It is a very long way from County Mayo, Ireland to Austin, Texas.  Eva Church, Director of the Caregiver Resource Center for the Austin Groups for the Elderly grew up on a farm just three miles outside of the town of Claremorris. Her family lived in Carradoyne House, which her grandfather, Tom Brett, had purchased. Perhaps it has to do with growing up in the land of leprechauns, or the ready smile and soft Irish lilt to her voice, but Eva Church has an energy and wit that is tireless.  And yes, most days, she does have a twinkle in her eye.

 

They had cows and sheep, Church recalls, and an orchard with apples, blackberries, raspberries and black currants. Church was the eldest of three sisters and one brother. She came by her love and respect for older individuals naturally. Her grandmother on her father's side lived with them at Carradoyne House, and her other grandmother, her mother's mother, was only three miles away.  Church would often hop on her bicycle and speed down the road to visit.

 

"I always felt they had more time to listen to what you had to say, and guide you," Church says. "They could help tell you what books to read and—just everything,"

 

One sister still lives in Ireland, the other outside London.  Her brother passed away about 10 years ago.  "We were closest growing up," Church says. They were also partners in childhood crime. "We grew up during the war, you know. I was born in 1930. We used to have rations stored in what we called dressing rooms, off the main big bedrooms that were in the house.  One of them was locked off, and all of the things that were rationed, especially biscuits—which are cookies, really—were kept in there."

 

"There was a window sill between the two windows," Church remembers, and laughs at the memory. "We could climb out one window and climb in the one  that was supposedly locked. My brother and I stole the ration [of biscuits] and went up the back avenue so nobody would see us. We would sit on the wall and eat the stolen goods.  We were so bad."

 

She was very close to her grandmothers growing up, but it was her aunt—who was a physician in London—who was responsible for nurturing that respect and caring for older adults into a lifelong passion. When Church would visit, her aunt would take her on rounds to visit low-income and homebound patients on the East side of London, where her aunt and her husband, also a physician, maintained their practice.

 

"She was the one who then got me involved in nursing. I ended up going over to London to do my nurses training at St. John & Elizabeth's, where Florence Nightingale was."

 

She earned her license as an SRN (State Registered Nurse), and eventually married and moved to the Northwest Territories in Canada with her husband, who had left law-enforcement to work as an engineer.  She practiced nursing in Uranium City, 100 miles south of the Arctic Circle. Eventually, they were transferred, first to New Jersey, and then to Houston.  By the time she arrived in Austin in 1979, she had decided she no longer wanted to practice nursing, and searched for a different career that would still let her indulge her passion for helping older adults, and utilize her nursing experience.  She went back to school at St. Edward's University and earned her degree in Healthcare Administration, with a focus on Geriatrics. It is somehow prophetic that the paper she wrote as part of her graduation requirements was entitled "Should Austin Establish a Coordinating Agency To Provide Care For the Elderly?" It was during her research for that paper that she first heard of Austin Groups for the Elderly (AGE), a group then recently formed by Bert Kruger-Smith and Willie Kocurek.

 

Church worked as the area Nursing Home Ombudsman, and was directly involved in helping to introduce Naomi Feil's concept of Validation Therapy (for patients or residents with dementia) to local healthcare administrators, staff members, law enforcement officials and state agencies.  In 1986, she also revived a flagging Interagency Council, designed to bring members of organizations and agencies serving the elderly together to exchange ideas and information.  Ironically, after she left the ombudsman position, she went to work for Holy Cross Home Care (later purchased by the SETON Healthcare Network), which was one of the first tenants in the newly refurbished AGE building at 3710 Cedar Street.  Little did Church know that she would return to the AGE building years later as the Director of the Caregiver Resource Center (CRC), a program of AGE designed to serve as a clearing house of information for caregivers and their families. It has been a wonderful fit from the beginning.

 

"I feel truly fortunate to be part of the AGE team—working to fulfill Bert’s [Bert Kruger-Smith's] dream to provide access, information, and care to older people and their families. So many times I heard her say 'and the dream is this… '

At the CRC we fulfill her dream every day by listening to stressed caregivers seeking information and guidance.  We even provide donated medical equipment from our loan closet to those who need but cannot afford it."

 

AGE has other programs, including Elderhaven, licensed adult day care center; SeniorNet, a computer learning lab for individuals over 50; and the building itself, which offers below-market rent on office space to non-profit organizations.  But for Eva, her heart is dedicated to the CRC, where she is able to do what she has always needed to do—to help, to be of service.

 

Her efforts have earned her numerous awards, and she characteristically deflects the attention away from herself.  She told one associate, Sister Mary Rose, that she didn't deserve the recognition she was receiving, that she was only the glue that held some things together.

 

Sister Mary Rose McPhee of SETON nodded, and smiled. "Yes, Eva. But without glue, we wouldn't have stained-glass windows."

 

For more information about the Caregiver Resource Center, all (512) 451-4611.