Honoree Marcia Fulfills Her Calling as a Care Professional
Fittingly, it was at a New Jersey church on a Sunday in 1999 when Marcia Hess unknowingly saw her future – a lifelong passion for senior care – begin to unfold. “I got my start in senior care when someone at church needed help with their senior loved one and asked if I would like to try to take care of the loved one, who had Alzheimer’s,” Marcia recalled.
“I’ve been working as a professional caregiver for 26 years. It is my calling,” said Marcia, an award-winning Care Professional with Home Instead® of Mount Airy, North Carolina, where Van and Ann Lankford have been the franchise owners since they opened their doors in May 2011.
Marcia also has served as an unpaid family caregiver. “In Florida, I took care of my mother for seven years. She had vascular dementia as well as many other medical challenges. She died April 28, 2023, two days before my birthday,” Marcia said.
The time with her mother included some learning experiences even though Marcia had been immersed in professional senior care with a New Jersey agency for five years. “The day before my mother died, hospice sent a music therapist, who brought a guitar and sang. When he started singing, my mom’s eyes popped open, she turned her head toward him and she became responsive. Her eyes remained open as long as he was there. It was proof that music therapy works with those who have dementia,” Marcia explained.
Marcia’s trek to Home Instead after her family caregiving stint ended in Florida was a unique one. “I was not fond of Florida and was ready to leave when my mother passed away. While trying to sell her Florida home, I began researching my next move. I did not want to move back to New Jersey,” Marcia said. “I wanted to choose a great, friendly smaller town where I’d be comfortable and happy. When I went online, I found Mount Airy and researched it thoroughly. By the time I was done with an in-depth look, I had decided I even wanted to go to the Mayberry Day parade. I had prayed about it. When I visited and saw how great it was, I stayed.”
Marcia added: “I love Mount Airy. It sounds crazy on the surface when I talk about how I got here, but I have had no regrets. It really is friendly and nice. I heard about Home Instead from television commercials, and the office is two blocks from my apartment. The Home Instead staff is good and extremely friendly. Home Instead is like my former agency in New Jersey because they are family owned by people who are Christians. I had heard that Home Instead holds Christian-based values, and it has proved to be true.”
When Marcia joined Home Instead on Oct. 1, 2024, her life’s rhythm changed drastically, but she adjusted and excelled so exceedingly well that she was honored as the franchise’s Care Pro of the Month for April. “When I joined Home Instead,” Marcia explained, “I wanted day shifts and women clients only. Home Instead asked if I’d give this male client a try with overnight shifts. The longer I was there, the more I bonded. I see him as a sweet man. He is in his early 90s, has dementia and is blind.”
By helping her client, Marcia and another Care Pro are providing a big assist for the client’s daughter, with whom he lives. She works on a part-time basis and needs Marcia to get her sleep and take care of household chores. “His daughter and I talk when I first get there and again at the end of my shift. When I am there until 11 a.m. on one of my shifts, she gets to run errands,” Marcia said.
Referring to her client, Marcia said: “About 90 percent of the time, he recognizes my voice and remembers me after I arrive. I recently took a couple of days off for medical reasons, and he became agitated when another Care Pro came to fill in for me. He does not like change. The client was fine with me when I came back.”
Marcia added: “As far as mobility goes, the client is not bedridden, but it’s close to that. He still eats well. His daughter prepares his meals. For breakfast, he has Cream of Wheat, sometimes with a sliced-up banana. He likes bananas and Honey Buns. He once awoke in the middle of the night and wanted to get up and make fried eggs and bacon. I offered him a Honey Bun, and that took care of the situation.”
Like Marcia’s late mother, her client responds well to music. A former member of the clergy, the client was a member of a gospel quartet and sang in his churches’ choirs. “He loves the Jimmy Swaggart Ministries channel. When they have music, he sings along and claps his hands,” Marcia said. “He loves the old hymns, remembering the songs that were popular in his era.”
Like soothing tunes that never escape a person’s memory, Marcia can’t imagine a life in which she stops helping people, building them up and empathizing with them. “I won’t ever be done with senior care,” Marcia said, “but I also like variety in terms of other forms of care. I volunteer at church with Sunday school for children and in the nursery. I’ve taken care of children on a private-duty basis, but I always come back to senior care. I am fulfilling my calling.”
