Short and Sweet: Greetings from all of us on the inside at the Kiwanis Pavilion

April 16, 2020 Edition #21

Dear Families and Friends of Residents,

Ever wonder how many times each of us has

washed our hands during these last weeks? In a

world that invites us to practice presence and

calm more than ever, hand washing just might

be the perfect opportunity for a regular

mindfulness pause throughout the day. As we

wash our hands, we can really feel them. The

texture of our skin, the shape of our knuckles,

the thickness of our fingers, the space between

our fingers. The wrinkles and veins. The

firmness of our fingernails. The scars and lumps

and bumps. We can hold our hands tenderly in

the suds and warm water. We can thank all the

bones and flesh under the surface of our skin

working to shape, stabilize and move our

hands. We can be thankful for our amazing

opposable thumbs! We can hold our hands in

gratitude as we scrub and rinse and dry them

with love and care. Our hands have been with

us through thick and thin. They wear our life

stories and certainly do so today. May your

hands be well and strong and clean! May your

spirits be at ease. May you know that we’re

sending all of you love and hugs!

Yours truly with deep respect,

The Pavilion Team

What’s Cooking?

The trusty kitchen crew served up Shepherd’s

Pie, Brussel sprouts, and bread pudding for

lunch. And for dinner they served chicken

gumbo soup, devilled egg sandwiches, potato

salad, and mandarin orange jello. Yummy

goodness despite the devilled part!

Update from the Director of Resident Services

Happy Thursday to you all. Once again it has been a

beautiful day both on the “inside” and the

“outside.” Today was a revisit/review of many

topics that we have covered over the past 36 days

such as Donning (putting on) and Doffing (taking

off) Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), the British

Columbia Centre of Disease Control (BCCDC)

updated COVID-19 testing guidelines for residents

and staff of Long Term Care Homes, Protecting

Yourself and Your Family Guidelines, along with

Mandatory Direct Care Worker Safety Guide about

not wearing the same uniforms or clothes to work

and then working in them and then wearing them

home. We have advised our staff to bring their

clean work clothes in a plastic bag and change at

work and then after work. We do not want our

direct care employees wearing the same clothes in

public. We have requested all employees wear their

hair up and out of their faces, they are sanitizing

their work phones, keys, nametags and we have

become hand washing experts with staff critiquing

each other. We are reminding staff to ensure that

their belongings are clean and to only bring what is

necessary into work. We revisited droplet and

contact precautions signage, location of outbreak

carts and supplies and the cleaning protocols for

cleaning eye protection during a pandemic. Each

member of the Kiwanis Pavilion team received a

package with some of these key messages

contained in it and today’s snack was apples and

Famous Amos Cookies. We continue to be staffed in

order to meet the needs of our residents and we

continue to meet every day on every shift to ensure

that all team members receive any and all key

messages during this extraordinary time. Most of

our residents who were admitted and on 14 day

isolation have been able to have these restrictions

lifted today. We continue to virtually meet with all

of the TORCH physicians and review all residents.

We have a designated physician who will come on

site if needed. We have continued to operate in a

joyful manner as we have celebrated residents’

birthdays, had lunch clubs (much smaller groups all

6 feet apart), we have the smells of baking, the

chatter of Skype visits, and music and laughter that

fill the halls. We miss you all and the love and

comfort that you bring to your loved ones, but rest

assured we are continually working to ensure that

our residents are not bored or lonely at The

Pavilion, just in a new type of “normal.” All of us are

looking forward to the day when our doors are

opened up wide and we can welcome you all back

in. Please feel free to reach out to me anytime at

sjohnson@obkp.org or 250 598-2022 ext. 222. Until

Next Time…Take Care and Stay Safe, Shannon

Thank YOU!!!

We would like to thank family member Carol

for the beautiful and delicious cake for the

team today. It was another layer of sunshine in

the day!

Quotable: Resident Delight

Franciane (Rehab Assistant) was helping a Unit

1C resident to stand and said: “I’m going to

have you stand at the bar please.” The resident

said “Well, it better be the right bar!!”

Virtual Visiting: Way Popular!

We are so thrilled with the ongoing requests for

virtual visits with residents. Please phone Krista

(Recreation/ Volunteers) at 250-598-2022 ext.

