Home Sweet Home started in a 2003. Jody Hill is a Registered Nurse in Steuben County would often receive calls from local Doctors that she had worked with for many years. She would be given the scenario of the sweet little old lady that lives in the area that needs someone to help her. For some reason the medical community thought she knew trusted care providers that she could recommend to these Senior Citizens. Jody did in fact know several people that did exactly that by provide such a service. She would give them the name of an individual and now the little elderly woman was able to stay in her some and also be safe and cared for.
In 2005 she had her first request for 24 hour care. This was for a gentleman that was very private. He had been scammed by an individual that took advantage of his dementia, as well as ex-communicated by his family for personal reasons. Adult protective Services and the police were both at his door stops as well. He was given the choice of Private Home Care or a Nursing Home for the rest of his life. Again, Jody was asked to help this individual. She created a team and they worked through a lot of trials and errors to meet his needs. The end result was very positive. We became a friend, we became family. We provided a service specific to this man’s needs and we even had a Christmas dinner with him. He had said it had been years since he had a Christmas dinner in his home. His privacy was maintained and he smiled.
Home Sweet Home was managed from Jody's home for the next 5 years with a word of mouth referral base. We started to grow rapidly.
The summer of 2010, Jody's daughter Anna had graduated college with her Business Management and Accounting Degree. She had also worked for Home Sweet Home as a caregiver while attending college. After Anna had graduated she started working for Jody as her Office Manager. Jody's husband Donald supported and assisted in helping to grow HSH. Working together as a family we were successfully able to become licensed with the State of Indiana with our Person Care Attendant license.
Just prior to our move to the public square in Angola we had yet another reason to take pride in caring for the elderly. We had a wonderful elderly man that we provided services for. His wife had passed and his children did not live close. He had been in a Nursing Home and was very unhappy. We provided care to him as he recovered from surgery. When I went to his home, closed his account, and congratulated him on his progress, he asked for just one thing. This elderly kind man looked at me with a tear in his eye. He said I want you to do one thing for me. He said “you just look under the shirts of all those girls that cared for me…I am sure they each have a set of Angel Wings growing that they don’t even know are there.