about us
“Hi, I’m Roxanne! I love my family, but sometimes it’s hard to figure out how to take care of them.
How can I merge my mother’s schedule with mine? How can I prepare for life changes? What should I be doing, that I don’t know I should be doing? Answering these questions helped me create Tele-Gramsy.”
Emily Davis
Our Story
Growing up in Colorado, I saw how difficult it was for my mother to take care of her parents while taking care of my brother and me. She worked full-time as school teacher and took care of my grandparents, Smitty and Gramsy, who lived in a nearby assisted living community. At first, it was relatively easy, but my mom still had to juggle doctors visits and other appointments for both her parents and her kids, organize activities, and complete her lesson plans for work.
Later on, however, when my grandfather was diagnosed with cancer, my mother’s workload increased— now she had double the health appointments and double the stress. When he ultimately became terminal, she had to arrange hospice care and then a funeral.
After his death, Gramsy, moved into a different assisted living center. And while this made it easier to manage her meals, prescriptions, and other needs, it also meant that my mother had to manage the center, paying bills and coordinating between the center’s staff and Gramsy’s doctors.
Fast-forward 10 years, to 2010. My father’s father had just died, and I moved in with my grandmother, Elmo, in Los Angeles. Years earlier, Elmo had suffered a stroke, and one side of her body was paralyzed. She needed help to do almost everything but managed to stay in her home with in-home care services. Nevertheless, my aunt had to organize the schedules of the home care nurses, renew and deliver prescriptions, pay bills (mortgage, phone, cable TV, health/medical- the list goes on!), and check on the status of the home. Like my mother, she had a full-time job taking care of her parents.
Now that I’m a bit older myself, I contemplate what my own role in taking care of my parents will be. In addition to my own parents, my brother and I have a few aunts and uncles who didn’t have children of their own, so we may be taking care of 6-8 seniors in the coming years. What’s the best way to organize everything so we’re ready to help when they need it? How can we manage their care with confidence? How can we support them while raising our own families?
If this sounds familiar, then please join the community!