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From a tender age, Sue Reardon knew she wanted to be a nurse. As a little girl, she recalls bandaging her brother and giving him “medicines made of weeds.”
“It’s a wonder I didn’t kill him,” the sparkly-eyed 81-year-old Manly resident told the paper last week, recalling a 61-year career in nursing capped when she was awarded the Queen’s Service Medal for services to nursing, in the recent King’s Birthday and Coronation Honours.
Sue was among the last group with honours named for the late Queen Elizabeth. From next year the medal will be named for King Charles III.
Sue – “never Susan, because I was called that when I was naughty” – said she was especially pleased to be in that group: In 1962, she was one year into her nursing training at St Bartholomew’s Hospital in London when the Queen visited, and winning the QSM provided a perfect bookend for her career. Sue was also glad to be honoured in the year the venerable St Barts marks its 900th anniversary.
After helping to deliver more than 60 babies in England, she moved to Canada in 1967 and four years later, to New Zealand. She has worked in various Auckland practices, a hospice in Takapuna, and since 2010, at Manly Medical Centre, where she introduced diabetes self-management education, leading weekly clinics helping patients to self-manage their condition.
“I’ve had a passion for diabetes for a long time,” she said, noting that 280,000 New Zealanders are affected, with diet and lack of exercise key factors. Sue will be giving a talk to staff at the medical centre this month to pass on her diabetes management knowledge.
“Helping people to change their lives” has been a highlight of her career, she said.
After retiring last year, Sue continues to work 12 hours a week as a healthcare assistant.
Meanwhile she lives a full life, with an exercise regimen that would be envied by someone half her age – gym, dancing lessons, and a walking group whose outings end with coffee and “something naughty.”
