True believers.

It was a warm June morning and I was reading the post op. instructions for an impending surgery. Oops. It read "no lifting or straining". As a caregiver to my husband, this creates a problem. Without hesitation, I contacted Covenant Living for help with respite care. Assisted Living Director May Sunglao guided us skillfully through the admission process and within days my husband was settled in a beautifully appointed peaceful room. The care he received was far beyond expectation. From the friendly staff that made sure every need was met, the exercise, planned activities, and entertainment programs, my husband flourished. I brought home a new man! Taking what we learned from the respite experience at Covenant Living he continues to exercise, help with the daily chores and eagerly looks for more ways to participate in our daily life. Thank you Assisted Living at The Sequoia at Covenant Living of Turlock. What a blessing you have been in our lives.

I have appreciated your work with me as a physical therapist. I possess a bad case of shoulder arthritis. It seems to worsen every year. Your treatments over the course of three weeks have amazingly helped lessen the pain, which seemingly is ever present. In fact, I told my visiting son last week that I felt totally well! The treatments have lessened my tenseness, which allows me to have greater range of motion. May this early success continue! A very grateful geezer.

During my wife's recent bout with Sciatic nerve pain, we had an occasion to use several services provided by the Village starting with our Wellness Nurse, who provided the initial diagnosis and then was very helpful in getting the necessary physician and insurance approvals for my wife to start physical therapy promptly. We were very pleased that the treatment received from the care center was very effective in relieving the initial pain and balance difficulties. Also, we were most grateful that the dining services provided tray delivery and take-out meals during the acute phase of the pain my wife endured. We thought you would like to know that these services met a very real need in our lives. Thank you.

The Sequoia Seedling that Grew to Grow Up Tall at Sequoia

A year ago, my mom began nurturing a Sequoia redwood seedling that popped up by her roses in her lovely garden. It was just peeking through the soil when I first saw it. It has thrived and just reached the tip of her patio ceiling this July.

In preparation for Mom's move from residential to assisted living, I have been thinking a lot about how my mom will miss her morning and evening time outside on her patio doing her devotions, reading the paper, eating breakfast, and enjoying the beauty around her...and the tree.

The other day when I was going out for a run around the hospital block, I noticed a guy trimming tree branches by the putting green. I said, "You must be the tree guy!" I told him about Mom's love for her Sequoia and wondered if there might be a place to transplant it in the gardens at the assisted living building where she will move. "We were just talking about getting a new tree.. he said, this is meant to be."

When I returned 30 minutes later, he had already gone to the building and noted that the space in front of her window is too small, but that they could plant it in front of the patio space that is close to her new room. He said she could sit at her patio table and watch her tree grow. I was so thrilled!

When my mom was told about the idea, we decided it would be fun to plant it around her moving day. I asked her if she knew any poem we could recite at the "planting," and she immediately recited the popular line from Joyce Kilmer's poem:

Happy moments for me and my mom!

Trees
by Joyce Kilmer

I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth's sweet flowing breast;

A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in Summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.