Julia Lodge, RN, B.S.N. ’03, has always loved being a pediatric nurse. Despite her calling, after nearly 20 years of hospital work caring for children, she began experiencing burnout and explored other employment options that led her to nurse coaching, a new field of nursing.
Lodge had always found fulfillment as a pediatric nurse. She spent 10 years at a children’s hospital in Portland before she and her family moved to Central Oregon, where she began working as a pediatric nurse navigator, a newly created position that she still holds at St. Charles Health System in Bend. Lodge developed a robust educational program for families of children with asthma — one of the primary diseases causing children to enter the hospital system. She navigates both inpatient and outpatient care, helping children and their families access a greater quality of life by reducing and preventing unnecessary hospitalizations.
Nearly 10 years after relocating to Bend, the COVID-19 pandemic arrived, and Lodge started to experience burnout. When a variant of the disease began leaving children dangerously ill, she felt a heaviness she couldn’t escape.
Lodge turned her focus to more intentional self-care through time with family, girlfriends and being in nature. She began considering other career options but struggled to find something that renewed her spark. Then a friend told her about a new field of nursing: nurse coaching.
“One thing that I loved about our nursing education is this idea of holistic care and holistic being. We’re looking at the whole person and their whole social community, their whole environment. And we’re helping all of that thrive.”
Julia Lodge, RN, B.S.N. ’03
Lodge began studying with the Nurse Coach Collective, a program that instructs registered nurses in health and wellness coaching.
“Nurse coaching is not necessarily nurses coaching nurses, though it can be,” Lodge says. She describes it as working under your nursing license as a coach, helping people achieve better mental and physical wellness. Lodge found the seven-month transformative nurse coach training empowering. She developed the skills to coach others while also diving deep into self-examination.
“I started to shed layers left from trauma and hardship in my past,” Lodge says. “The version of me that emerged from that program felt like the truest version of myself that I have ever been, and I couldn’t wait to share that experience with other women.”
Upon receiving certification, she launched her private practice, Julia Lodge Wellness Coaching. Lodge feels the traditional health care system focuses on what she calls a “quick fix,” responding to acute illness with little opportunity to provide longer-lasting holistic care. As a nurse coach, Lodge works with her clients upstream, helping them become proactive and find the root of their health issues. Rather than prescribing medication, Lodge helps her clients restore their energy through nutrition, healthy habits and self-compassion.
“I love building relationships with my patients and clients,” Lodge says. “I love to educate, to help people understand what’s going on in their body — to come alongside them and empower them to make life choices that support their values and their goals.”
Lodge is grateful for the education she received at the OHSU School of Nursing. She praises the faculty and feels she graduated well-prepared for her career.
“One thing that I loved about our nursing education is this idea of holistic care and holistic being,” she says. “We’re looking at the whole person and their whole social community, their whole environment. And we’re helping all of that thrive.”
The holistic nursing care practice Lodge learned at OHSU is what she now offers her clients through her private practice.
“Nurse coaching feels like the truest expression of nursing, a new expansion of nursing.”
Lodge offers coaching remotely or in person. Most of her clients are working mothers experiencing chronic stress, exhaustion and burnout. They may have high blood pressure or carry extra weight. As a breast cancer survivor herself, Lodge is also passionate about serving women after they have completed breast cancer treatment.
“They are relearning who they are after breast cancer,” Lodge says. “It’s a life-defining experience that doesn’t just end when treatment ends. You are not who you were before.”
The most rewarding aspect of owning her own private practice is watching her clients learn to prioritize themselves and seeing how that positively impacts their lives. Lodge feels the most difficult facet of being a new entrepreneur has been learning how to run a business.
“Being a business owner is a whole new world and not something I learned about in nursing school,” she says. “It’s not something you want to venture into without the right support.”
The Nurse Coach Collective community has supported Lodge with her new business, acting as a sounding board. She has also built a professional network and found business coaches who offer advice. She recommends that potential entrepreneurs build a strong support network to successfully launch a new business.
Lodge carries many responsibilities: She is a mother of twin 14-year-old daughters, continues her hospital work and runs her coaching business, which she plans to grow into a full-time career. She is excited to start offering wilderness wellness retreats in the future, bringing women on backpacking adventures. She says the key to avoiding another round of burnout is to focus on her long-term goals, work intentionally and remember to honor her self-care.
Throughout her career choices, Lodge has always known she wanted to help others on their health journeys. “This is my calling. This is where I’m meant to be.”
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