As Mercy Home has continued to bring back old pre-COVID traditions, Susan Hackney, the clinical director of Community Care at Mercy Home, spearheaded the return of that program’s Thanksgiving potluck lunch.
Prior to the pandemic, Community Care would host a Thanksgiving dinner that focused on serving housing unstable members (as former residents who regularly connect with the Home through Community Care are called) or those that Mercy Home knew wouldn’t be able to have a nice Thanksgiving meal. Typically, they invited some of the older youth and it was held on the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. “I remembered even as a manager outside of After Care (now Community Care) that it was a really cool way to give people that sense of belonging,” Hackney said.
This year, Hackney brought it up in an impromptu meeting and everybody was excited about bringing it back, but as a lunch. Each Community Care coworker cooked or brought in a different side dish. Hackney made mashed potatoes, Carlos Martinez’s wife brought delicious vegetables, and Phillip Brown made mac and cheese, cabbage, and stuffing. Even Alan Mares-Green, a former youth and cook at Mercy Home, made turkey.
“We all agreed it was probably the best turkey we’d ever had,” Hackney said. “People might be asking for his recipe.”
Community Care invited members who actively attend drop-ins and participate in care management. Drop-ins are scheduled hours when our members can come in and get support, eat lunch, do laundry, use computers, or take a shower. But on this day, it was an opportunity to celebrate, break bread together, and share gratitude.
“It’s a big goal of ours to create a sense of belonging at Mercy Home for our members,” Hackney said. “What made [the lunch] so special is that all the staff cooked for the members and created this time and space to show our gratitude for them and how much we love working with them and how much we see the hard work that they are doing with Community Care.”
But this day was about being together and it allowed Community Care coworkers to reconnect in-person with some of their members. “It was a really fun and light day, and it was nice to be able to come together in a social context where we’re not sitting and doing work together.”
We are already looking forward to next year, when the event will be held in the evening so more members can attend.
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