Life Stories: How home care supports Anita to stay socially active
Anita has always valued her friendships and local community in Victor Harbor. After her husband passed away, Anita had her own health concerns to manage but was not going to let them prevent her from doing the things she always enjoyed.
Her Home care package helped Anita to maintain her social activities, participating in art and craft, community events, volunteer work and enjoying social outings with her friends. She’s created a support network around her and feels safe and comfortable living at home on her own, knowing that help is only a phone call away.
How home care helps Anita to maintain her independence
Our home care clients all have different needs to which we tailor our services. For Anita, social interactions and staying in touch with friends is very important to her. A good part of her home care package is allocated to transport to and from gatherings and events.
“Home care has prevented me from getting depressed and miserable, because it’s helped me stay connected to my friends. I have made many new friends through my home care service.”
Anita no longer drives, and this is often a reason people begin to stay indoors more often. But this doesn’t need to be the case. Anita may not drive anymore but she is very organised and plans ahead for transport to and from social and community events with her carer or home care coordinator. This also includes St Louis’ wide range of planned social activities.
“The social events are exceptionally good and people are often surprised at the things we do and will often tell me ‘oh, we never do anything like that’. The quality of the events is good and staff are very caring.”
The home care services that help Anita the most
When our home care coordinators sat down with Anita to create her home support plan, she was quite clear about the help she wanted at home. After spending the time to understand her lifestyle needs, we included the following services in her home support plan:
- A gardener to maintain and tidy her garden
- A cleaning service every fortnight
- Podiatry to keep her feet in good health
- Hairdressing on occasions
- Transport to and from social events, doctors’ appointments, shopping trips and anything else she needs to get out and about for.
“Home care keeps you in touch with the world outside. St Louis are very kind, caring and generous people, both the staff and the people I’ve met on the trips. I couldn’t manage without them.”
Thinking about home care but concerned about maintaining your independence?
We asked Anita what advice she’d give people who were thinking about home care but concerned about strangers in their home and that they may lose their independence.
“Don’t worry and get on with it. They are honest, kind and good people. You’ll be in control of your services. Ring St Louis, they will help you. It has definitely given me more independence and anything I need they will advise and help me.
I would not have been as social as I am now, and I wouldn’t be able to do the things I do now if I didn’t have home care help.
I work on the home care services as I go. If I need something, I just ring my home care coordinators and they will help me immediately. If I have any complications with my services, they are there for me and will promptly attend to things, I have never had to wait long. Thank you to St Louis for all your care.”
Phone us to find out how home care can help you live more comfortably at home
We have many happy home care clients in both Adelaide and Victor Harbor. They are creating the lifestyles they want, enjoying new hobbies, making new friendships and feeling safer and more supported at home. If you would like to find out how home care will help you remain at home independently, please call our home care Adelaide office on 8332 09050, or home care Victor Harbor on 8552 1481.