After my service year, I accepted an offer to continue employment, becoming the agency's first Patient Advocate. I could not help but recognize injustices and disparities within the healthcare system, as well as the toxic influence of capitalism on the care of our planet and fellow human beings. This recognition was rooted firmly in the four values, the seeds of which were planted early on, but were watered and fertilized during JVC.
Later on, my service year inspired me to pursue further education to maximize my potential impact, which began with a permaculture and ecovillage design course, continued with a market gardener training program which fostered my broader health-focused vision, and determined my next steps . During the next leg of my journey, I lived and worked in an intergenerational community with a group of elders, and served developmentally disabled adults while studying nursing. In 2009, I became legally recognized as what I always had been - a nurse - and subsequently worked and volunteered as such in a variety of settings. Eventually, I became a nurse practitioner working primarily in geriatrics and in integrative medicine, and currently work as an adult/gerontology NP at a large hospital system in primary care and in their interdisciplinary geriatric assessment program.