This is a place to discuss with each other what has worked well including care providers, institutions, elder law experts, care consultants, care at home options, etc. Please enjoy and don’t forget to drop us a line , join the forum, or submit your own story or poem.  Let’s spread the word about elder issues and give recognition to those who have been valuable in our journey and perhaps help folks avoid those who have made it more difficult.

Jane A. Malkoff MSN RN and associate Valerie Billingsley RN are care consultants on older adult issues. Their hope is to broaden ideas on aging and community through this website by creating a place for people of all ages from all over the web to gather and discuss the pertinent issues facing the aged such as institutionalization, home care, community deprivation, broken families, wisdom, life care planning, beauty in the aging body, profits from forced community extraction, excellence in caregiving, improving caregivers, empowering the elderly and their families, and more.

Jane, founder of Eldervibes, always wanted to be surrounded by the wisdom of older adults.  She can’t remember ever NOT thinking about the how and why of life and the way humans grow, develop and eventually pass on. For the past 25 years, Jane has worked on paths to improve the lives of those those with aging issues be it themselves or an aging loved one.  One thing lead to another and she found herself in nursing school and eventually a nurse practitioner with a Master’s Degree in Adult Health. Funny, her favorite work continues to be the first job she ever had. It was working in a nursing home where the nurse’s aides bathed, feed, toileted, dressed, loved, held, visited, laughed with, and cried with the residents (many of which Jane can still remember full names and clothing they owned) for $3.65/hour in the mid 1980s. Not to mention, this job also included preparing snacks, rinsing the dirty cloth diapers out by hand (no gloves, no disposable diapers), starting a load of laundry or two each shift, and being assigned 12-15 or more residents.

How could someone love this type of work so much and still miss it? It was meaningful, in ways hard to describe these days. When your work involves feeling the breath of those you care for, knowing the feel of their skin, being familiar with the quirks that keep them singing versus screaming, knowing their favorite clothes, understanding the loss of their identity…you know your existence is real and purposeful. This work is present moment stuff and it is more connection than most folks can bear.

Jane and Valerie would love to hear from other caregivers be it nursing home employees, home care workers, or family members providing care to a loved one. Your input to current issues is extremely valuable.