Care Journey
Beginning
Ranger Home Care would like to introduce to you a client with an extraordinary story, Evelyn Cutler.
Evelyn was born in East-Prussia in 1933, known nowadays as Poland. At the age of 12, in 1945, she had to flee Poland with her mother and two sisters, due to the Russian invasion at the end of World War 2. Sadly, Evelyn’s father did not survive this risky escape and Evelyn and her mother and her sisters found themselves in Eastern Germany. Fortunately relatives offered them living space. As they became integrated into life in East Germany Evelyn felt challenged by the constraints of life in Communist Eastern Germany. She desperately wanted to be a teacher but did not want to teach the syllabus. Evelyn gave up her dream and decided instead to be a seamstress.
In 1951, at 18 years old, Evelyn again risked a daring escape to West Berlin. Finding herself outside the contraints of Eastern Germany she set her sights on becoming an au pair in England, a place she always dreamed of living. She got a UK permit and soon made the journey to her dreamland. The journey itself was not without drama, Evelyn developed lung disease and a high fever when crossing the channel she became so ill that immediately upon arrival in the UK she was admitted to hospital. Thankfully Evelyn was treated successfully and the year she spent in hospital allowed her to learn English fluently. When she left hospital Evelyn secured a job a companion/housekeeper to a wealthy couple. Years later, the wife died, and Evelyn married the husband, a successful stockbroker.
Having a great love for books, Evelyn developed her clever mind and quickly became engaged in her husbands job learning to invest and play the stock market she had her own office and was a career woman before the term had been invented.
Evelyn has a love for many things. As mentioned before, she has an large collection of books, which she always enjoyed diving into. Her love for gardening is also obvious when seeing her well-kept and vibrant garden. Evelyn is also a great dog lover. This much is clear when seeing the many pictures of dogs around the house. Furthermore, she has a wonderful singing voice and used to enjoy signing opera music. Evelyn also has the skillful ability to paint, which she showcases by putting her paintings around her house.
Working together
Evelyn developed dementia during her 84th year. She lived alone with her dog and was at risk of self neglect, financial abuse and wandering. She could no longer complete daily tasks such as cooking, cleaning and personal care alone. As Evelyn’s next of kin all lived overseas, Adult Services stepped in to appoint the Court of Protection to oversee her finances and Ranger Home Care to provide her with live in care. Evelyn had made it clear to Adult Services, she never wanted to leave her much loved home and garden. Evelyn loves having a live-in carer, they love sharing their meals, cooking together, walking round the garden and watching of course Strictly Come Dancing.
Evelyn’s sister, who was based in Germany and visited her annually, sadly passed in 2016. The rest of her family are in the USA so when we began caring for Evelyn she had not seen her family for 5 years. Contacting her family abroad had been difficult due to her limited technological expertise, and then forgetting her sister phone number. Her sister in the USA had not seen Evelyn for 12 years. Mary – Ranger Home Care’s Care Co-ordinator visits fortnightly to facilitate a facetime call between Evelyn and her sister. Using an iPad Evelyn is now able to communicate with her sister on a regular basis and see each other whilst also being able to remain in her much loved home.
Thank you
We would like to thank Evelyn and her family for sharing her story and hope that we can enable many more golden moments between Evelyn and her family.
