Eden is here
Shannon LeClair – Times Reporter
Debbie Wakelam, owner of Meadowlark supportive living facility, always knew she thought outside of the box when it comes to caring for seniors. So one day while she was searching the Internet to see how other care homes worked, she came across the Eden alternative. Wakelam went to Saskatoon and took the Eden Alternative Associate Training at Sherbrooke Community Centre.
“A lot of the information wasn’t new for what I’m already doing, but there are subtle changes that we are making. Things like empowering the resident to make more choices,” said Wakelam. “I always felt that I was different, and here was an idea that sort of resonated with me.”
The Eden alternative follows 10 principals. The main focus is to identify and correct the three plagues which affect most seniors in care homes: loneliness, helplessness and boredom.
“When I came home from the conference, they wanted to know what I had learned. I told them I was doing it all wrong, and that from now on we’re going to do things the way you want them to be done. They embraced it pretty quick,” said Wakelam. She currently has three elderly ladies living with her, Margarite Godkin, Maggie Gregory and Helen Jensen, and the ladies live upstairs in the house while Wakelam lives downstairs. By edenizing the house, the ladies now have more of a say in what they want to do, and aren’t stuck to a structured day like they might have at the Lodge.
“There are lots of things you can’t do there, that you can do here, like coming out in your house coat for breakfast, or sleeping in until 8 a.m.,” said Jensen. The ladies chose to live with Debbie, instead of going to a more structured care home, because they felt they were treated like kids in other facilities.
“I still have some of my faculties left yet, and I like to think for myself,” said Godkin.
The changes which have come about have made the house feel more like a home for the ladies and less like a care centre. Wakelam is hoping the word will spread, and that other facilities in and around Strathmore will begin to adopt the idea.