good instructors use the students' own knowledge - we had a student who
worked her way through school working with an ambulance company as an EMT -
and another who worked in a lab - she would ask them to add information they
knew from their own experiences also...

...just last Friday I had a working breastfeeding mom in my class and the
sister of a child with Downs - having THEM speak about their experiences
added to the presentation - and didn't make me feel I wasn't "up to par"
because I didn't present everything!

Jeanette Panchula, BSW, RN, PHN, IBCLC
California, USA

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