Christmas on the Special Care Unit
Wednesday, November 28, 2012
By: Beth Reinert

Bomb Threat brings out the best on a Special Care Unit

It was the day before Christmas Eve and I expected to be winding down the holiday activities on the unit, then have a few days off to enjoy Christmas with my family. We'd been back in Mobile for a year, my new husband and I and now we were six months pregnant with our first child.
Having worked nine months on the Special Care Unit, life there was very routine. The residents passed their time in the dayroom, the place where meals were eaten and the 14 residents gathered daily. I was the recreation director for this locked Alzheimer ward. Although I was the youngest there, I felt a strong sense of protectiveness and responsibility toward these unfortunate people whose minds had seemingly wandered off, thereby landing them in a nursing home that provided this safe and secure haven for them to live out their days. Each resident was unique, yet few could speak a full sentence, let alone understandable words. I wore a large printed sign suspended around my neck that spelled my name. Somehow they knew me by that sign as I always wore it. One of my favorite residents, a woman named Ruth, who was usually in an agitated state and shuffling her feet along the hallway in her slippers, would call out to me with a heart wrenching wail while reaching through the locked iron gate toward me as I passed from the elevator to my office before coming onto the unit. Many times she would try to say something to me, the usual stuttering syllables coming out, then grab onto my nametag, give it a little pull and be satisfied that she had communicated her message. We had mostly ambulatory patients, only one bed ridden, a few unsteady on their feet but mostly there was a good deal of wandering from room to room, looking for the way out.
What started out as a routine day in December turned into anything but normal. We got word on the unit that the nursing home was under a bomb threat and all residents would have to be evacuated. The nursing home had three floors, filled to capacity. Since we were careful to keep our wandering residents "locked in", to get them all out seemed like a momentous task. However, with no time to waste, an alternate location was secured at a nearby nursing home and the transporting began. All vehicles available were put to use. Since the elevators were being used for the bed-ridden residents, I helped some of our people down the three flights of stairs and out the front door into an awaiting station wagon. Even to our confused Alzheimer folks, this was highly unusual activity and surprisingly, everyone was cooperating. This must have seemed like the great escape they had all been hoping for. We loaded five residents into the station wagon and I got into the drivers seat. As we pulled up to the exit onto the main street, I paused to wait for a break in the traffic. Next to me on the front seat was my dear Ruth who was very attentive to all that was happening. She watched the oncoming traffic, then spoke. "You can go," she said. These were the first intelligible words I had ever heard her speak and she was right. I looked at her with surprise and saw a smug satisfied smile on her face. I hugged her and said, "thank you", knowing I had just witnessed something extraordinary. Off we went on our great adventure to move to the safe location. Thankfully, everyone was successfully moved and housed for the night. As the threat turned out to be a false alarm, everyone was moved back the next day. I was off that Christmas Eve but could not enjoy the evening service without first checking on "my people". Dressed in my red velvet maternity shift, I insisted we drop by the unit on our way to church. My husband and I crept down the hall and snuck a peek into the activity room to be sure all was well. If I'd been seen, there would have been a disturbance but as it was, all were seated at the table, peacefully having their dinner. Satisfied that they were all safe, I was then able to exhale and enjoy the evening and Christmas with my other loved ones.