ON CAMPUS
campusreview.com.au
Keeping it in the family
A mother and daughter graduate
with nursing degrees.
By Conor Burke
“H
ow would you have gone if
you’d taken your mum to
uni, Conor?” recent nursing
graduate and mother Lorella McLatchey
asks me.
As I ponder this, I imagine sitting at the
uni bar while my mother stares at me
disapprovingly, or us falling out when my
mother gets better marks than me.
I crack up laughing before I can get
another question out.
Lorella and daughter Laine McLatchey
have both recently graduated from USC,
each with a Bachelor of Nursing degree,
and when I ask for any juicy stories of
awkward moments during their three years
at uni together, I was a little disappointed
and touched in equal measures with
the response.
“Not really. Mum is my best friend,”
Laine says.
A mother and daughter studying the
same degree at the same university at
the same time may be uncommon,
but they both entered nursing for very
common reasons.
It was Laine who originally wanted to
go into the profession. According to her
mum, she was always going to be a doctor
or a nurse.
“I think I’ve always wanted to care for
people,” Laine says. “I’ve always had that
side, but I actually went down the business
route in school. I wanted to do marketing,
and then I was like, ‘Um, no thanks.’ I didn’t
like it at all. So then I came back to nursing.”
“She changed all her subjects for senior
year to do the nursing,” interjects Lorella.
They often jump in and out of each other’s
sentences in the easy back and forth way
best friends do.
“So that’s always been my goal. I went
straight from school into doing the degree.
I’ve always wanted to do it,” Laine says.
As for Lorella, who had previously worked
in the family business and administration
roles, a nursing degree was a chance to do
something new.
“I’d been at that crossroads a couple of
times previously and I was like, ‘You know
what, I need to start using my brain again.
I’m going to go to uni.’ But then we moved
and life takes over again,” she says.
“The timing was not right. It just didn’t
work out. So when this opportunity came
along, I thought I’m just going to go for it.”
The two women went to open days
together at a few unis, but it was USC and
the conversations Lorella had with nursing
professors that made up her mind.
“We met a couple of the tutors and
lecturers. I ended up talking with the
associate professor of nursing. She was so
encouraging. She said, ‘You should do it as
well. Come on, you can do this’.”
And, unlike me if I was in her situation,
Laine was happy her mum was joining her.
“I thought it was great. Someone to pack
my lunches still!” Laine jokes.
“I was so excited. I think because Mum
and I are very close. I was a competitive
swimmer in my younger days. Mum
would always get up with me at 3:30
in the morning, take me to training,
then to school, then back to training in
the afternoon. So we already had this
close bond.”
Although they had to face living with one
another, family commitments, university
assignments and an 18-year-old’s social life,
they got through it together.
“She agreed that she was going to help
me,” Lorella says.
“We got each other through the
breakdowns. We could cry together,” Laine
chimes in, finishing her mum’s thought.
“It was difficult,” Lorella says, “because
I hadn’t written an assignment in forever.
I hadn’t done referencing or anything
like that.
“So, just getting back into that academic
brain again, it was ... interesting. But we did
it. We got there, and we helped each other.”
Now that they are done with uni, the
McLatcheys are heading out into the world
of nursing – this time, apart.
“It feels a little odd, because I’ve always
had mum there. Even on our placements,
we would be at the same hospital, and
I could go across to a ward and be like,
‘Where’s Mum?’” Laine says.
Laine has already started work in an
occupational health role at Gold Coast
theme park Dreamworld.
“I started in January and am loving the
job so much,” Laine says.
“I administer first aid and do assessments
on people at the park who might be sick or
hurt, as well as drug and alcohol testing and
mental health evaluations for staff. No two
days are the same.”
And Lorella is currently applying for
the mid-year intake of graduate nursing
programs at hospitals in Brisbane.
“That’s just a matter of jumping through
all those hoops, which is not that easy. It’s
a long process and you kind of just have
to hang in there and hope that something
comes out of the whole thing,” she says.
“I would encourage anyone looking at
studying later in life to look at the journey as
a challenge and not put too much pressure
on yourself.
“Enjoy the opportunity and take each day
as it comes.” ■
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