Connie Brown will fulfill her lifelong dream of becoming a midwife when she graduates from The University of Queensland (UQ) with a Bachelor of Midwifery today (18 July).
The 33-year-old Ipswich resident and mother of four first wanted to be a nurse after suffering severe burns in house fire at the age of five.
“I spent a lot of time in hospital as a child and underwent countless surgeries for skin grafts and reconstructions on scar tissue,” Ms Brown said.
“I remember the nurses were always wonderful and took amazing care of me.”
It wasn’t until Ms Brown was pregnant with her first child that her focus changed to midwifery.
“I was so inspired by my midwife who was with me for three of my four of my pregnancies, that I knew I wanted to become a midwife and give that same care to other women,” she said.
Ms Brown looked for a program that would provide her with the knowledge and skills she would need to handle any situation.
“The Bachelor of Midwifery at UQ is fantastic; the follow through program allows you to be with a woman during the whole amazing pregnancy, birth and postnatal journey,” Ms Brown said.
“I still keep in contact with some of my mums, I’ve just received a whole group of first birthday invitations from babies I helped deliver last year” said Connie.
“I even had the same midwife who delivered my children mentor me through my days as a student midwife.
“UQ provided the right balance of academic learning and clinical experience to help ensure I would be prepared to handle some of the extreme challenges I have, and will face in the workplace.”
“I’ve already experienced a situation during a delivery where the baby became distressed and the mother needed to be rushed to theatre for an emergency cesarean section”
“In situations like these you need the skills to remain calm, take a deep breath and remember your training. In this case everything turned out well and the baby was delivered safely.”
Ms Brown joins 140 other UQ students at today’s graduation ceremony at the Ipswich Civic Hall at 2pm today.
Almost 6000 students will graduate at the seven graduation ceremonies being held at UQ this week. Details of venues and times for the UQ mid-year graduations are available online.
For further information or interviews with nursing and midwifery graduates, please contact Lya McTaggart (07 3365 5084, lya.mctaggart@uq.edu.au) or Kathy Grube (0418 524 297).
For further information on the Ipswich graduation ceremony, please contact Janardan Kewin (0421 587 278).
