Susan Katherine Lipsey

1952 - 2022

Suzy would tell you, very proudly, that she is the one person in her family who is Hawaiian. “I was born in Hawaii when it was still a territory. The first air that entered my lungs was that of the islands.” And despite our family eye-rolls about her native islander claims, it is true, Susan Katherine Fields was born at Tripler Naval Hospital in Honolulu, HI on June 14, 1952 to Chuck and Patsy Fields. They transferred back to the mainland a few months later, according to ship passage records.

Suzy was the oldest of seven children who grew up as naval brats, living primarily in base housing in Long Beach and San Diego, and later in Poway and Ramona. Suzy remembers a giant fig tree she used to play under as a toddler and she was nicknamed “Figgy.” Among siblings she became known as “Dukes.” The family grew so big, they didn’t fit in standard Naval housing, so they were placed in a Quonset Hut on 32nd street - housing that was designed for returning troops, with gaps between the ground and walls, and pounding water pressure in the showers. Eventually they moved to a house in Poway where Nana Perla and Uncle John also resided with their big family and her Dad converted the garage into several kid bedrooms. Mom always said she just never found the show “The Brady Bunch” all that fascinating.

Fond memories from her youth included going to spend the night with Nana Betty and Grandpa Duke, riding the Balboa Park Carousel and having fried chicken picnics under the big trees there, going to the movies, watching Jiminy Cricket in school (I’m No Fool/Always Let Your Conscience Be Your Guide), sunburnt beach days, and giggling with her flock of girlfriends.

While living at “Barefoot Manor” (Holland Place, Poway), Suzy began to attend, on her own, St. Michael’s Catholic Church. She always knew she would become a nun or a nurse. She also listened, every night, to the hit parade (top songs) throughout the 1960s on a little transistor radio that her Nana Betty gave her.

The idea of becoming a nun went out the window when Suzy met Reggie, the love of her life, in eighth grade. They dated all through high school. Reggie told his family at 16 that he was going to marry Suzy Fields. In her senior year, Suzy lived mostly at her best friend Marilyn Estes’ house, and they were inseparable. They both worked after school - full-time 3-11 p.m. shifts, as Nurse’s Aides - at Palomar Hospital and hung out at the beach. They dated the twins, Reggie and Ronnie Lipsey.

After graduating from Poway High School in 1970, Suzy and Reggie eloped at 18, when Reggie enlisted in the Marine Corps. Their honeymoon was a road trip, visiting Lipsey family in Georgia on their way to Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, where he completed boot camp and was assigned to Lifeguard shore duty. He taught Suzy how to drive and how to cook. Suzy often says they raised each other. 

When they returned to California, Suzy taught high school health and sex education/family planning, and worked for Dr. Locke and Dr. Solis in Escondido. She and Reggie enjoyed their kid-free years, taking off to camp and surf in Ensenada, Mexico most weekends and playing slow-pitch softball. (Fun times with Kim and Scott and Mike and Linda!) Suzy also hosted the first NOW North County (National Organization for Women) meetings in her home.

1975 brought the birth of Scott Michael and 1979 brought Lisa Lauren. Suzy deeply enjoyed motherhood and took time to be home with her littles. Daily adventures included learning songs, Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood and learning to swim at the Brook Street Pool with Cousin Kristy Faye. There were big family gatherings—grandparents, all seven siblings, and 12 grandkids, plus all of Reggie’s family. Volleyball and shooting pool were always a part of get togethers. Although the pool table eventually turned into a laundry folding table.

A recession hit the construction trade pretty hard in the early 1980s and the family moved to Houston, Texas where Reggie was offered highway work, core drilling and asphalt. These were lean years and Suzy ran a tight kitchen budget, attended Harris College, earning her ADN nursing degree, and made extra money tutoring her peers. Suzy raised four kids under the age of eight (Scott and Lisa, plus cousins Heather and Jamie!) and was nominated Class President and graduated Valedictorian in 1986. Kelly Bellanger became her Texas bestie and Ann and AJ like second parents. All of the Bellanger family adopted her and us, to this day.

After her college graduation, the Lipsey’s returned to California and settled into Carlsbad. Suzy worked in the New Born Nursery and Newborn Intensive Care Unit at Tri-City Medical Center. Key friends and mentors on night shift included Yamila Ayad, Kathy Zeroll and Candace Trombetta, affectionately named by Reggie, “The Nursing Cartel”. Later, on day shift, more dear friends included Bev Tyner and Rachel Gentzsch. In 1992 Suzy was named hospital-wide Nurse of the Year. (1986 -1994)

Suzy put great importance in nightly family dinner, a “how was your day?” check-in. Then we could watch family favorite TV shows (Family Ties, The Wonder Years, The Simpsons, Rosanne). Bedtime always included books (The Velveteen Rabbit, Horton Hatches the Egg, The Mouse and the Motorcycle, Charlotte’s Web, Frog and Toad, and Little House on the Prairie to name a few of the stories she loved and shared with us kids.)

Once Lisa entered high school, Suzy started work at Sharp Mary Birch Hospital for Women. There she was an NICU Advanced Practice Nurse Level III/Clinical Resource and Preceptor program coordinator for new nurses (1995 – 2000). During this time, Reggie and Suzy divorced and Suzy pulled part of her retirement fund to put a down payment on her lovely little home in Rancho del Oro area of Oceanside. She has always taken great pride in her home.

