Lois Ruth MCLAREN

1927 - 2021

LOIS RUTH McLAREN September 1, 1927 November 22, 2021 'Go placidly amid the noise & haste, & remember what peace there may be in silence.' Max Ehrman, Desiderata, 1927. Lois McLaren of Nanaimo, British Columbia, died as peacefully as she lived in the presence of her loving family on November 22, 2021. Lois was Born in Edmonton, Alberta on September 1, 1927 as the only child of William and Vera MacKenzie. She grew up on a farm in nearby Ardrossan, where she and her close-knit family weathered the challenges of the Great Depression. She was a graduate of Fort Saskatchewan High School in 1947 and then the Royal Alexandra Hospital School of Nursing in 1950. She worked for 2 years at the University of Alberta Hospital in Edmonton before becoming a stewardess for Air Canada (then Trans Canada Airlines), when she was stationed in Montreal. She worked for the airline until her marriage to Lloyd McLaren on December 5, 1953. Through her time living in Montreal, she worked at Montreal Children's and Herbert Reddy Memorial Hospital and Lakeshore General Hospital in Pointe Claire while raising her two children. After moving with her family to Oakville, Ontario during the summer of 1966, she worked part time at Oakville Trafalgar Memorial Hospital. After 7 years of working in the premature nursery unit, she moved with her family to Lancaster, Ontario during the summer of 1973, when she left her nursing career to take care of her elderly father. After stops in Peterborough and Alliston, Ontario, and the death of her husband in 1997, she moved to Nanaimo, BC in 2012 to live nearby her daughter, Janyce. During her remarkable, peripatetic life Lois made friends at every stop. Her training as a nurse was not only her career, it defined her attitude to life. She served others before herself - a trait that made her much beloved to all the people she met. She was preceded in death by her loving husband, Lloyd Ross McLaren (March 1, 1923 - December 23, 1997). She is survived by her daughter Janyce and son Brian; son-in- law Harry Sturm and daughter-in-law Louisa Iarocci; grandchildren Sara (Michaël Rioux) and Heather (Gavin Boutet), and Lucia McLaren; and great-grandchildren Eloïse and Sam Rioux. The family ask that donations in her memory be made to the Nanaimo Regional General Hospital Palliative Care Unit, 1200 Dufferin Crescent, Nanaimo, BC, V9S 2B7 - Phone: 250-755-7690 https://nanaimohospital foundation.com/donate/