Sue Paquette has been volunteering for more than 20 years with a variety of different organizations.
Benefitting from her gift of time have been the Salvation Army, United Church, Friends of Rotary and Vancouver Coastal Health’s baby clinics.
It’s her current volunteering that “fills” her up. While Paquette has been assisting with Better At Home for the past seven years, she says it feels like just yesterday that she started.
Better At Home provides a range of non-medical home support services that allow seniors to live independently longer. Funded by the provincial government through United Way, the service in the qathet region is delivered through inclusion Powell River.
“I’ve found my little niche,” said Paquette, who has provided rides for groceries and doctor appointments, friendly home visits and going for walks. “There’s a variety of different things I have done.”
She was one of the very first people to sign up to volunteer for the program, taking all the in-service training under then-coordinator Lisa Daniels.
Paquette loved the idea of Gerry Gray Centre for Older Adults when she first heard about the concept.
“I said I wanted to be part of the centre and was willing to come in and do a little kitchen prep for weekly lunches.”
Now she does the meal planning, shopping, meal prep and serving for the lunches every Wednesday. It has become a very popular outing for seniors who may or may not have family and friends close by.
Everyone going to the centre for drop-in, activities or lunch needs to preregister and then call to let staff know they will be attending the luncheon. Approximately 25 people come, filling every available seat at the tables. Tea, coffee, soup, sandwiches and dessert are on the menu.
Career background
Born and raised in Powell River, Paquette left the community with her family for 18 years to further her career as a nurse and her husband Chip’s as an RCMP officer. They lived in Ottawa and Alberta, where she returned to school in Calgary to do some upgrading and then went to work at the hospital in Edson.
In early 2000, Paquette returned to her hometown to look after her grandparents who raised her. She still lives in the house where she first came to them as a three-days-old infant.
Over the ensuing years Paquette worked in the life skills program at Child Youth and Family Services (now LIFT), at Sunshine Coast Health Centre, and Cherry Doors, a private company that operates two homes for people with developmental differences.
In 2016 she was involved in an automobile accident and, unable to go back to work in her field, was placed on disability.
“I really like to help people and knew that from the time I was a little girl,” said Paquette. “People would say to me, ‘Susie, what do you want to be when you grow up?’ I always replied ‘an entertainer and singer or a nurse.’ With help from my grandparents, I had lots of opportunities to be entertaining. I was blessed.”
Her current volunteering makes her feel like the blessings have never stopped.
“With this position where there is no heavy lifting, I started again just where I left off. I love it; it’s a perfect fit for me.”
Paquette said inclusion and Better at Home staff are great at expressing their appreciation for everything that has been brought to the program.
“They always acknowledge what we are doing and have done a really good job of that. It’s a good thing they are happy with me because I tell them I’m not going anywhere.”
As for the seniors themselves, Paquette said she has met the “most loving, caring, crazy” seniors she never knew existed.
“We’ve formed a bond of trust and they are always happy to see you.”
She recalls a conversation she had recently with a woman who told her she had two sons and never had a daughter.
“She told me: ‘if I had a daughter, I would want her to be just like you.’”
They are so appreciative of everything that is done for them and Paquette says she is very happy to help them.
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