When You Already Know the Resident: A Long-Term Care Ombudsman Story

“You lived next to me when you were in elementary school. You were my son’s friend,” I said.

He looked at the floor, smiled, and replied, “Yeah. I used to play at your house.”

For over a year, I had visited him as a resident at an assisted living facility without recognizing him.

That day, he told me his father had recently died. I asked his parents’ names. When he answered, everything came together.

Knowing his first name and hearing his last, I realized the forty-year-old man in assisted living was the little boy I had known in kindergarten.

“Did you recognize me before?” I asked.

“Of course,” he said.

“Why didn’t you tell me who you were?”

“I figured you knew.”

I had known him since he was five. He had been in special education with my son. I remembered him coming to my house for birthday parties and trick-or-treating. I watched him grow up.

At the facility, he loved to cook, and they helped him earn his food handler permit so he could assist in the kitchen. In my ombudsman notes, I often wrote about how included he was. Even as the youngest resident, he was always smiling, helping with dishes, and living a fulfilling life.

He invited me to his room and showed me his father’s obituary. He told me his mother had died ten years earlier from Alzheimer’s. We shared memories of his parents and his childhood.

He was the youngest of nine. His parents had been older when he was born. His siblings grew up, married, and built lives. Then their parents died.

And he was left.

I have a tender spot for middle-aged adults in skilled nursing facilities. I see their family photos on the walls, Special Olympics medals, reminders of when they were the center of someone’s universe. Then I see them alone, contracted, confined to beds, living what I know was their parents’ worst nightmare.

I was not prepared to see my son’s friend in care.

There was comfort in knowing he was in a good place. His siblings visited. The staff found ways for him to contribute, to be useful, to live his life.

It was the first time I had encountered the child of people I once knew living in a facility. I realized that if his parents were still alive, they would be relieved. He was safe. He was valued.

But it also made something else impossible to ignore.

My children are now middle-aged, and one has a classmate who will live the rest of his life in care.

And that knowledge stays with me.

To protect resident privacy, identifying details in this story have been changed. The situations described reflect real issues encountered in long-term care.