Wendy Martin, Traverse City, MI, Certified Phlebotomist, co-owns Crystal Penny Inc. Home Healthcare Company with her mother who is an RN. She worked as a quality automotive engineer for years. Then the recession hit, she was laid off and not sure what to do next. Her mother proposed moving north to help her with the […]
Therese Mukarushema, Lansing, MI emigrated c. 2004 from Rwanda where she was a nurse. Now a U.S. citizen, she at first had difficulty finding work and faced racism, discrimination, and ignorance. “Some people treat you like you are from the junk in Africa. They ask you, ‘Did you live with animals?’” Then she found home […]
Jennifer Lugo, Kent City, MI, is a Certified Nursing Assistant who is both a paid DCW and a family caregiver. She started caregiving as a teenager, with her maternal grandmother, who had cancer. She also watched her aunt take care of her grandfather with dementia in his home around that time. In 2007, she began […]
Eva Sharpe, Lansing, MI is a family caregiver, raised among an extended family of primarily Mexican descent that modeled caregiving for elders. She started helping her grandmother when she was age 12 and now cares for her uncle who has mild dementia. The family respite it provides makes home care possible. Family caregivers differ from […]
Richard Dusenbury, Ferndale, MI has been a DCW since age 20 when he took care of his grandmother. He is a certified nursing assistant, medical assistant, photography buff, speaks fluent French, and does mission work in Ghana with his church. He’s a DCW because he likes people, it reflects his Christian values, it allows him […]
Manila Freeman, Detroit, MI, retired from the Detroit school system as a GED specialist. Like many DCWs, she started as a family caregiver, caring for her brother, a disabled Veteran with multiple needs. After he moved in, she learned that “an agency” had signed him up for assistance and made her the paid homecare worker. […]
Kelli Holmgren, Battle Creek, MI started as a Certified Nursing Assistant in 1993 after a few tries as a “factory rat”. She discovered she “can’t do the mundane things over and over and over. It’s just not me. I fit helping people.” She is now a “rehab home health aide” who can make it financially, […]
Aria Porraz, Kalamazoo, MI, self-identifies as Hispanic and is an education major at Western Michigan University. She has been working as a DCW for 2 years to pay rent while in college, plans to work with children, loves animals, reading and yoga, and works full-time for a home care agency that provided training on specific […]
Heather Zielinski, Belmont, MI, a certified medical assistant who self identifies as Cherokee, loves to read and learn about history and other cultures, and feels working with people who are dying is a privilege. She has been “screamed at, spit at, sworn at, swung at, stuck with a needle, worked with a convicted pedophile, and […]
Sue Fierro, Lansing, MI, has been in home care for over 20 years. She entered the field because it seemed like a good fit with her desire to help people and it didn’t require a college degree. Her first experiences were frightening because she was sent to homes without sufficient training to care for clients […]
