Joan S.

“ Well, in my life I have learned at a young age to appreciate older people first of all for their wisdom and they truly do have a lot to offer people in many ways if you give them a chance. When I was 11 years old we opened our home to my father's great uncle. He lived with us for 14 years. I saw how my mother and father cared for him. My first work experience in caring for a senior was in a precious 80-year-old...

Well, in my life I have learned at a young age to appreciate older people first of all for their wisdom and they truly do have a lot to offer people in many ways if you give them a chance. When I was 11 years old we opened our home to my father's great uncle. He lived with us for 14 years. I saw how my mother and father cared for him. My first work experience in caring for a senior was in a precious 80-year-old woman's home six days a week, for two years. That was 6 years ago and I still go to visit her. She thinks of me as her daughter! I then had the pleasure in meeting a 75-year-old woman with a brain tumor who I cared for five days a week for one year. She was so sweet how she would try to communicate through her eyes. In 2002 my mother came out of a 6-month stay in the hospital as an invalid. My father insisted he did not want to move her to a nursing home. So, I helped him a couple days a week to care for her in a hospital bed in his living room for five years. My father passed away in Feb. 2007, so I moved my mother into my dining room and cared for her full time for two years. My nursing training at Greenville Tech. surely has helped me in many ways to manage so well.

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