Good Neighbor Podcast: Rochester
Bringing Together Local Businesses and Neighbors of Rochester
Good Neighbor Podcast: Rochester
EP#126: Home Helpers Home Care of Rochester with Brandy Broadbent
Discover how Brandy Broadbent, the dynamic owner of Home Helpers Home Care of Rochester, Michigan, is making a profound impact on her community by supporting seniors who want to age in place. Brandy's journey is deeply personal, rooted in her experiences with her own aging parents and her service in the Air Force. She shares how her team provides invaluable non-medical care services, from companionship and light housekeeping to meal preparation and transportation, fostering independence and joy for seniors. Brandy goes beyond conventional caregiving by highlighting the trust-based relationships her caregivers build, often turning client interactions into genuine, heartwarming friendships.
Balancing the demands of entrepreneurship with personal wellness, Brandy opens up about the strategies she employs to maintain a sustainable work-life balance. Engaging in activities like CrossFit and rock climbing, she shares how these pursuits not only offer a mental break but also teach lessons in managing fear and emotions, crucial for weathering the ups and downs of running a business. Brandy underscores the importance of having open conversations with aging family members about their living preferences, a proactive approach that can alleviate stress when unexpected health issues arise. Tune in for an insightful discussion blending personal growth, caregiving, and community service.
This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Lisa Swiftney.
Speaker 2:Hi everyone and welcome to episode number 126 of the Good Neighbor Podcast. Today we have with us good neighbor Brandi Broadbent, and she has Home Helpers, home Care of Rochester Michigan. How are you doing today, brandy?
Speaker 3:I'm doing great. I'm doing great. Thank you, Lisa. How are you.
Speaker 2:I'm really good, thank you, and thank you for being a guest today and sharing your business with us. You're welcome. I'm happy to be here. Good, good, so tell us what is your business. What do you do?
Speaker 3:my business is home helpers, home care of Rochester, michigan. We offer non-medical care to anyone in need. That being said, our primary clients are senior citizens who would rather age in place and stay in the home as opposed to going to, like, an assisted living facility. And so, the way that we do this, we help our clients with a variety of things Companionship, just being there to help keep them stimulated throughout the day. We can do light housework, meal preparation, even going with them to the grocery store or going to the grocery store for them and then helping them cook a nutritious meal. We can provide transportation to, like, the doctor's office or even like if they wanted to go to a senior center like OPC, we could take them to OPC so they could get their socializing in there. And we can also help you know, if they've been released from the hospital recently with maybe a physical therapy or occupational therapy plan, we can help make sure. Help them with those exercises, make sure they're regaining their strength and their independence, help them with things like that. And then, really, just our caregivers are so much fun to be around. They really bring joy to people's lives. So it's just really want that to be a bright spot in my client's day.
Speaker 3:When we're not, when our caregivers aren't there, we have a device called a direct link, which is kind of an Alexa looking device. The senior can use it in an emergency situation Light comes on, voice comes on, can help them dial either 911 or can help them dial a family number if they just need to talk to a family member. We can also provide wellness calls on days we're not there, so you know just good morning, how are you? Have you had your breakfast? Have you had your meds? Just checking up with them, seeing how their day is going. And we also have a contract with a meal service so we can deliver frozen nutritious meals, help get them in the freezer and then they can take a meal out, put it in the microwave, which can be a lot more nutritious and a lot more economical than ordering out all the time.
Speaker 2:That is amazing, amazing, and I like the part where you like to bring joy. That is so important. So tell our listeners about your journey.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, definitely so the reason I chose Home Helpers my parents are aging. They live in Cincinnati, ohio, and then my family is we're kind of all spread around the country. They've made it clear that they want to age in place, age independently, for as long as possible. In order for them to do that, at some point they're going to need somebody to come in the house and just and help them with things around the house perhaps meal preparation help keep them stimulated during the day. And so I thought, well, that's probably something that I could provide to my community, got in touch with Home Helpers. They've been tremendously supportive every step of the way, helping me learn, hit the ground running, and just always helpful with tools and tips and that kind of thing. It's been a great experience.
