Blessings All Around

Have you been to a nursing home lately?

Over the summer as I prayed for a career and thought about my passions, I decided I wanted to work there: in a nursing home.

I thought an activities director in a nursing home would be the ideal thing for me. I have a bachelor's degree in Art Therapy and Psychology and a nearly life long compassion and special interest in the elderly.

A woman I consider a spiritual mentor told me, as my life fell down around me two years ago, that God  is "able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us" (Ephesians 3:20). I have clung to those words and have meditated on them many times, as I have asked for and imagined many pieces of a new and less broken life. A job has been a central focus for me in the rebuilding. For the first time since becoming a mother nine years ago, I must work out side the home. 

For months before hand I prayed and researched. I swung wildly trying to land on something I could be excited to do every day. Last winter I started classes to be a Medical Assistant, grappling for something reliable. Discovering that is not something I would enjoy doing every day, I jumped (with abandon) to the idea of a therapeutic art studio. A dream I still hold onto for the future. As I flailed I applied to many jobs, ranging from activity director positions in nursing homes, to cleaning positions for residential homes. 

I am so excited to say, I have a new job! I have been there right around a month. It is not a nursing home activities director, I am finding it is a much better job for me than that. More than I could have asked for or imagined. I didn't know this position even existed at the time of my prayers for a career job.

Which brings me back to my last question. Have you been to a nursing home lately?

The first day of my new job I went to an activities session at a nursing home. It was an eerie place, with people in and out of their minds, missing body parts and ignoring social norms. It stopped my world and I saw for a few moments all that is most beautiful about life. Everything was simplified to the most basic of human experiences, exposing the essence of humanity and our tender form.

I had thought nursing homes had changed from the bad reputations of old and I think many establishments really have. However, every day I walk through the doors of this particular place (where half of my caseload resides) my heart aches for the residents confined to these walls, with little intellectual or social interaction to feed the spirit and I thank God I'm there. 

I get to make my own schedule, do casework from home and do a truly meaningful job as a means of supporting my children. Life as a single mother of three is some kind of crazy beautiful. I am learning to trust in God's goodness and abundant provision. He is faithful. 

Be blessed! 

Artwork by 75yo female with very limited use of arms/hands