 I'm so excited about our new book out in stores now! Take Your Oxygen First was written by our Executive Director, Dr. Jamie Huysman, our good friend Dr. Rosemary Laird and me. Through the story of my family's personal struggle with Alzheimer's Disease, we provide practical advice on how caregivers and their families can and must take care of their own physical, emotional and spiritual needs in order to give better care to their loved ones suffering with a memory loss disorder. Order your copy today! CLICK HERE to purchase now...
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Watch "Take Your Oxygen First" Video >>
 If this is your first time on our site,
I'm so glad you found us. Since you’re here, chances
are you need help, hope or just to take a breath.
It was my dream when Jamie Huysman (our
executive director and my good friend) and I co-founded
The Leeza Gibbons Memory Foundation that we would offer
a safe setting for all families who are dealing with loved
ones diagnosed with a memory disorder. We are pleased to
offer Leeza’s Place, a community-based oasis for
caregivers and the newly diagnosed.
 Before
we lost my mother to the thief of memories called Alzheimer's
disease, she asked me to tell her story and make
it count. As she now hangs on in the final stages of
the disease, I'm hopeful she knows that her spirit, love
and energy are being used to create a web of support
for families. After 30 years of working in radio and
television, I now have the most important story of my
life to tell - the story of all the millions of families
like mine who know the frustration and heartache of memory
disorders.
Please join us in our efforts
to offer comfort and care while we work towards a cure.
We must ensure that those who are forgetting are not being
forgotten.
Blessings,
Leeza
National Family Caregiving Month
Leeza's Place Caregiving Story Map
(click on the yellow locations and view a caregiver story)
The heart of a caregiver.
A Story by Leeza Gibbons
I sat with one of our guests at Circle of Care Leeza’s Place on Friday at lunchtime. Beverly was looking especially pretty in a bright yellow top and her make up (as usual) impeccable. She was loving, charming, nurturing….asking about everyone else and smiling and laughing. More than once Beverly made it a point to thank me and my mom for creating Leeza’s Place since it had become “her home away from home”- it was her safe place. She reminded me of so many other caregivers who’s hearts I have come to know. Open, tender and kind. You would have never known that just five days earlier, Beverly’s husband Al had passed away. She was now a grieving widow, and yet there was not one ounce of ptiy surrounding her. “I know he is in a better place”, she told me” and she continued to say that she hadn’t cooked so much lately since he had been sick.
Beverly loves to cook and she’s good at it. In fact, on this very day , she had baked carrot cake cupcakes for her group at Leeza’s Place, complete with her own handy little Tupperware carry-caddy. I thought about how that is just one of the changes that have occurred in Beverly’s life. Her church just shut it’s doors. She founded the church and taught Sunday school there to 300 children. In the end, not one child passed through the door. Churches are supposed to last forever , even if husbands don’t. I could see the sadness in her eyes when she told me, but she quickly caught herself and said, You know, Leeza; you laugh and the world laughs with you, but if you cry, you cry alone.”
She had vowed to try out a new church that very Sunday saying she was going to take her time to make sure the “congregation was friendly”.
As with many caregivers, Beverly has faced her share of health problems and had just had a stint put in her heart. She has lost weight, but not her sense of purpose or her joy in life. I was so inspired by her that I was encouraged to write these words about caregivers with admiration and respect during National Caregiver’s Month and always.
Read Poem >> |
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© 2006
The Leeza Gibbons Memory Foundation | 3050 Biscayne Boulevard, Suite
605 | Miami, Florida 33137 | 1-888-OK-Leeza | info@leezasplace.org | 
