Nursing is a calling, an art form that calls to the soul of someone born with the passion to care for others, and the same goes for nurses whose calling is to be a nurse midwife.
Such was the calling of Patricia L. Olenick, assistant professor at the College of Nursing and Health Sciences at Texas A&M University Corpus Christi.
“The biggest reward as a nurse midwife is the endless, boundless joy of being there to help families in their times of transition in child bearing,” she says. “There is nothing like attending a birth. There is an energy that you don’t get anywhere else, and to help the family in any small way is a wonderful thing. I feel as a nurse you make a difference and what you do matters.”
It was the story of families and helping those families that made nurse midwifery all the more enjoyable for Olenick, and now she wants to give her knowledge and passion back by teaching future nurses.
“I am currently living with the end in mind,” says Olenick. “Not meaning to sound morbid but I am looking at what I can leave behind. I want to leave something that will last for generations.”
This is the reason Olenick went into teaching, so she can help prepare for the next generation of nurses. Jokingly, she says, “I am also looking at it somewhat selfishly in that these men and women will be taking care of me when I get older.”
With more than 30 years of nursing experience, Olenick, 53, teaches undergrads and registered nurse graduate students. The latter seek to become family nurse practitioners, who have a master’s degree and are in the advance practice role.
Olenick teaches many courses online and in the classroom, as well as clinical courses where she teaches her students hands-on in a hospital setting. She enjoys the hands-on classes because she is in a clinical practice environment while teaching at the same time.
“It is actually a very good idea to juggle both roles,” she says, “and since I miss the hospital setting I am planning on going back in a couple of years to do faculty practice.”
Olenick received her master’s degree in science and nursing from Texas A&M in Corpus Christi. She also has a certificate in nurse midwifery from the Frontier School of Midwifery and Family Nursing in Hyden, Ky. The Frontier School of Midwifery is the first and oldest midwifery school established in the United States.
“The school is famous for the nurses who went out into the Appalachian Mountains to demonstrate to the medical community that midwifery is a viable option,” says Olenick.
Although Olenick already had a master’s degree, she enrolled in courses to get a post-master’s certificate because she wanted the education and experience that the school offered.
Outside of the classroom, Olenick participates in activities such as traveling to Guatemala to help Dr. James Hines and his wife with their foster home,school and two clinics. She is also involved with the Coastal Bend Breastfeeding Coalition, of which she is a co-founder and the current president.
“Our mission is to promote breast feeding in the Coastal Bend area, and the Coastal Bend Diabetes Initiative supports our cause due to the fact that children who are breastfed are less likely to get diabetes later,” she says.
One of Olenick’s supporters through the years has been Dr. Shevaun Beck, doctorally prepared nurse and nurse educator. Beck helped establish the Family Nurse Practitioner Program at Texas A&M College of Nursing and Health Sciences of which Olenick is now a faculty member.
“(Shevaun) has been my friend since as long as I lived in the Corpus Christi Area,” says Olenick, “and she has been the major influence on my career and personal life and continues to be a big influence.”
Beck taught Olenick more than 20 years ago and has watched Olenick’s progress with pride.
“I have watched her progress from a challenging graduate student in nursing to a exemplary nurse midwife, nurse practitioner, and now as a professor of nursing,” says Beck. “As a graduate student she was an example to other students because of her critical thinking and ability to get to the crux of a problem and solve it. She was a leader even then as she is now. She is an excellent nurse and educator and her background gives her exceptional credibility with other nurses, doctors, and her students.”
For those seeking a career in nursing, Olenick advises them to have a strong academic background, especially in science and math. More so, she advises that future students better understand what nursing entails.
“Some of the new nursing students are coming into the profession with just the salary in mind,” says Olenick. “I am not saying that is bad, but the downside of that is that people look at the perks and benefits of the profession without knowing what a nurse does.”
When Olenick was in school, people pursued nursing because it was an art form and they had a passion for caring, which she believes sometimes new nurses may not have.
“There needs to be the lifelong commitment,” says Olenick. Her hope is that people will look at the whole picture of nursing and make sure they can meet the demands of caring for people.
Olenick has lived in Rockport for 28 years. She was born in Chicago and lived there until she was 10, when her parents move to the Philippines for two years. After the Philippines, Olenick’s family moved to Dallas and then Houston. In 1982, she moved to Rockport.
