JUDY Martin was just 16 or 17 when she started working as a nurse at Inglewood hospital.
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On Friday, at the age of 70, Ms Martin is bidding farewell to her decades-long job and retiring.
Ms Martin’s mother worked as a cook at the hospital, so she began working there too.
When she turned 18, Ms Martin went to Bendigo to do training at the then-Anne Caudle Centre and then returned to Inglewood, where she married and had children.
After having kids she returned to permanent work and continued to work for the next 35 years.
While the hospital has several acute care beds, Ms Martin has preferred to work in the aged care facility.
“You get quite attached to the older people,” she said.
She told the Bendigo Advertiser she was feeling quite sad in the lead-up to her last day of work, having dedicated most of her life to caring for people in her community.
She also expects she will miss her colleagues.
“The social part of it, the company,” Ms Martin said of what she would miss most.
“I get along really well with the girls I work with and we have a lot of fun.
“It’s hard work, but lots of fun.”
Fellow nurse Anne Boulton said those feelings would be reciprocated by those who worked alongside her.
“She’s been a wonderful nurse,” Mrs Boulton said.
“She’s been really wonderful for the hospital, they’re going to really miss her.
“She’s a really nice, caring person.”
Ms Martin said she had seen a lot of changes in the hospital in the 50-plus years that had passed since she began working there.
She said record-keeping was one area that had undergone massive transformation over the course of her career – records were now kept on computers, but they used to be documented in small exercise books.
Ms Martin will kick off her retirement with a holiday to Canada and Alaska, and will then return to Inglewood.
She said she liked to keep active and planned to volunteer, as well as spend more time with her three grandchildren who live in the town.