St. John’s Staff Works Hard to Make Mother’s Day Memorable

This Mother’s Day was unlike any other in communities across the St. John’s spectrum of care as well as at other long-term care facilities and senior living residences across New York and around the country. With continuing visitation restrictions and social distancing precautions, the ability for residents to socialize with family, friends, and even neighbors has been severely impeded. “It is incredibly tough. Our residents miss their families so much, we miss their families,” Nate Sweeney, vice president of skilled services at St. John’s said. “This is an incredibly different Mother’s Day than we’ve ever had before.”

In the days leading up to Mother’s Day, St. John’s support staff made arrangements to, as Sweeney put it, “do everything we can to make sure that people are still surrounded with love.” That included bringing extra staff volunteers in throughout the weekend to make sure the several dozen deliveries were received by residents on time. In addition, well over 100 short videos were collected from loved ones from as far away as California and were shown to enthusiastic moms throughout the day. Previous Mother’s Day celebrations have included a special tea party, and the 2020 version included a mobile tea cart making stops to moms throughout St. John’s Home. Each mom also received flowers.

Sweeney summed up the importance of these Mother’s Day efforts to help residents celebrate the day while experiencing at least a touch of normalcy. “We’re living in a new normal right now and it’s a scary new normal, so what we try to do is just make sure that people feel supported.”

Check out the great WROC-TV coverage of Mother’s Day at St. John’s.