In Your Own Community

I live in Broward County, Florida. Best known for the white sandy beaches of Fort Lauderdale. For the past 40 years, my community has been blessed with a true senior advocate embodied by the Executive Director of the Broward County Aging & Disability Resource Center/Area Agency on Aging. She recently passed away at the age of 89.

This morning, I attended her celebration of life service at the funeral home down the street from her office. Her name was Edith Shaeffer Lederberg. The morning was as filled with laughter as it was with tears as her staff, family and friends got up to remember her humor, tenacity and dedication to caring for the seniors in our community.

I speak of her today for two reasons. One, because she was a unique and singular advocate for the seniors, disabled and family caregivers of Broward County. And two, if you look around, I know that you are sure to find your own Edith in your community. I know this for certain because for the past twenty years I have traveled these United States, hosting Fearless Caregivers in cities large and small. In each and every community, I find strong, caring and dedicated caregiver advocates who share the same concern; there are more people to help than they can possibly reach.

In fact, one year we hosted an event in Philadelphia and the inimitable Della Reese was our keynote speaker. As always, Della took every caregiver question posed to her and interacted with all the family members in the room. More than that, as the session progressed, we found family care advocates sharing stories of supporting community caregivers on a daily basis.

About three weeks after this event, out of the blue, I received an email from a Philly caregiver who was deeply upset that nobody got what she goes through. She was convinced that there was no help for her. This was, of course, a concerning conversation for many reasons, but especially because she lived blocks from the caregiving lovefest we held just weeks before. So, I knew that our work was really cut out for us and every other caregiver advocate in cities big, small and rural.

We connected this caregiver with some local support organizations, including the Philadelphia Corporation on Aging and last I heard, she was doing well.

The moral of the story is that although Edith was truly one of a kind, in every single community where caregivers reside, you will find your own Edith(s), working diligently to support your communities’ caregivers. Just let them know that you need them, and I guarantee they will come running.

Please share your caregiver advocate story in the comments below.