“When an elderly lady screams that she wants to kill me, I ask her which color shirt she would like to wear. While loved ones sob after a death and others move past silently, I bring in a tray of treats, give them each a hug and recall my favorite memories of their lost loved one.”
It’s a poignant sentiment, especially coming from a college freshman. After watching her grandfather suffer a life-changing car accident while she was in middle school, Kate Hildebrand developed a consuming passion for helping those around her. In high school, watching her grandfather defy doctors’ prognoses yet noting the steady decline in his health, she took a job at a nursing home near her hometown of Earlville. She just wanted to help people.
“I have to care about people,” Hildebrand says. “Care is something that is missing in our society, at least more than it should be.”
As a freshman at Central, Hildebrand had the chance to relate her nursing home experiences and the passion that drives her to serve the sick and elderly. While taking Intersections, a required first-year seminar, she was assigned an essay modeled after those featured on thisibelive.org, a website publishing short essays about the core values that guide the author’s daily lives.
Hildebrand’s effort, titled “In my Papa’s Lap,” is a moving piece tracing the source of her core value—helping others in any way she can. The essay follows her experience from the innocence of youth through her grandfather’s accident to her decision to make caring a core value of her life.
“I always want to help people,” says Hildebrand. “Every resident I work with at the nursing home is special to somebody.”
After reading the final essay, her Intersections teacher Paulina Mena was so moved she suggested Hildebrand submit it to thisibelieve.org.
“It was such a well-written and touching piece that I suggested she—along with a handful of other students—submit it for publication,” says Mena, assistant professor of biology. “I thought that it had a chance of being accepted.”
Following Mena’s suggestion, Hildebrand submitted her essay in February. It was several months before a reply. “I was surprised when it was accepted,” says Hildebrand. “It had been so long since I’d submitted it I just assumed they had passed on it.”
Unfortunately, she was unable to share the essay with her grandfather. He passed away in July, just 10 days after it was published. His passing has done nothing to deter Hildebrand’s commitment to helping others. She is studying biology with the hope of becoming a trauma surgeon.
In the meantime, she continues to work at the nursing home during time away from Central. She often makes the two-and-a half-hour drive to put in 36 hours of work over the weekend. She says that no matter what happens at the nursing home—the abuse that is thrown at her, the frustration or the death of a resident—she does not lose her will to help the patients. She reminds herself of the care she would give if it were her papa.
As Hildebrand concludes in her essay, “I believe each one of those residents is somebody’s someone, just like my papa who inspires me every time he proves the doctors wrong and takes another step. I believe people can change lives.”