At work, Suzy went from womb to tomb, quite literally, when she took on several units at Sharp Memorial Hospital. She became manager for the Medical ICU, Transplant & Progressive Care Units with a staff of more than 150. During this 10-year span, she was the 2002 & 2007 Hospital-wide Nurse of the Year for Nursing Leadership. Further, in 2007 she received the Sharp system-wide Vision Achievement Award for Excellence in Department and People Management. In an anonymous independent survey, her units were voted “Best Place to Work” with an employee workplace and manager satisfaction score of 94%. Suzy always credited her leads/charge nurses as the heart of her team, including Dorothy Wagemester, Deb Ferraro, Josie McDowell and Lori Rogers to name a few (2000 – 2010).

At this time, Suzy returned to school, earning her Master of Science in Nursing with a focus on Public Health. (Every paper she wrote, she hunted and pecked on the computer keyboard, calling her right pointer finger, ( "Fastest finger in the west") She also helped coordinate the move from the old site to the newly built Sharp hospital, and led the team during JCAHO accreditation. SHARP Memorial earned their ACCN Magnet Status and the prestigious national M. Baldridge Award. Suzy then took time off to visit her Texas family and volunteer at public health clinics in the most remote areas of the Appalachian Mountains.

Family was always a priority, and when it became necessary, Suzy took time off to help raise two of her grandchildren until they started school. Then she was off on her next nursing adventures. She worked two years for the Department of Defense, serving at Camp Pendleton’s Naval Hospital. Her daily work included Intensive Nurse Case Management for wounded veterans with complex cases, pending surgeries, and mortal injury/PTSD.

Suzy then felt a calling to get back to her nursing roots, babies and pediatrics. She was asked by The Elizabeth Hospice to help develop their Perinatal/Neonatal/Pediatric Hospice Program (2014-2017). At this time, she also fell in love with teaching pediatric nursing. She taught Pediatric Nursing Cohorts for SDSU and Brightwood College, with practicums at Rady Children’s Hospital and Together We Grow. (2016-2020)

Over the last few years, Reggie found sobriety and he and Suzy reconciled. The pair settled into retirement (well, sort of - Suzy still taught nursing classes and ran a COVID clinic for the pharmaceutical company Genentech). They worked to remodel her Oceanside home’s kitchen, patio and front yard landscape. They have enjoyed, as always, time by the beach, grabbing a taco, watching movies and football, fussing over the dogs, and bickering over politics and silly things.

When we think of our Mom, there is always music, of every era and culture, every musical, or NPR/KPBS. We think of her in her 1986 Toyota 4-Runner, hair blowing in the wind. We think of epic meals like pot roast or beef stew and simple things like BLT’s with tomato soup, chipped beef on toast, egg potato, and homemade popcorn. Our whole life, she had the sign “Skinny Cooks Can’t Be Trusted” hanging in the kitchen. She loved to set a beautiful table for her family and friends, and enjoyed flower arranging and wreath making. She enjoyed girly things, like a facial and doing her hair and make-up, but also called it her “daily community service”. She always picked out the perfect gifts. She liked knowing, at night, that all her birds were safe in the nest.

Our Mom had a great love of animals and she hoped, when she got to heaven, she would be greeted by every dog she ever owned. She had a wicked sense of humor and a way of joking that could throw you off and make you wonder—was she really on the cover of Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition? Will she really be gone at intermission because she was called to the stage to take over the lead? Was Scott really born to some rich family and switched in the nursery? Will she really embarrass us by wearing her red bathrobe to our parent teacher conference? Before we learned to read, did our fortune cookie really always say, “You have most beautiful Mother”?

Always competitive, she never let us kids win in cards… if you sat next to her, you were no longer her baby bird. She’d cut you. Any wooden cooking spoon, in a flash, would become a microphone to sing the lead of any song; she even had one at work labeled “Suzy’s Microphone”. She could also use it to swat your tail…or at least threaten to do so.

Nursing was never a career for Suzy, it was a passionate calling. She renewed her RN License three weeks before her passing. She was sure that she would go back to teaching students, or doing something where she could be purposeful. The Nursing Cartel will tell you that she is excellent at crucial conversations and establishing rapport, and stubborn – professional, but stubborn - with solid ethics and high expectations. But most of all, she expected it from herself. She’d go toe-to-toe with leadership or physicians to ensure best practices and advocate for her patients and their families.

Some of her more famous quotes include:

Girls can do anything!

You can’t be as good as watched. / Do the right thing even when nobody is watching.

You don’t have sex to say thanks for the cheeseburger

Holy crap!

I love you, a bushel and a peck…and a hug around the neck

Hope is not a game plan.

Someday is not a day of the week.

Meet you back at the pass.

A diploma isn’t going to just fall into your cereal bowl

And …Whining gets you nothing!

When Reggie passed in April of this year, Suzy was heartbroken, but looked forward to spending more time with friends, taking Native American Indian studies and Astronomy classes, seeing live theatre and traveling, once she felt better. She could be very matter of fact, and ever the nurse. ONLY she could manage her plan of care. She would often say, “I can still accomplish things. I just have to pace myself.”

Suzy passed peacefully in her own bed, in her own home, just as she wanted, on the evening of Tuesday, October 18, 2022. Suzy is survived by her children, Scott and Lisa; her sisters Debbie, Laura, Patty and Jennifer; her three grandchildren, Ethan, Seth and Evelyn; and many nieces and nephews. She is preceded in death by her husband Reggie, her parents, Patsy and Chuck, her brother Char and sister Beverly.

Please join us in honoring Susan Katherine Lipsey’s life on Sunday, November 13, 2022 at 2:00 p.m. at Pilgrim United Church of Christ, 2020 Chestnut Ave, Carlsbad, CA 92008.

The family thanks Hospice by the Sea, Mom’s nursing friends from across the years, and Chaplain Jamie Romo for making her final days peaceful, comfortable and loving. In lieu of flowers, please make a donation to Fraternity House, Inc. www.fraternityhouse-inc.org, an organization she often gave to in memory of her brother.