LUNDAR, Man. – With a song, a smile and a laugh that builds deep within before it bursts out and fills the room, Lorraine Vigfusson works with the old, the sick, the lonesome.
One day, she was getting ready to lift a woman with Alzheimer’s, a woman who spent most of her time locked in her own world.
“Put your arms around me honey,” sang Vigfusson. “Hold me tight.”
Something in the old song struck a chord in the woman. She began to sing, not missing a word, and went to bed happy.
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“I was amazed. It was wonderful,” said Vigfusson. “You never know how they’re feeling when they can’t talk to you.”
It was a moment that stands out in the decade Vigfusson has worked in home care in this small town in Manitoba’s Interlake region.
Rural home-care workers have a hard job, said Vigfusson, who tends to tell it like it is. They work unpredictable hours with people who are often in great pain, and when they get home from work, they can’t talk about their day because of the confidentiality required in a small town where everyone knows everything about everybody.
A big part of the job is cleaning and bathing people who have lost control of their most personal functions.
“Some people are very dignified,” she said. “It’s humiliating for them to have you go in and do this stuff.”
She said she would probably feel the same way, if she were in their position. But she is never embarrassed to help them.
“I had four kids and I had done it for them.”
Puts people at ease
Vigfusson tries to make the experience as easy as possible. First, she always asks new clients what they can handle and what she should do, even if her duties are printed on a home-care task sheet.
Then, she tries to break the tension with humor.
“I can usually joke about it. I’m pretty crass sometimes.”
One fellow, paralyzed on one side of his body, kept his fly open all day so he could urinate into a container. He also chewed snuff, and through the day, tobacco would fall into his pants. When it came time for a sponge bath, Vigfusson got the man to laugh through his embarrassment.
“You’re not supposed to give Peter any of this stuff,” she told him, laughing at the memory.
Before she became a home-care attendant, Vigfusson worked as a payroll clerk and bookkeeper. She was attracted to home care because of the unionized pay – $8.25 to $11.04 per hour – and it was the only job available.
While the work and hours are challenging, the job has its rewards.
“You get to the point where they (clients) become like family to you. They get to depend on you. Sometimes you’re the only person they see.”
But personal relationships can also bring sadness or stress. Once, Vigfusson asked to be removed from an assignment because she couldn’t stand the client. Some clients have also requested she leave.
“It’s a two-way street,” she said.
And she has worked on three palliative care cases, where clients are facing death.
