SHERIDAN — At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, everyone from family and friends to beauticians were prohibited from entering long-term care facilities, month after month.
Daughters on the outside wondered, who would sort their mother’s summer wardrobe? Loved ones worried about who would trim their uncle’s hair, or even his fingernails, and people hoped there was someone to sit beside their loved one, bringing comfort at a time when the world was so scary. Nurses, certified nursing assistants and staff across the nation picked up the pieces, acting as family to residents in the absence of their own.
“Our ladies couldn’t get to the beauty shop, they couldn’t get their nails done,” Barbara Maronick, director of nursing at Elmcroft of Sugarland Ridge said. “Those very intimate relationships we took on, for both the men and the women. The men couldn’t get to the barber shop. Those things are so important for dignity.”
Staff and residents at Elmcroft have always felt like family, but those bonds deepened in 2020, Executive Director Tammy Yelton-Boone said. People who had spent decades caring for residents in long-term care facilities — people who had already dedicated their lives to others — acted with even more selflessness and compassion than before.
“Everyone here gave so much of themselves, and when we didn’t think we had more to give, we kept giving,” Yelton-Boone said. “It’s one of those things that we will look back on and wonder how we got through it. But we did. One day at a time.”
Carolyn Ley, a CNA who has worked at Elmcroft for 24 years, said she turned to God on the hardest days, and she kept going to work for the residents.
“If we just spent a little extra time getting them ready, making sure their hair looked alright, trimming their nails, whatever they needed, we would do that,” Ley said. “I feel it is my calling to take care of the elderly. I did a lot of praying, and I relied on God. And for so long, we were the encouragers, saying it will get better. Well, when?
“But now, it is getting better,” Ley said.
The staff at Elmcroft, though required to shut out much of the rest of the world, was not alone. Just miles away at Westview Health Care Center, the residents and staff were coping in much the same ways. Erika Burgess, nurse manager at Westview, said her staff relied on each other, growing closer than they thought possible.
“I think that long-term care nurses, in general, have huge hearts,” Burgess said. “They’re in it to develop long-term relationships. They truly love and care for people. That includes each other, and where they lean on each other for support and guidance, they also give that to the residents, and they get that love and support back from the residents.”
Through shortages and outbreaks, heartbreak and even in death, Sheridan nurses continued to go to work every day, becoming more and more like family to each other and to those they cared for.
“It has been a big struggle, but they just keep coming back. Our nurses and our CNAs just keep coming back, every day, every shift,” said Erin Steigelman, director of nursing at Westview.
Westview faced a small COVID outbreak involving eight patients in January and February, and nurses worked day in and day out, putting their own needs aside to be with the patients. In the end, four residents passed away, and the loss was immeasurable.
“We had nurses that worked in the COVID unit for long stretches of time, 18 straight days of 12 hour shifts, and (who were the) only the nurse back there with the patients,” she said. “That takes somebody very special to be able to do that. They put themselves at risk, they put their families at risk, but they were still there, every day. We didn’t get breaks, but I haven’t heard my nurses complain. They amaze me every day.”
Kim Deti, spokesperson with the Wyoming Department of Health, said she believes more than 80% of residents in long-term care facilities in Wyoming were vaccinated by the end of February. The WDH encourages long-term care facility staff and all eligible Wyoming residents to get vaccinated as well.
“Vaccines are our most effective tool to keep COVID-19 at bay. When we can keep transmission rates low within our communities, that helps protect the staff and residents of long-term care facilities,” Deti said. “Staff of long-term care facilities have had a difficult but critical role to fill during the pandemic, and they deserve our respect and our thanks.”
Yelton-Boone said that while “normal” is on the horizon, she remains cautious.
“It’s great that things are easing up and we can have visitors again,” she said. “But I think that people should still be cautious and wear their mask. It is almost like the floodgates have opened, or like this is done. But it’s a process. There is a new normal. That new normal is that we have to take precautions even though we are opening up.”
A certain protectiveness toward both her staff and residents is understandable. The pandemic intensified what was already a demanding, although beloved, career. Amy Martini, a nurse at Elmcroft for more than a decade, struggled to put into words exactly how the COVID-19 pandemic changed her life.
“For me, this is my passion. It’s all I have done for 31 years,” Martini said. “And being the one to be able to go to residents’ rooms every day, and to be able to be there for them — that has meant something. Talking about it, I get a little tightness in my chest. That is new. I have always had good relationships with patients, but now, when I talk about it, that tightness is there.”
For many, many months, it was the nurses, staff and residents on the inside, and the COVID-19 pandemic on the outside.
“The nurses aren’t related to these guys by blood, but they are family,” said Tonya Murner, executive director at Westview. “They hold their hands when they are sick or when they are dying. They shed just as many tears as if it would be their own mother or grandmother.”
Long-term care facility staff from the bus driver to the director of nursing took on new tasks, shopping for residents, sorting through seasonal clothing when summer came, fixing hair and setting up virtual and telephone calls with loved ones. They went room to room chatting, giving residents a window to normalcy. And as things get better, as families can visit again and residents can gather in dining halls, there is light at the end of the tunnel.
“Just getting to see the families again, and see the smiles on their faces as well, that is huge. Every little bit that we are able to open up, you can see the morale lift a little bit more,” Murner said. “Our nurses and CNAs worked tirelessly through everything, and gave up spending time with their own families so they could be here for this family.”
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