256 or email at kcampbell@obkp.org to make a

booking. With 122 residents and the high

volume of requests, please understand that she

will need a bit of time to get back to you. We

are grateful for your patience!

Impromptu Dance Party

A resident listening to her rock’n’roll in the Unit

2C dining room got everyone dancing this

morning. She shook her booty and the rest

couldn’t resist joining in. Even one resident,

who said she was just there for lunch, was

waving her arms around to the beat and

beaming a giant smile.

Funky Hair Friday: Join Us

With all of us sporting longer hairdos these

days, we’ve decided to make it wacky hair day

on Friday, April 17. Maybe you’d like the

diversion of doing something fun and crazy with

your hair tomorrow too. We invite you to send

us selfies for the newsletter (if you’re okay with

them going out to the world)!

Ladies’ Summer Picnic with Christmas Carols

The residents partaking in this burger picnic,

requested Christmas music today. After lunch,

they sang along with great enthusiasm. This is

person-centered care through all the seasons!

And Another Mattress Parade

We’ll need to wear

costumes and throw

candy soon! Thirty

mattresses is a lot and

we continued to haul

them around today.

The team continues to

rise towards

collaboration and good

cheer!

Gratitude for the Delivery Folks

Let us not

forget these

truck drivers

making sure

the Pavilion

gets its

supplies.

Signs of the Times: Love and Thanks

Our thanks to the

residents, Krista

(Recreation), Nik

(Reception) and Rainer (Maintenance) for the

amazing team effort to make and display these

signs on our street. Honk for all to be well!

Meditation Circle: Sit “With” Us

We had our fifth mindfulness meditation circle

for staff today and we had several new

attendees! The garden once again welcomed us

with sunshine and a gentle breeze. By popular

demand, we repeated yesterday’s body scan

meditation by Andrew Johnson. We were

guided to gently notice our bodies from head to

toe and let them relax – even the tongue and

the tiny muscles around the eyes. Comments

afterwards included: “That was wonderful!”

and “His voice!!” These and other guided

meditations are available on YouTube, the

Insight Timer App, on Spotify, etc. Perhaps you

too would like to sit in silence with us at your

homes tomorrow at 12:30.

“He Can Help You Cope”

The New York Times interviews Jack Kornfield, a

clinical psychologist and “mindfulness pioneer.”

“Epidemics are a part of the cycle of life on this

planet,” Kornfield said. “The choice is how we

respond. With greed and hatred and fear and

ignorance? Or with generosity, clarity,

steadiness and love?”

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/04

/13/magazine/jack-kornfield-mindfulness.html

More on Coping: Finding Deep Strength

“When we look back on our lives, we see that

we have survived many trials and surmounted

many obstacles, often to our own amazement.

In each of those instances, we had to break

through our ideas about how much we can

handle and go deeper into our hidden reserves.

The thought that we do not have the strength

to handle what is before us can be likened to

the hard surface of a frozen lake. It appears to

be an impenetrable fact, but when we break

through it, we find that a deep well of energy

and inspiration was trapped beneath that icy

barrier the whole time. Sometimes we break

through by cutting a hole into our resistance

with our willpower, and sometimes we melt the

ice with compassion for our predicament and

ourselves. Either way, each time we break

through, we reach a new understanding of the

strength we store within ourselves. When we

find ourselves up against that frozen barrier of

thinking we cannot handle our situation, we

may find that the kindest choice is to love

ourselves and our resistance too. We can

simply accept that we are overwhelmed,

exhausted, and stretched, and we can offer

ourselves loving kindness and compassion. If

we can extend to ourselves the unconditional

warmth of a mother's love, before we know it,

the ice will begin to break.” By Madisyn Taylor

Piano Cat Man Can Help You Cope Too

This man’s cats do interpretive dance snuggles

while he plays the piano! What else do we

need?! (Thanks Alan for the tip!)

https://www.instagram.com/sarperduman/

Women Physicians Choir Sings Rise Again

Voices Rock Medicine, a choir of women

physicians has put together this heartfelt

tribute “dedicated to the superheroes of

Canadian healthcare, and beyond.” Enjoy their

message of gratitude and positivity.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wuiqee-

AC-o