Personal experiences and crises can lead to career choices
People thinking about career options are often advised to consider on five factors: interests and passions; skills and strengths; values and beliefs; job market potential; and earning potential.
For some, however, there’s a sixth dimension to career decisions: Personal experience, or even crisis. This is frequently true in areas related to health care.
Meet three of us for whom personal experience or crises lighted our path toward new careers.
Teri (Dreher) Frykenberg, RN
NShore Patient Advocates
My journey toward the growing field of private patient advocacy began on a family vacation.
As an experienced critical care nurse, I was on a family cruise when my then father-in-law fell critically ill while we were in Belize. I remained with him in the hospital and was alarmed when the hospital moved to release him, despite a life-threatening blood clot and deteriorating condition.
I intervened, and stayed by his side until we were able to return to the U.S. “It made me wonder: What if he didn’t have a nurse in the family to advocate on his behalf?”
I came home with fresh eyes and empathy for how terrifying it can be for patients and their families to face a crisis alone. Back on my job at a hospital, I watched with alarm as the focus in patient care was shifting from bedside assessment, critical thinking, and common sense to documentation and making sure there couldn’t be a lawsuit.
I advocated for a patient who was having complications after major surgery — and soon found myself on a 10-day suspension. I was grateful for the time to think about my career and realized I could no longer continue to work inside a hospital.
I went on to form NShore Patient Advocates in 2011, which has become the largest high skill professional advocacy firm in Illinois and possibly the largest in the U.S. Today, I am regarded as an industry pioneer and authority, and I am the author of four books.
Mary Anne Ehlert
Protected Tomorrows
One of six siblings, Mary Anne Ehlert watched as her parents struggled to ensure the future of her younger sister, Marcia, who was born with cerebral palsy. “Marcia was a very cheerful girl. We sisters had a lot of fun together and were very close.”
Marcia became Ehlert’s inspiration for her passion and her business: ensuring the financial, social, and health futures of special needs individuals and their families. After becoming disillusioned with her career in corporate finance, she acted on her passion for special-needs individuals and their families and founded Protected Tomorrows in 2003.
“I once thought there wouldn’t be enough families who needed my services,” Ehlert says. Now, she has seven employees, is a partner in a national financial firm, and has more work than she could have imagined. She is a sought-after speaker, and she hosts Parent University, a monthly webinar program for families of special-needs individuals to learn the ins and outs of Special Needs Trusts, ABLE Accounts, and estate planning.
“Marcia passed away more than 25 years ago,” Ehlert says. “I’m proud to keep her memory and her legacy alive.”
Bonnie Lane
Family Support Services
www.TheFamilySupportServices.com
Bonnie Lane had a long career in mental health at community-based agencies, but went into consulting after a severe mental illness hit close to home.
“I fell into every pothole,” she says. “I made lots of mistakes that cost a lot of money and played musical therapists to find the right care. I realized families without my background were struggling even more.”
She founded Family Support Services in 2007. Lane provides support, advocacy, and resource referrals to caregivers and loved ones of people with severe mental illness and drug addiction disorder.
When people ask her what she does, she responds with, “What do you need?” She helps families with discharge planning and finding the right level of care for their loved one. She assists them with getting benefits and finding permanent, supportive housing for those who can’t live on their own. “My clients trust me because they know I don’t just work it, I lived it,” she says.
And that’s one thing that all three of we entrepreneurs have in common: Lived experience that gives their clients confidence, in addition to their knowledge, skills, and abilities. Those looking for new career paths should stop and look to their past experiences for inspiration.
• Teri (Dreher) Frykenberg, a registered nurse and board-certified patient advocate, is the founder of Northshore Patient Advocates LLC (NShore). She is also founder and CEO of Nurse Advocate Entrepreneur, which trains medical professionals to become successful private patient advocates. Teri offers a free phone consultation to newspaper readers as well as to nurses interested in becoming advocates. Reach her at Teri@NurseAdvocateEntrepreneur.com.