When Debbie Reed first walked through Butterfield’s doors in 1987, she was 22 years old. Fresh from a difficult experience at another facility, she was uncertain about what her future held. Hired practically on the spot and fast-forwarding almost four decades later, Debbie is an integral part of Butterfield’s story – a living bridge between the community’s earliest days and the evolved campus it is today.
Debbie’s arrival at Butterfield came just days before losing her father, making that first year one of major personal adjustment. She began as a healthcare aide when the building looked dramatically different. “Where this office is now wasn’t built, and that stone wall was outside,” Debbie remembers, gesturing to the east interior wall of the Resident Care suite where she now works. “The hallway in the Health Care Center toward Special Care? It ended where the kitchen and Special Care are now. Special Care didn’t even exist.”
In its earliest days, Butterfield operated differently from today’s Life Plan model, for a time accepting direct admissions from the public into healthcare beds. Debbie recalled, “The independent living side was filling up so fast that one resident was worried she wouldn’t have a healthcare bed if she ever needed one. She moved over to the healthcare wing even though she got around just as good as me and you!”
As Butterfield evolved, Debbie grew right alongside it. Staff training and certification requirements were less stringent then, but eventually Butterfield’s own registered nurses began providing Certified Nursing Assistant training onsite. Debbie became one of the first to earn her certification through classes taught right after her work shifts ended.
Now, Debbie serves as a CNA in the Resident Care office, a role requiring versatility and occasional problem-solving. On any given day, she might trim toenails and fingernails, clean hearing aids and change their tiny batteries, assist with earwax removal, check vital signs or even patch up minor wounds. She takes her role very seriously, engaging with people on a personal level. “I just love the residents,” she says. “Their stories are awesome. We laugh, we cry and everything in between.” Residents pop into her office not just for medical needs, but to visit, to ask for help with opening a stubborn jar – or simply to connect with someone who cares. She has become a master of “reading the room,” knowing instinctively which residents appreciate a lighthearted joke and who requires a more serious, compassionate approach.
But if an emergency call comes through on her pager, showing a resident’s exact location and contact information, everything stops. In roughly three minutes or less, Debbie, a nurse and a security team member converge on the scene, wherever on campus a resident has sounded an alert. “Sometimes I stay here and call the resident while the nurse and security are already on their way,” Debbie says. “If the resident needs to go to the hospital, I get a radio call to print the necessary paperwork and take it up there.” The response time is impressive, made possible by golf carts and a well-coordinated team.
Debbie’s dedication to care is rooted in her West Fork upbringing, where she was raised on her family’s 180-acre homestead near Devil’s Den. She learned young to appreciate the value of community by caring for her grandmother, a prolific quilter until the age of 96. Debbie and her devoted Yorkie, Princess still live on ten of those family acres, surrounded by the homes of multiple close relatives. Growing from a nervous 22-year-old into a trusted caregiver who has trained nearly every nurse in the Resident Care office, Debbie’s professional journey mirrors Butterfield’s own remarkable evolution in so many ways.
