Today, July 1 (Canada Day) 2018, marks 7 months since Jordan’s death. My family and I wish to acknowledge colleagues, family members, and dear friends who have made generous contributions in Jordan’s memory to various non-profit organizations, including the International Family Nursing Association (IFNA) and Covenant House, Vancouver.
Your donations and these particular non-profit organizations have special meaning to our family.
I served on a small steering committee of family nursing colleagues who helped found IFNA in 2009 with a vision of “transforming health for families worldwide”. I believe “illness is a family affair” and a family focused approach to health care is desperately needed. Family nurse scholars and practitioners around the world are leading the way to change the culture of health care to include families as the unit of care.
Through Jordan’s illness journey as a young adult who lived alongside TBI and addiction and returned to live at home after he completed a university business degree in 2010, our family did not routinely experience family focused care. Frequently, it was us, his parents, who requested to be involved in conversations with health care professionals about Jordan’s well-being. Often we were told we were not privileged to information because Jordan was an adult and even occasionally we felt pathologized by health care professionals for wanting to be involved in his care. Never once was our whole family unit of parents and siblings ever involved in a therapeutic conversation, led by a health care professional, about the impact of Jordan’s illness on our family.
Jordan also experienced a brief period of homelessness in his illness experience. The beautiful mission of Covenant House, Vancouver is to “provide homeless and at-risk youth warmth, love, and hope”.
To date, more than $4,000 has been donated to these two organizations. Heartfelt thanks for your charitable donations to honour the life our precious son, Jordan.
A tax deductible donation to the International Family Nursing Association (IFNA) can be made here.