I finished my decorating and my house was just the way I wanted it. Everything was beautiful to me. I would walk through the house each day and thank the LORD and my husband and my son for my house. I invited my whole family to my house for Thanksgiving that year and also for Christmas. It was so great to be able to have family there with me. But soon the holidays were over and the new had worn off and people were not visiting much so I knew I needed to find me a new project.
The year passed and it came close to the second anniversary date of when my husband and son had died. I was getting depressed again and I was just staying home and sleeping for days again. I was sick a lot that year and I had to have gall bladder surgery on my husband’s birthday. I was so depressed that the doctor sent me back to grief counseling. I began going to counseling once a week and I was very fortunate to get a wonderful counselor who helped me a lot. She would suggest things for me to do to help me cope. She mentioned the Senior Volunteer Program to me and also the Recreation Department Programs for seniors.
I told her I would be interested in helping with the Senior Volunteer Program. It is a program where people fifty-five years old or older help older home-bound folks who cannot do everything for themselves. The Senior Companions Program allows them to be able to stay in their own homes instead of having to go to a nursing home.
I joined the Recreation Department and became active in that program. We meet for lunch and bingo on Tuesdays, and we take trips and have classes, etc. I have met a lot of ladies that I am now friends with through this organization. This program has helped me a lot.
But the Senior Companion Program has been such a blessing to me and has improved my life and made feel whole and useful again. I go and sit with a lady that is eighty-three years old and her husband is seventy-nine years old and a veteran for twenty hours each week. I am also disabled to a certain degree, so I told the program director that I could not do anything real physical and that I could not stand the heat. I would have to work inside. She assigned me to this family and I began visiting them each week about six months ago.
I go to visit them on Wednesdays from 8:00 a.m. until 4:00 p.m. Then I visit the same hours on Thursdays and I work only four hours on Fridays. Then I go to my grief counseling session afterwards.
I loved the little lady right from the start. She is petite and weighted only ninety something pounds and suffers from Parkinson’s disease. She has beautiful silver grey hair and she is mentally sharp as a tack and so neat and organized. Her husband was trying to take care of her by himself and he is also disabled and has trouble walking.
You know I love to cook—so here was my chance to cook for people who would really enjoy it and really appreciate it. I began cooking breakfast when I get there if they had not eaten. They would have me a cup of coffee ready when I walked in the door. Then we would decide what to cook for lunch and dinner. I usually bring food from my house to cook over at their house even though that is not in the program guidelines, but I have found that I do a lot of things that are not in the program guidelines. My supervisor told me to make sure and tell my folks that all the workers in the program did not do everything that I do for them.
