The wife of one of the Dallas Cowboys’ biggest stars could sit around enjoying a life of luxury. Instead, she tends to the sick and injured in Dallas County’s public hospital.
Her badge simply reads “Michelle W.” Few people know the trauma nurse is Michelle Witten, the wife of tight end Jason Witten.
And just like No. 82, she is living her dream in Dallas.
“He had played in the Cotton Bowl down here when he was in college and, at the time, I was in nursing school, and I said, ‘I would love to work at Parkland. I would love to be a trauma nurse and work in the ER at a Level I trauma center like that,” she said.
No day is the same, and it can be brutal.
The Parkland Hospital emergency room delivers more infants under one roof than any other hospital in the country. The hospital also serves inmates from the Dallas County jail.
“I love the patients here,” Witten said. “I love the staff that I work with, the autonomy that you have in the ER as a nurse.”
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She and her husband were high school sweethearts who both ended up at the University of Tennessee. They landed in Dallas in 2003 when Jason was picked to play for the Cowboys.
You will rarely see Witten in Dallas’ society pages. She says being a mother, a wife, a trauma nurse and someone who pours her time into the couple’s foundation is a lot, but it’s worth it.
“I think it’s about finding your passion in life and what you love, and I love being a wife and a mother, first and foremost,” she said. “But I think everybody has a gift, and I am completely passionate about what I do.”
“Just the reward at the end of the day — I pray every day, ‘Lord, just use me where you need me to be used. I want to bless someone today, whether it be someone I work with needing an encouraging word, a patient, just making a difference in whose ever life it is that day,'” Witten said.
Her passion has left an impression at home, too, on their sons, C.J. and Cooper.
“Jason will say, “Cooper, what are you going to be when you grow up? And he’ll say, ‘play football.'” C.J. says, ‘I want to be a doctor and take care of people just like my Mommy,’ and I never prompted him that, and to see that compassion in him just means more than anything,” she said.
She said her goal is for the Witten name to be known for giving back.
“It could end tomorrow — everything could — and just to know that when it’s over, you’ve done all that you can do for that day and that you enjoyed it to the most that you could as well,” she said.