Speaker 3:Long, long time ago I was in the Air Force. I was a helicopter pilot, so service has always been important to me. It's always been important to me to be part of things that are bigger than just myself. So I really feel that by owning Home Helpers, home Care and by helping people within my community, I can continue to serve and I can continue to be part of something that's bigger than just myself. So that's how I got here and why I chose Home Helpers.
Speaker 2:That is amazing, and we'll have to do another whole podcast about you being a pilot. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:I'd love to talk about it.
Speaker 2:Can you tell us about any myths or misconceptions that you hear about in your industry?
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah for sure. I think one of the biggest myths or one of the biggest concerns. When people come to me, they're uncomfortable with the idea of having a stranger in their house and they're worried that they won't connect with the caregiver and that it'll just always be like there's just this stranger there. That couldn't be further from the truth. My caregivers are absolute delight. They are really really good with connecting with people, hearing their stories, really identifying what's going to bring that senior joy during the day.
Speaker 3:You know, is it a puzzle, is it a game? Is it reading? Do they like to talk about news events? They're really good about talking to the senior, finding out what it is in their life that makes them happy and brings them joy, so they can connect with them and really form a trusting and lasting bond. So it's only briefly that they're strangers. Then they really move in to a friend to feel like friend and family, quite confident, confident, somebody you can really put trust in and rely on, and so yeah. So that's probably the biggest myth that I'd like to dispel. Just that it's not an uncomfortable situation at all. It's really a joyous, happy, happy situation.
Speaker 2:And that is good to know for everybody. So when you're not working on your business, what do you like to do for fun?
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, I think that's so important to have fun. Just, you know, launching the business, it felt like I could spend 24 hours a day, seven days a week, working on the business, tweaking this, tweaking that, you know, constantly questioning my decisions, and I realized early on that that's just not sustainable. If I, you know, I want this to be a long, lasting, sustainable business and in order to do that, I've got to make time for myself to hands off the business and do what I love. So, yeah, when I'm not working on the business, I have two daughters they're 15 and 11, and I love being around them. So we just we love playing games, watching movies together. I love hearing about their day at school. You know what went well, what didn't go well.
Speaker 3:And then you know then, of course, as a parent of a preteen and a teen, shuttling them to all the different activities. They're into dance and gymnastics pretty heavily, so I do a lot of that. And then also, I'm a big proponent of fitness. Fitness has always been important to me, so I work out at CrossFit Maven in Rochester six times a week. That's really important to me. And then I also got in to rock climbing at Planet Rock down in Madison Heights, and I do that a couple of times a week as well. So, yeah, definitely making the most of my time away from the business is really important to me.
Speaker 2:Wow, rock climbing, that's something that's pretty adventurous too.
Speaker 3:It's a great way to be outside and to really test your limits and it's really great, yeah, and my rock climbing partner is amazing. So we just we have a great time.
Speaker 2:That's great. Can you describe to our listeners one hardship or life challenge that you rose above and can now say because of that challenge that you're better for it and are stronger?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I really think rock climbing has really been beneficial to me, reason being when you're climbing you're often afraid of falling Even though I trust my client partner and explicitly we have a really great relationship but still when you're up there climbing you can just get really, really fearful and just really afraid. And so one thing that you're constantly trying to do is calm your breath, get control of your emotions and you know, and still make the climb even though you have fear. And some days are great and I really I'm really in charge of my fear and it's not, I can control it through my breath. And then there's some days where I can't and I'm just fearful and I climb well within my limits and stay safe because I'm just not in the right frame of mind to push myself that day. And I really think that having that constant fear that you're trying to manage and trying to not defeat, you can never really defeat it, but trying to be the master of it has really helped me in this business, just because the business is just constant series of highs and lows, highs and lows, and if it's, and if I'm letting those highs and lows always drive my emotions, then it just becomes this emotional roller coaster. That's just hard to wrap your mind around.
