Mount Pleasant Neighbourhood House shows love to seniors in care

Many seniors in hospitals and long-term care homes will spend Valentine’s Day alone this year. Miranda Fatur shares how the Mount Pleasant Neighbourhood House is ensuring seniors feel the love.

By

VANCOUVER (CityNews) — Valentine’s Day is just around the corner, and Vancouver’s Mount Pleasant Neighbourhood House is rallying the community to make sure isolated seniors feel the love.

The organization reached out to long term care homes and hospitals in the area to find out if there was interest in having handmade Valentine’s cards delivered, and organizers received a much greater response than expected.

“It’s a hard year for everyone, especially seniors, so we were thinking, What we can do to make sure they know the community cares about them?'” says Daniela Gunndoerge who is one of the people behind the initiative.

“We started out thinking maybe 150 seniors would be interested across the city, and it’s just exploded over the last few days. We’re now close to 1000 seniors.”

With so many cards to make before Feb. 14th, the public is being invited to help fulfill the requests.

“We have schools involved, our youth programs and volunteers, and we’re calling on any neighbours that feel inspired to make their own Valentines, and send them to the neighbourhood house before Feb. 10,” Gunndoerge. says.

“Mail would be great, otherwise you can come during office hours and drop them off at reception.”

Make Valentine Cards for Seniors ❤️

We are gearing up to spread the love this Valentine’s Day to 400 of our older…

Posted by Mount Pleasant Neighbourhood House on Tuesday, January 26, 2021

 

Seniors in care are more isolated than ever this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the province’s seniors advocate is thrilled that the community has found a way to connect at a safe, social distance.

“A lot of people in long term care used to spend Valentine’s Day with their spouse. Some will be experiencing their first Valentine’s without their spouse, so this outreach saying you’re not alone is really, really important,” says Isobel Mackenzie.

Claudine Matlo, another organizer with the nieghbourhood house, says the only requirement for submissions is to be creative, and speak from the heart.

“There’s a lot of folks who can’t see their loved ones. It’s that much more important for them to know the community cares about them, and we’re in this together. We want to see whatever inspires people, messages of love, as if you’re writing to someone you care about. Even finger painting, anything’s amazing, ” she says.

“I hope there’s going to be a lot of smiles that day.”

Top Stories

Top Stories

Most Watched Today