Q: Tell us a little bit about Kristine Farrell…
KF: I’m a Midwestern girl. I was born and raised in Minnesota. I have a 26-yearold son who is in his first year of law school. I raised him as a single mom since he was 3, and after he went off to college I remarried. A couple of years ago, we moved out to Pauma Valley which is located under Mt. Palomar (San Diego, California). It’s tiny, very rural, out in the middle nowhere surrounded by avocado and orange groves…really peaceful.
Workwise I’ve always been in employee benefits. A little over 8 years ago, I came to work at Sterling Administration as an Account Manager and am currently the Director of the team. When I first came on, Cora had launched Amazing Care and I needed to learn what it was all about, so I went to a couple of the luncheons at Rancho Santa Fe. The meetings are wonderful because they expose you to so many people, so many different walks of life, and useful resources for everybody. Between the speakers and the attendees, the doors are open to so many resources.
In 2019, we had to navigate some serious care issues in my family. I have an aunt and uncle who lived in Florida. My uncle Sam was caretaking for my aunt who was very ill for quite some time, and when she passed in 2019, we asked him if he wanted to come to California and live near us. He said yes…and he was already in his 90s! So, he came out to CA and lived with my mom. My husband and I were living a block away. After all the stress of taking care of his wife for so long, he began to relax, which was great, but then we started to notice, he was suffering from problems of his own and one of those problems was dementia. It took a few months for us to realize how bad it was and that he couldn’t be left alone.
My mother, who is extremely active in her 80s, is now taking care of her 90-year old brother! My husband and I would go over to give her a break. I started Friday night “date nights”, with just myself and Uncle Sam. We’ve always been close, but we really bonded during that time. And then he started to deteriorate more. He got lost a few times when out on his daily walk; he needed constant care. It was a rapid decline in that first nine months.
I reached out to Cora who sent me to the Amazing Care Network resources page. She also got me in touch with the Glenner Center.
It’s a center that helps aging people with dementia and Alzheimer’s. It’s an environment set up like in the 50s. When you walk in, all of the different rooms are from the past. They have an old Barber Shop, a room with a jukebox, everything from the 50s, so when people with dementia come in, they feel comfortable. It’s a Day Center that provides care to individuals and classes to caretakers. We enrolled my mom and my uncle. My mom was ecstatic because she was learning so much about how to deal with our new situation. Nobody teaches you these things…like when your loved one says 10 times, ‘did I eat?’ or ‘where’s my hat?’. You can’t say ‘I just told you that’. You have to act like it’s the first time. My mom was able to learn from the other caregivers in the class, most of them were spouses. My mom was seeing that she was not alone. She’s going through the same thing as everybody else. It really helped her process the entire situation.
I had also noticed it taking a toll on my mom from the time she started taking care of her brother until they enrolled in the classes at Glenner. She came out of the Glenner experience like she’d had breath of fresh air, like ‘I’m not alone’, it was so refreshing.
After a while, it became clear that mom could not continue to be a full-time care giver. And we started discussing our options for Uncle Sam. It was a terrible, a really hard decision…nobody wanted to make it.
And then Uncle Sam got sick with Covid and spent a month in the hospital. Fortunately, he made it through, but we knew we could not send him home with my mom as his fulltime caregiver. We went online to the Amazing Care Network and found a more resources. My sister and I reached out to a number of places and just started sifting through the possibilities. Luckily, we found a place for him. It’s actually a home that’s been converted into a residential facility. He’s 94 now, has been there for over a year and it’s his new home. We know he is in good hands.
Q: What would you like people to know about the Amazing Care Network?
KF: I don’t think people realize the resources that are available from Amazing Care Network. You can become connected with so many wonderful resources during times in need.
It’s a vehicle that allows you to have access to a savings program for yourself or if you want to help someone in need. There are also financial information resources, legal resources, health, and nutrition resources. So many resources are available on the website.
