Nine Years of Service (Part 3 of 3)

This month, our company celebrates nine years in business. As a founding partner of Elder Care Guides, I've enjoyed this opportunity to reflect on how far we've come, and how much we've accomplished for and with our clients. In this final post, I'll recount three more of my favorite memories from my first nine years as a part of this company:

7) Several years ago, in an effort to reconnect a frail and disabled elderly woman to a forgotten passion, one of our care managers helped a client who lived in a skilled nursing facility procure the supplies she would need to take up a unique form of painting she had mastered as a young woman. I will never forget the transformation that this client underwent, as she not only revived her old skills, but in fact taught them to her own art therapist. We arranged an art show at her facility, wherein several of her pieces were displayed and sold. I was so proud of our team, for not only providing for this client's basic care needs, but for helping her connect to this part of herself that she was able to pass along to the next generation.

8) Not long ago, a dear client whose care I had managed for many years passed away, and when I walked into the office the next morning, I was met with hugs from my colleagues, who shared funny memories of him, and joined me in my grief. I loved not only the fact that I was not expected to "be a professional" in that moment, and instead felt free to process the sadness of the personal loss, but I also loved the fact that every member of the Elder Care Guides team actually knew him. In our many years of providing care management and caregiving services for him, everyone on our staff had met him, knew his family, and understood his quirky personality. I'd often spoken of the merits of our team approach, and had never felt it more profoundly than in that moment.

9) Last year, I was elected to the Board of Directors of the National Association of Professional Geriatric Care Managers (NAPGCM), the organization that provides standards of practice and ethics for care managers, promotes certification, and provides continuing education for care managers nationwide. I'm deeply proud of Elder Care Guides' commitment to service and professional leadership with NAPGCM and in our local community.

Cheers to a great first nine! Here's to many more.

Nine Years of Service (Part 2 of 3)

This month, our company celebrates nine years in business. As a founding partner of Elder Care Guides, I've enjoyed this opportunity to reflect on how far we've come, and how much we've accomplished for and with our clients. In this series of posts, I recount nine of my favorite memories from my first nine years as a part of this company:

4) In 2007, Susan Valoff (who was then a colleague working at another local care management agency) and I co-chaired a committee that planned the annual educational conference of the Western Regional Chapter of the National Association of Professional Geriatric Care Managers (NAPGCM). To do so, we enlisted the help of several of our local care manager colleagues, providing many of us with our first opportunities to get to know one another. From this very positive experience of working together, we formed the local unit of NAPGCM, which continues to meet six times per year for professional education and collaboration. I'm deeply proud to work in an industry that is collaborative, rather than competitive, at its core. (Not to mention that just a few years later, Susan would join our team at Elder Care Guides, becoming a partner in the business and the foundation of our great clinical team.)

5) In 2008, we moved from our humble home office beginnings into a beautiful leased office space in Liberty Station. Our office in Historic Building 28 is a set of restored barracks, built when this property was the Naval Training Center (NTC). It was an area of San Diego that is full of historical importance, and personal memories for our clients (many of whom were WWII veterans), and their families.

6) Three years ago, one of our caregiver employees received the award for Outstanding Home Care Service from the California Association of Health Services at Home (CAHSAH). The award is given in Sacramento annually to an individual who is "directly involved in day-to-day care and has consistently provided outstanding service to patients in their homes." An employee of Elder Care Guides since 2004, today she continues to embody our philosophy of client-centered care.

Nine Years of Service (Part 1 of 3)

This month, our company celebrates nine years in business. As a founding partner of Elder Care Guides, I've enjoyed this opportunity to reflect on how far we've come, and how much we've accomplished for and with our clients. In these next few posts, I'll recount nine of my favorite memories from my first nine years as a part of this company:

1) Our first day in business together, I woke up in the morning excited to head over to the home of Norman Hannay (Elder Care Guides' founder and President) to get to work. Full of energy and enthusiasm, I headed outside, only to find that my car wouldn't start. I called Norman, we had a good laugh, and then spent our first couple of hours as business partners getting my car towed to the mechanic. It was a frustrating start, but from the beginning, it was clear that we were creating a place where employees would feel cared for and supported.

2) Receiving our first call. A social worker from a local hospital system called to describe a difficult situation she had on her hands, and to ask if it sounded like an appropriate referral to a geriatric care manager. We served her patient for years, helping to get his dirty apartment cleaned up, finding him a companion caregiver who was a perfect match for his personality and interests, and keeping his long-distance family caregiver connected and informed. We kept Mr. S, who had lived alone all of his life and had resisted assistance, safe and happy in his home for several years, and I still think of him often.

3) Our first company holiday party (in 2004) was just myself, Norman, and my husband -- the three of us sharing a meal together around Norman's dining table. Every year since, I've thought back to this old memory as our company has grown, and note that our holiday gatherings today involve a big, bustling room full of people that I'm very proud to call my colleagues.

The Myth of Independence

The month of July always starts off with a bang, as Americans celebrate the anniversary of our nation's founders having declared our independence from Britain all those years ago. The word "independence" comes up in nearly every conversation that I have with a family, as a professional geriatric care manager. Many of the phone calls and e-mails that we receive from concerned caregivers center around the dilemma of independence: wanting to allow an aging or disabled loved one to retain as much independence as possible, while ensuring their health, safety, and well-being. Sometimes we talk about independence as a living arrangement: "My grandmother is 95 years old, and still lives alone in her own home." Other times we talk about it as a feature of one's personality: "My father would never ask for help with anything." Families frequently see what they describe as "independence" as an obstacle to connecting their loved one with the resources and supports that they need.

As deeply as I understand this dilemma, I often challenge families to re-frame their thinking around the concept of independence. A person who lives alone in a private home without the assistance of a caregiver is not necessarily independent. A person who prefers solitude to socialization is not necessarily independent. And a person who has difficulty asking for - or accepting - help from others, is also not necessarily independent. It is a rare human being who could actually be considered "independent," contrary to our popular myths about ourselves as Americans. Throughout our lives, we rely upon others - our families, the other members of our economy, and society at large - to help us meet most of our basic needs of food, clothing, and shelter. We are, in reality, entirely interdependent upon one another, and this does not change as we age. The ways in which we rely upon those around us certainly change, but the fact of our needing their assistance does not. By shifting the way that we think and talk about dependence, I believe that we can begin to break down the emotional barriers to the giving and receiving of help.