Air force veteran reflects on career and her path to dentistry

Dr. Maria Rabbio served as a dentist in the U.S. Air Force from 1978-2000.
Dr. Maria Rabbio served as a dentist in the U.S. Air Force from 1978-2000.
photo Dr. Maria Rabbio served as a dentist in the U.S. Air Force from 1978-2000.

BIO

Name: Dr. Maria RabbioAge: 75Branch of military: U.S. Air ForceYears of service: 1978-2000

View our 21 Veteran Salute page

The pages of the anatomy book in Dr. Maria Rabbio's house are streaked with the scribbles of a yellow marker.

She saved the book to remind her of the struggles - and humor - of her life 33 years ago, when she was a single mother in dental school. By day, her parents looked after her 2-year-old son and 5-year-old daughter as Rabbio took classes at Tufts University School of Dental Medicine in Boston. But at night, she fed the children, put them to sleep and studied.

There were complications. Rabbio often stayed up all night, looking after a sick child and reviewing her notes during rare breaks. She took exams on no sleep. One day, when she opened that anatomy book, she noticed the scribbles. Her son must have seen her taking notes in the margins and tried to emulate her.

"There was something sweet about that," she said.

Then there other problems, decidedly nastier.

Few women became dentists when she enrolled at Tufts in 1975, and some of her peers did not see the value of diversity. Although she was 10 years older than most of them, they accused her of taking a man's spot. They told her she was a token student, just a name on a list to satisfy feminists. Rabbio said she didn't have time to worry about the accusation.

"I just let it roll off my back," she said. "My goal was to get that degree. I really didn't care what their feelings were."

Rabbio, of Hixson, was under pressure at the time. She had graduated with degrees in biology and chemistry 10 years earlier and worked at U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs hospital in Iowa City, Iowa, assisting a study on how to solve the complications of dialysis. But when she and her husband divorced, she wanted more money to provide a better life for her children.

She thought about medical school, but she believed the time commitment would be too demanding for a single mother - especially when she graduated and would need to be on-call. A friend talked her into becoming a dentist. She applied to three dental schools in Boston, near where her parents lived. A worker in the admissions office at one school told her she couldn't enroll because the demands of classes were too great for a mother.

Instead, she went to Tufts. And by the time she graduated three years later, she had legally changed back to her maiden name. She wanted to honor her parents for their help, she said.

Money was still a challenge after school. Rabbio needed to pay back loans, and she didn't want to extend another line of credit to open her own practice. Instead, she enlisted in the United States Air Force.

She entered as a captain, learned how to shoot a handgun and studied the ranks of servicemen above her so she would know who to salute. She planned to stay three years. She stayed 22 and a half years.

"It just really fit me perfectly," the 75-year-old said.

In the clinics where the Air Force sent her, Rabbio was usually the only woman. But the structure of the military cut down on the discrimination she had experience before she enlisted.

"You got pay raises according to your own hard work," she said. "When you got promoted, you would get a pay raise. It made no difference if you were male or female. It was a very fair system. It was something like fulfilling the American dream."

She enjoyed working for the military because, unlike civilian dental offices, the cost of treatment was not a factor for patients. Healthy gums and healthy teeth were a matter of national security. If a dentist found something wrong, they fixed it.

After five years as a general dentist, Rabbio was accepted into a specialty program at Tufts in 1983, where she studied to become an endodontist. She liked the challenge of a root canal, the precision it required.

Her military career took her to Biloxi, Mississippi; Portsmouth, New Hampshire; Homestead, Florida; Las Vegas and Tokyo. She retired as a colonel before she and her second husband retired here to be closer to her son.

In between her many moves, Rabbio returned to Tufts for class reunions. Times and attitudes have changed, she said. With the perspective of hindsight, some of her male peers appreciate what she did.

"So many students came up to me and said, 'How did you ever do it?'" she recalled.

Contact staff writer Tyler Jett at 423-757-6476 or tjett@timesfreepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @LetsJett.

Upcoming Events