Helping Hand: Rita Villarreal

Giving free flu shots to low-income people recently at Loaves and Fishes was just another day at the office for Rita Villarreal, even though it wasn’t part of her regular job in the Nursing Education Department at Valley Baptist Medical Center-Harlingen.
The free flu shot program is operated by the Pastoral Services Department at the hospital, but they needed a registered nurse to actually give the shots. So Villarreal was ready and willing, she said.
In Nursing Education, “we orient the new nurses and when changes come in health care, we have to do more education,” she said.
She wasn’t born in the Rio Grande Valley, but her father was.
“I was born in Tennessee. My dad, Salvador Torres, was in the Air Force and we moved here when I was 4 years old, so I’ve been here most of my life,” Villarreal said.
 “I’m one of eight siblings. I’m the oldest.”
She got her education in the Rio Grande Valley, Villarreal said.
“Harlingen High School, then UT-Pan Am and then UT-Brownsville for my bachelor’s,” she said. “I got my associate’s from Pan Am and my bachelor’s degree in nursing from UT-Brownsville.”
She has three children. One son, Christopher, is still on active duty in the Army as a drill sergeant and will transfer from Tennessee to Fort Benning, Ga., in January, she said.
Son J.R. Villarreal served four years in the Army and now attends University of Texas-Pan American, she said.
Her daughter Vanessa Hinojosa is a choir director at Coakley Middle School.
“I help with my church. I’m a Eucharistic minister at St. Anthony’s Church and a lector,” Villarreal said. “I’m a member of the Elks Lodge and the Texas Nurses Association.”
She likes to go with her children and grandchildren on outings such as camping, fishing, bird watching, visiting wildlife refuges and visiting the zoo.
“I do like to travel; I enjoy traveling,” she said. “I’ve been to Niagara Falls, to New York City, Las Vegas, military posts because of my sons. Fort Benning, Ga., Fort Bragg, N.C., Fort Jackson, S.C. and, of course Fort Hood here in Texas. Also Fort Campbell, Ky.”
Other interests include music and reading.
“I like Christian and country music, especially George Strait,” she said. “I love to go shopping and I watch Grey’s Anatomy.”
She and her family like to go to the beach, to Schlitterbahn and Sea World, “We haven’t gone to Disney World yet, not as a family, but I did as a kid.”