Story By: Juria Mulbah
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – As the Baby Boomer generation continues to age, states like Alabama are seeing their elderly population increase. From 2020 to 2024, the number of Alabamians over the age of 65 grew 11% from 861,000 to almost 956,000.
Many of these older Alabamians move into senior communities and nursing homes, where nurses and caregivers tend to their daily needs. These jobs aren’t easy, but for the people who are called to work in this field, they become a lifeline for those living in their golden years.
Elizabeth Oladipo works as a certified nursing assistant (CNA) at Fair Haven, a senior living community in Birmingham, where she takes care of the elderly. Usually, she cares for seven to 12 residents during her 3:30-11:30 p.m. shift. This includes taking them to the bathroom, changing their diapers, giving them showers, washing clothes, dressing them, feeding those who can’t feed themselves, and tucking them into bed at night.
Oladipo works in a section of Fair Haven for people who have high mental instability. No matter where the residents go, Oladipo follows and directs them, telling them where to go and how to do things. Many residents are “not even conscious of what they’re doing,” she said. There seems to be no end in caring for them as she makes sure they don’t hurt themselves or start a fight.
“Of course, some are difficult,” she said. “Some react… Some attack, but upon all, the love is in your heart. You love them because it’s not intentional.”
Though it is not easy to be in those kinds of situations, Oladipo says she “keeps on loving and caring for them. When they’re happy, you’re happy.” By creating good experiences like this they talk about each other’s families and introduce one another, and “you have another family again. You become family.”
Caring for people so closely helps Oladipo forget that they aren’t blood related, she says. She often views her residents as if they are her parents.
“Even when they pass on, you become close like you are family, and it becomes hard to let them go.”
‘I love caring for people’
Oladipo was born and raised in Nigeria. “This type of work is not common in Africa,” she said. “Our style is to stay with our people, grow old and die.” In contrast, “Here [in America] people are busy with work and don’t want the old ones to suffer.”
While Americans tend to care for the elderly in a very different way, Oladipo says “this system is also good.”
“We are all human beings,” she said. “It’s just our color is different.”
Before working at Fair Haven, Oladipo had experience caring for the elderly, including her parents and grandparents. “I love caring for people,” she said. And although they “don’t do it professionally” in Africa, in the end, “you take care of them same way.”
Becoming a CNA
Being a certified nursing assistant was Oladipo’s first career. “I started off as a housekeeper five years ago,” she stated. She began to take classes for CNA and passed the exam. She is now in her fourth year in the field.
Fair Haven’s CNAs work on a three-shift rotation: 7:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., 3:30 p.m. to 11:30 p.m., and 11:30 p.m. to 7:30 a.m. There are anywhere from two to four CNAs on duty at a time.
From the moment Oladipo clocks in a 3:30 p.m. in the afternoon, she knows “the welfare of the residents is in your hands.”
When one of her coworkers takes their 15-minute break, she will also keep a watchful eye on their residents in addition to her own.
When it comes to guiding the residents, Oladipo says to talk to them with kindness. “Correct them with love, and you don’t force them to do things.”
“They’re old and thinking might be low,” she said, “but they’re still human beings.”
The job is demanding, but Oladipo says her passion is caring for people, even when the tasks may be small, like giving someone a glass of water or helping them to the bathroom.
And despite the long hours, Oladipo says she’s always eager to start caring for her residents again at the start of her next shift. “No matter how tired I am the next day, the grace is there and the desire to see those people from where we stopped yesterday.”
They’re old and thinking might be low, but they’re still human beings.
-Elizabeth Oladipo
Vallo Vision News 