Featured Testimonial About Creighton University
My time at Creighton became meaningful once I allowed myself to slow down and seek opportunities to be loved.
The summer after graduating from Creighton, Miranda Burigsay, BSN’25, chose a different path than most. But that’s normal for her.
Instead of stepping directly into her nursing career, Burigsay traveled across the country with Catholic Heart Workcamp, serving youth and communities through long days of preparing food, skits and prayer activities. It was demanding, joyful and deeply formative, affirming the kind of nurse and person she hopes to be: one who cares for the whole person — body, mind and spirit.
That clarity, however, was shaped long before the summer began.
By the end of her sophomore year at the College of Nursing, Burigsay reached a difficult but necessary decision. She stepped away from Creighton to care for her mother, who was battling stage-four gallbladder cancer.
The time they shared taught her lessons about caregiving that no classroom could replicate.
“As my mom’s caregiver, I learned that being vigilant in making sure she took her medicine on time, having difficult but meaningful conversations, and holding her hand through prayer were all equally valuable to her healing,” she says. “To me, healing was never about saving or fixing, but helping my mom make the most of her new normal.”
What began as a year away from school became two, as Burigsay cared for herself and her family while grieving her mother’s passing.
When she returned to Creighton for her junior year, Burigsay knew she would have to persevere. She was grieving far from her home in Hawaiʻi, navigating some of the most demanding courses and clinicals of nursing school and rebuilding friendships after many of her peers had already graduated.
At first, she wasn’t sure she was ready. “Getting through” felt like the most she could manage. And in clinical settings, caring for patients often reopened wounds she was still learning to live with.
“The biggest challenge I needed to cope with was how to be a nurse amidst my own grief and loss,” Burigsay said. “My mom was my first patient, so inevitably, in every patient I met, I also saw my mom.”
But somewhere along the way, she felt a shift. Burigsay realized she was meant to leave Creighton with more than a degree.
“My time at Creighton became meaningful once I allowed myself to slow down and seek opportunities to be loved,” she says, noting that caring for herself, building friendships and seeking mentorship from faculty greatly added to her experience.
She learned to share that love during her summer of service at the Catholic Heart Workcamp, where she prayed alongside teens and community members and experienced caregiving in its most communal form.
This experience affirmed what she already knew to be true: nursing, like ministry, is about presence.
“As a future nurse, I understand that it’s not just about getting assessments done and medications administered but taking the time to make my patients feel seen, celebrated and valued,” she says. “This summer, I learned that making the time to have conversations and pray with people made the work meaningful.”
As she looks ahead to her nursing career, returning to Omaha in early 2026 to start at Children’s Nebraska, Burigsay carries with her the lessons shaped by loss, resilience and service. Creighton’s emphasis on cura personalis for helped her integrate grief into growth and compassion into practice.
“These past six years were filled with joy and heartache. Resilience and persistence. Overcoming and becoming,” she says. “But through it, I have been nurtured into a version of myself that I love and that I’m excited to share. I’m excited to continue to give purpose to my story.”
