After taking care at home for our parents ten years plus, with the advance of dementia, we were forced to find another path.
Our family, Nine living children (one deceased), the parents and siblings were all afraid of what the future would bring.
As a couple in their late 90s one will always be more needy than the other. That was our family case and probably the hardest hurdle.
Our path fell into the caring, loving hands of John Clarke Retirement Center.
The head social worker/nurse (Tara and Dru) and staff – after a long assimilation time, worked with our family. They learned our parents’ struggles/obstacles and we witnessed their fortitude and dedication to help us accommodate the parents’ ever-changing needs.
If in one phrase if I could compliment the people at JC it would be: They rolled with the changes, the uncertainty of the dementia brain, they held/embraced the sad and the laughing siblings, they supported us nonstop and put up with our parents’ oddities (including daily private dog visits).
The Staff at JC – on all echelons – they got our parents and despite their tight schedules they became family to them.
The sad part is that now our parents are deceased – sadder is missing that wave, that smile, that hug from the JC family in the hallways.
They have become family in our hearts and our parents, and we will never forget their kindness and support when we were all so very weak and scared to follow the path that we were set on.