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Kathy (Eby) Mikel, a 1981 Southwestern Michigan College nursing graduate, “retired” last June from South Bend’s Memorial Hospital after almost 43 years.

Memorial, a 647-bed hospital, is part of Beacon Health System.

“I worked as an RN in NICU for 10 years and on the mother/baby unit as a lactation consultant for more than 32 years,” she said.

Neonatal Intensive Care Units are specialized hospital departments for newborns, typically under 28 days old, requiring advanced, around-the-clock medical attention for premature birth (before 37 weeks), low birth weight or severe health conditions.

“I help new moms and babies with breast feeding difficulties,” she said. “I did strictly NICU staff nursing for 10 years. Then I started having my own children and got into lactation consulting, and that became my passion in nursing.

“We did a lot of education to get babies to nurse, to learn to latch on if they’re struggling.”

When she graduated from SMC, her first job was in Fort Wayne at Lutheran Hospital for 10 months before moving back to northern Indiana.

Mikel, of Wakarusa, managed to stay idle for three months before returning in October to working “two to four days a month when I want to or after seeing what the weather’s doing. After 43 years, I just didn’t think I could quit cold turkey. I still loved what I was doing. I guess working in one facility for so many years is kind of unusual anymore, but I loved what I was doing and I liked working at Memorial, so I stayed.”

Pink uniforms and volleyball

Her class contained 31 associate degrees and 33 one-year practical nursing students.

Nurses wore pink uniforms and were capped rather than pinned. Men received chevron bars.

Eileen Parks, “intimidating” dean of the nursing school, conducted the ceremony.

“I also played volleyball,” Mikel said, “and Dean Parks didn’t like her students to do anything else than be in the nursing program.”

After graduating from NorthWood High School in Nappanee — part of the Wa-Nee Community School System shared with Wakarusa — Mikel started college at Indiana University in Bloomington.

“After freshman year I transferred up to SMC to get my nursing degree,” she said. “I knew I wanted a health care field, though I wasn’t sure what that was when I graduated high school.”

Family members influenced her decision to pursue nursing.

“My mom never finished her nursing degree, but she worked for 30-some years in what would now be called medical assisting at a clinic in Wakarusa. My sister, who was two years older (she also has a younger brother) was going into nursing also,” Mikel said. “My grandmother worked as an aide for a long time.”

Though she used to return to campus to participate in Steve’s Run, Mikel has not been back to SMC since the nursing and health services building expanded in 2019.

“Back then,” before the addition of three residence halls, “everyone was a commuter,” Mikel said. “I lived with my aunt in Edwardsburg” to shorten the drive. “I had an accident one time on those snowy roads on those S curves on the back road between Edwardsburg and Dowagiac. I slid. The car went up on its side, then came back down in kind of a swampy area.”

“It was tough because you had to take 21 or 22 credits to graduate on time,” she recalled.

She took advantage of one January break to pick up cross-country skiing for physical education credit. “The other January I did a speech class.”

“I had a year of college under my belt,” Mikel said, “but I had never worked as an aide or LPN, like a lot of people in my program. They were already comfortable with patient care. I was comfortable with the academic stuff, but I struggled at first with patient care because it was new.”

Four daughters, two granddaughters

Mikel married her high school sweetheart the month after graduating from SMC.

Her oldest daughter in Benton Harbor is going to be 42, the youngest in Denver is 30. “We just got back from seeing her. My third daughter just moved around the corner from us so we babysit our granddaughters twice a week. My second daughter died in a car accident in 2004 when she was a (16-year-old) junior in high school (after a job interview at a daycare center). She became an organ tissue donor, so we are active with Donate Life in Indiana,” an Indianapolis non-profit organization.

The three surviving sisters are Emily, Mattie and McKenna.

“Our oldest granddaughter, she’s 5, and was born on the (Aug. 20) anniversary of Kelsey’s accident.”

“Working at Memorial for so long,” Mikel said, “they were like my second family and really helped me during that time when I came back to work after Kelsey died.”

“My parents are still alive,” Mikel said. “They’re 90 and 87 and live just a mile up the road from us. My brother and sister are also close. My mother-in-law isn’t very far away, either, so we have family all around us.”

Looking ahead

Travel doesn’t loom large on the Mikel’s horizon.

“My husband and I like to hike at state parks,” Mikel said. “We’re going on (Feb. 2) to Pokagon in Angola. We’d like to do a riverboat cruise, like one a friend did in New York. We don’t need to do an ocean cruise. I’ve gone on one and that was enough for me.

“We’re looking at downsizing. We have a 100-year-old farmhouse on three acres. We’re looking at building a smaller, single-story home in Wakarusa — hopefully, by the end of this year.”

Mark retired in October. “He directed a non-profit in Nappanee that was a food pantry, clothing closet and rent, utilities and prescription assistance for our community. He still coaches girls track and cross country at NorthWood High School. We started dating our sophomore year of high school.”

“I’m grateful I got into nursing, and that Southwestern had a two-year associate degree,” she said. “I wanted a health care field, I like helping new moms and babies. I’m grateful I was able to get those goals met at Southwestern.”

Last winter’s snow reminded her of her senior year of high school, which coincided with the Great Blizzard of 1978.

“We were stuck in the house for three days before we got plowed out,” Mikel said.