Juanita Norton
Juanita Norton was born to George and Lillian Colley of East Preston. She had one sister and four brothers and her parents fostered another boy. She was raised in East Preston and moved to Dartmouth in 1976 with two of her children and Billy Norton who was to eventually become her husband.
In 1975 Juanita worked as a Production Line worker with Hermes Electronics. She worked there for 14.5 years and went from line worker to supervisor during that time. After Hermes she worked at Plastics Maritime as a Production Line worker for 2.5 years and then became the receptionist of the company. She worked as the receptionist for fourteen years and then the company was sold to Ashland Canada. The office was moved to Bedford and then a re- organization of the company took place. In the re-organization process Ms. Norton was laid off.
She decided to retire at this time since her husband needed her at home. In 2004/5 her husband had been diagnosed with kidney disease and in 2009 was put on peritoneal dialysis. He was on this type of dialysis for 2.5 - 3 years but due to the number of stomach infections he was getting on this type of dialysis he went on home hemo dialysis.
In 2013 Ms. Norton and her husband took an eight week training session to learn how to do dialysis at home. She became responsible for her husband’s dialysis four times a week. Every two weeks she reports to the hospital to let them know how things are going. Ms. Norton had been involved with the Kidney Patient Advocacy Committee but she found that it wasn’t meeting her needs as a person who provides home dialysis. As a result, when Clifford Clayton called her in 2019 to get involved with his organization she agreed to come on board. She wanted to be able to help other people and pass on the knowledge that she had gathered over the past decade in regards to kidney dialysis. She wanted to be able to provide support to the people who are told that their partner was going to have to go on kidney dialysis. She wanted to be an advocate for others and to educate them on the dialysis process. She said that there are pros and cons to everything but being on dialysis prolongs your life.
She is also aware of the underlying challenges that kidney disease is kin to. Her husband had his first amputation in 2017 due to a blister on his toe which broke and due to his poor circulation it turned to gangrene. He has had several more amputations since 2017.