“This place has been good to us and for us.” - A Park Place of St. John Testimonial

St. John has been Carroll and Ruth Austin’s home since 1973 and they’d made a great life for themselves. Carroll was a successful businessman who sold insurance to many of the residents, and Ruth worked for him.

“He was very good to work with. I did the money and he did his thing,” Ruth says.

Then Carroll had a stroke, and Ruth had to take over everything. He had another stroke, and Ruth decided that they should move into a retirement community, where much of the upkeep of a house would be passed on to the community.

Their son suggested Park Place of St. John, and began looking into it. When the community manager visited her house, Ruth says, “We were just taken.” They went to visit Park Place. “We just saw it and said, ‘This is it.’”

They chose a spacious 2-bedroom, 2-bathroom apartment, and moved in. “I liked it there [at my house] and all, but it was getting hard to take care of,” she says, “and I knew that someday I wouldn’t be able to do it at all.”

Ruth enjoyed many facets of Park Place almost immediately. “Things are pretty handy here,” she says. “They take care of the cleaning. A very nice lady comes to clean, and that is a must, because I can’t do the floors. We get our dinner and all of that is included. It’s a relief, really.”

Ruth has also enjoyed the social side of life at Park Place. “It’s a nice Christian community,” she says. “It’s fun to get to know the people here.” 

Those people include a neighbor who is an artist, as well as all of the people Ruth plays dominos with, and all the people she spends time with on Park Place bus outings. Her great grandson came with other third graders to entertain the residents recently, and she’s enjoyed the other intergenerational activities available. But she also appreciated the staff who care for Carroll.

“He always loved to read and write, and was the life of the party. Now he can’t do those things, and he is conscious of that. But everyone here is so patient with him and so kind.”

In fact, when Ruth was in the hospital for a short time, staff made sure that Carroll still got his fruit cup every morning, the one that Ruth always brought back to him from breakfast. Both Ruth and Carroll have benefited from the continuum of care available, having both used the Park Place Health & Wellness Center for rehab, as well as home health services from Providence at Home.

“We’ve been married 72 years,” Ruth says “This place has been good to us and for us.”