Seasons Retirement Communities Lethbridge is recognizing one of its own as a remarkable resident for her desire to help others.
Beginning as soon as she graduated school, Lorraine Fitzgerald spent her career helping people as a psychiatric nurse.
“One night somebody in psychiatry couldn’t come in and they couldn’t find anybody,” Fitzgerald said.
“Not a nurse in the hospital, it seemed, wanted to go to psychiatry and I thought: ‘That’ll be a good adventure.'”
Stumbling into mental health work, Fitzgerald found her true calling and carried it into her personal life.
She started a halfway house to help those receiving treatment transition to life at home, bridging a gap in people’s care.
“Why don’t we get a place where, (when) people are discharged, (they) learn how to live back in the community and how to deal with what they’re going to deal with when they get back to society?” Fitzgerald said.
The home was extremely successful and closed this year because its services were no longer needed.
Now, Fitzgerald finds other ways to volunteer her time and make improvements for others.
When she saw the Seasons Lethbridge library in disarray, Fitzgerald took it upon herself to do something, spending a month reorganizing all the books.
“I loved reading so I would go in and it would be chaos and my husband and I just decided: ‘Why don’t we tidy this up a little bit?'” Fitzgerald said.
“So we asked the general manager and they said: ‘Fine, go to it.'”
Not one for the spotlight, Fitzgerald says helping people is its own reward.
“I used to say that the payment I received wasn’t my paycheque but when I would be walking along the street and see somebody interacting or being part of the community not looking lost.”
“I’d just go: ‘Yay!’ That’s my paycheque.”