Tom's Transformation

Let me tell you about my friend Tom*. Upon admission to our home in 2016, Tom was able to walk. However, due to several health complications, he started to rapidly decline to the point where he lost the ability to stand and walk. That’s when his behaviours really started to change and he became very aggressive. 

I got to know Tom pretty well, as I’m his primary day nurse. He gravitated to me for whatever reason. If I spent time with him and took him for walks around the building, then his behaviours would deescalate. 

However, one day, I happened to be on my coffee break, and Tom was having an aggressive episode. One of the charge nurses felt that to protect him from the other residents, he had to be removed. By the time I was called downstairs, Tom was being taken away, yelling at me, “I thought you were my friend!”

I drove home from work that day in tears. I felt so powerless because he depended on me to care for him, and in that moment, I was unable to help. It was a horrific moment to experience, and all of us at the home agreed to ensure that it never happened again. 

Tom was kept at the hospital for a week, where he was evaluated and put on different medications. When he came back to our care, he was still agitated. So as a team, we made a game plan for how to deal with his behaviour. We agreed that when he started getting agitated, another PSW would tend to my clients so I could go to him and deescalate his behaviours. I’d take him for a walk around the building, and we’d go get a pop together because that’s his favourite treat. 

Then one day, I was walking down the hallway by his room, and I saw he was standing up by himself without any help! He said he was going to get chocolate for some of the gentlemen who sit at his table in the dining room, because it was almost Christmas and he heard they hadn’t seen their families yet. A week after that, he told me he was ready to walk! We spoke with a physiotherapist, and within a couple weeks, he was up and walking again! 

His aggressive behaviours have totally subsided. Just the little thing of arranging it so that I can be available to take Tom for a walk and get him a pop, and having a physiotherapist see him, has made a total difference. A lot of times, in this profession, you only hear the bad stuff, but it helps to value your residents as people with lives, not just a job. 

To my fellow PSWs: don’t be afraid of speaking up and being an advocate for your residents. We spoke up and came up with a game plan for dealing with Tom, and it’s made a huge difference. You know the resident better than anybody. We know it’s such a difficult thing for a family to go through, and we PSWs play such a major role in the lives of the entire family as well as the residents in our care.

Everyone in our facility has been so touched by Tom’s transformation. It’s changed all of us, and given us renewed hope that the little things we do to help our residents can transform their lives as well. 

*Name changed