When Tracy Hehr, a resident in the Sierra Vista Health Care Center in Loveland, started toward her goal of showing appreciation for long-term care workers, she complained — complained that the long-term care workers were being too bashful and too shy about the important work they were doing.
Hehr, who has lived in the facility for around four years, said that with the impacts of the pandemic and the dangers it brings for those living in health care facilities like hers, she wanted those who help her every day to be recognized for the hard work that they do to keep her and others safe.
“It baffles me how they can come to work every day and it is like their home,” Hehr said. “They treat us with the respect of us being in our home.”
She added she recognizes that the field of long-term care nursing can be difficult, especially during a time like right now, and she didn’t want those who meant so much to her to look back and feel their work was not noticed.
“Twenty years down the line I don’t want to think about Anna or Amanda or somebody being depressed because they didn’t get the recognition they deserve,” Hehr said. “They would say ‘I am (so) depressed and I don’t know why.’ But I would know.”
And while she said she thanked those around her for all they did, she wanted to do more. So she reached out to the office of Larimer County Commissioner John Kefalas and got to work on creating a proclamation.
“She really wanted it to get out to everybody,” said Courtney Deckman, administrator with Sierra Vista “I thought it was really neat and so profound that she had thought through that.”
Kefalas brought the official proclamation before his fellow commissioners Tuesday morning during the weekly county commissioners meeting. He said he had heard from Hehr around a month ago, and had since worked with her and his staff to get it ready.
“Our intent is to appreciate the work of those putting themselves at risk providing a safe place for people to live in skilled nursing facilities and assisted living centers,” Kefalas said during the meeting.
The motion to make Nov. 10 an appreciation day for long-term care workers passed unanimously and with no debate. This meant a lot to Hehr and those who work at Sierra Vista.
“It is a wonderful thing,” said Anna Swinney, assistant director of nursing at Sierra Vista. “Long-term care can be … unrecognized by a lot of people; dismissed as not so hard. It was nice to receive the recognition and the appreciation, and for others to recognize the importance of long-term care in these people’s lives.”
She added that for many of those who work in long-term care, the people they work with become more than just patients or someone living in the facility.
“Not only are we here just taking care of their medical needs and their daily activities of daily living but they become family, they become friends, they become a very special place in our hearts for the rest of our lives,” Swinney said.
Tisa Hove, a licensed practical nurse with Sierra Vista, said the recognition from the commissioners and the county meant a lot. “I think for people in long-term care it is very important, because you lose your sense of purpose and importance in the community, so I think it means a great deal,” she said.
Deckman said for many, including herself, working in long-term care is long-term. Many workers start out when they are very young.
“It is pretty remarkable to see these 18- or 19-year-olds balancing school, a personal life and coming to work and taking care of these people when you don’t know what you are going to face each day,” Deckman said.
This hard work is not lost on the residents at Sierra Vista. Hehr said she has talked to many of her fellow residents who feel the same about the work that their caretakers do; work that Hehr described as being done with dignity, respect, honesty and pride that brings true wealth of the heart to the community.
“That is why I think health care centers should be recognized at least once a year,” Hehr said. “It makes Colorado, all of Colorado, a very rich state.”
She said that she and other residents are hoping to get some money together to buy a plaque for the official proclamation to continue to honor the work that those at Sierra Vista do.
Hehr said thinking of this recognition of the work of those around her brings tears of joy to her eyes, and she hopes that the staff’s families, their “little boys and little girls” who may ask why their family member is putting themselves in potential danger, know this hard work is not taken for granted.
“For that little kid to know that they come here with everything and they put everything into it and we appreciate it,” Hehr said. “And we give them our everything back.”
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Sierra Vista resident behind long-term care worker appreciation proclamation discusses importance of care workers - Loveland Reporter-Herald
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