TESTIMONIALS

I would like to share our family’s experience with Rob Pettyjohn, the owner/operator of Agape Senior Home Care. I first met Rob after my mother passed, and my sisters and I were searching for professionals or qualified in-home caregivers to support our father. He was already in his 90s, was legally blind, and suffered from dementia. He did recognize and acknowledge friends and relatives, was conversational, and enjoyed decent mobility. For these reasons, we felt his dementia was relatively mild, but we learned later that this perception was incorrect; our mother had done an excellent job of guiding him through daily routines, finishing sentences, and offering a helping hand, all of which minimized our awareness of his dementia. Right after mom’s death, we found several caregivers, some of them CNAs, but they didn’t work out for more than a week or two. We were beginning to feel a little desperate when one of my sisters heard about Rob and contacted him. He had just finished a work tour with a patient who had passed, and he was clearly saddened by that loss. 

This degree of care and a willingness to share his sense of loss about his former patient spoke well for his compassion. We quickly hired Rob for a fixed number of daytime hours a week, then, within a few weeks, hired three other workers, including another CNA, a niece, and her friend, each of whom looked after Dad one afternoon a week. Rob covered the rest of the weekdays. Most Saturdays, I went grocery shopping with Dad and stayed with him until early afternoon, and Rob usually covered Saturday afternoon until dinner. My sisters often came on Sunday, took Dad to lunch, shopped for clothes or whatever else he needed, and visited until dinner. One or the other of the siblings typically accompanied Dad to doctor visits so we could stay abreast of his physical and/or cognitive condition; occasionally, Rob would go along or take Dad to these visits, if needed. Most nights, Dad stayed alone and seemed pretty satisfied with that arrangement. Once he arrived, Rob was Dad’s primary caregiver. He connected with Dad and became familiar with his needs, routines, likes and dislikes, and the vitally important areas like medication management, personal hygiene, and nutrition.

One of the most significant components of care for those aging and declining in capability is recognizing the potential loss of dignity that goes along with such loss. It is in these areas that Rob’s work was demonstrative. He brought Dad through the painful loss of parsing out his own medications and helped ease the difficulty of dressing and maintaining clothing care. He regularly took care of things we had never considered, like laundry, bathing, haircuts, getting non-prescription medicines, making sure Dad spent time outdoors, and moving, and even accompanying Dad to gatherings with neighbors. Rob became a trusted part of a neighborhood that looked out for each other, and this kept Dad connected, too. Rob and Dad spent many hours sitting on the front porch talking, which was one of Dad’s favorite pastimes as long as I can remember. Dad’s emerging fear of things like bathing presented challenges. This was hard on Rob because he took personal hygiene for Dad very seriously. I credit much of this to Rob’s experience with other older patients and his awareness of how easy it is to overlook cleanliness when mobility and willingness fail. As his dementia advanced, Dad became afraid of the shower, and particularly the overspray during a shampoo. To us, this sounded irrational, but we would learn that it is not uncommon for dementia patients. Rob knew of a product to help deal with it and recommended soapless shower caps that allowed Dad’s hair to be cleaned without soap and water. We purchased those, and Dad’s hair was again cleaned on a regular basis. As Dad’s fears evolved, Rob had to begin assisting him with bathing as a safety measure. When Dad’s fear reached the point where he wouldn’t allow Rob to even try to help him into the shower, Rob deferred to the family for assistance, a move that was wise. He knew it was critically important that Dad trust him, and he never did anything to compromise that trust. In short, as Dad’s needs became more complex, Rob adjusted to meet those needs, applying his own experience to anticipate and respond to changing circumstances.

Although Rob was hired for daytime coverage, more than once he volunteered to stay late to clean up a mess, take Dad to a neighborhood function, or pick Dad up at an out-of-town family wedding and stay the night with him so the rest of the family could enjoy the festivities without concern. He routinely communicated with family and the other caregivers about Dad’s needs, which eased our fears greatly. As Dad declined, Rob was called on to manage his movements more carefully. When it became clear that Dad could no longer manage to stay in his home, Rob was as supportive of our decision to move him to a memory care unit to meet Dad’s daily needs. He visited Dad in his new home and was there to support the family when Dad passed away several months later. Nine years later, my sisters and I remain friends with Rob.

Considering all I have experienced and shared here, I recommend Agape Senior Home Care and Robert Pettyjohn without reservation. I can’t imagine what our Dad’s life, or ours, would have been without him and this agency.

~Tim Binkley