Speaker 3:And again back to that sustainability. You really can't sustain it in the long term if you're riding the highs and lows with the business. So I've really had to learn to step back and just go. You know, okay, this is just a hiccup, it was a minor thing, we're going to get past this. In the longterm it won't make a difference. And even with the highs, just you know congratulating myself and really being proud of the business, but at the same time, you know not thinking, oh, this is going to be a meteoric rise from here, because there's always going to be highs and lows, highs and lows. And so really managing my emotions is critical, I think, and running the business and making it sustainable for the long term.
Speaker 2:That is great. What is one thing you wish our listeners knew about your business?
Speaker 3:Well, I thought of two things. So I'm going to share two things that I really wish people knew. So I'm going to share things that I really wish people knew. I think the first thing that I really wish people did is have the hard conversations with mom, dad and uncles them, the hard questions hey, what are your wishes as you get older? You know, do you want to live in place for as long as possible? Is that your goal? How do you feel about retirement communities? When you're independent living, how do you feel about assisted living? You know what kind of environment you know. What do you think of when you think of assisted living? What do you think of when you think of memory care? I really think having those discussions and just talking about it as if it's normal because it is normal, right, god willing parents are going to age, you're going to age, and so having those conversations about how they want their aging to go, so that when a health crisis does occur because they're going to occur that's the definition of aging You're, you're going to have some health setbacks, so that when those do come, you're not caught off guard. You know, I talked to so many people where mom had a fall and now they're rushing. They don't know what to do. They don't really know what mom wants to do, they don't know how much help they can provide as a family and they're just really stressed and it's never good to make a decision when you're in crisis mode. So I think having those discussions early so that when something does happen, somebody gets that really devastating Alzheimer's diagnosis it's like OK, now we've had these discussions, now we know what mom and dad, aunt and uncle would want and you know, so we can help them live the life and age in the way that they want to. So that's the first thing that I just wish that families would have those conversations. And it's almost the holidays, so that's a great. You're going to be around family, aunts, uncles, mom and dad, so it's a great time to bring up those conversations.
Speaker 3:The other myth I'd like to dispel, and I kind of talked about it earlier. I just I really want people to know how remarkable my caregivers are. Like this is it's a caring profession, it's a service profession and the people that are drawn to it are really amazing individuals. They have just a really wonderful way of connecting with people and earning their trust and just being with them, and I really think you know, once you meet my caregivers, you're going to be like oh wow, this is amazing. You know, I'm working with one family now Every week. They're like oh, kiki's just wonderful, we really love her, she's doing such a great job with dad, she's just amazing. And so I just that's the other thing that having care in the home it's not a negative thing. So I want to dispel that myth. They're not there to take away your independence. They're there to help you live independently. So that would be the second thing that that I'd like to dispel from the, from the care field okay.
Speaker 2:Well, that is truly amazing. Our listeners are now intrigued and they want to learn how to in contact with you. They might have a parent they would like to to meet and spend time with, so how can they learn more and contact you?
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely. I keep up with my socials, so you can find Home Helpers, home Care, on Instagram, facebook and then on my personal Brandy Broadbent LinkedIn page as well, as I've got a website for Home Helpers. It's homehelpershomecarecom. Forward slash, rochester-mi, or you can call me. The office number is 248-270-2268. Reach out to me any way you can, or see me at a chamber event. I love talking about home care.
Speaker 2:That is great, Randy. Thank you so much for being a guest today on our Good Neighbor podcast.
Speaker 3:Thanks for having me. I've had a great time.
Speaker 1:Thanks for listening to the Good Neighbor podcast Rochester. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to GNPRochestercom. That's GNPRochestercom, or call 248-988-9640. Music.