Independent Living Community in Bellevue, Nebraska

Barb

My aunt was a resident of Richmont Village. She was there for five years. She really loved it. They were all kinds of people that she met and she developed good friends there. She complained about the food sometimes. That's kinda normal, especially the last couple of months were too bad, because they had to shut down the dining room off and on. Before that, she loved going down for breakfast with the people. I would kinda come over sometimes with her just to help her get dressed, cause she had a bad shoulder, so I would come over and help her with her clothes. I'd go down with her and take a cup of coffee with her and the ladies that were sitting at the table. She really enjoyed that. She celebrated her 90th birthday there, she had a huge party in the dining room, and all the residents pretty much came and enjoyed it. Every time I go over there, they'd say something like, "We really had fun with your aunt's birthday." It was just a really nice and safe place. There were a lot of people there that she became friends with. The people that worked there were fantastic. One of the ladies that would come in and clean her room, they became best friends. Denise would stop in and check on her periodically to just see how she was doing. There was another lady named Michelle, who lived and worked there. She would come up and visit with my aunt and talk to her and make sure she needed any help because she'd been a CNA. It was just really, really nice. Her room was like an apartment. She had a big, huge closet, a nice-sized bedroom, a living room with a kitchen, and a huge window in the living room that you could look out. It was just a real nice apartment. There was a place for a washer and dryer and they were stacked. When she was driving her car, her car was right there. It's just a matter of going down the elevator and out. When she couldn't drive anymore, if I were to go to pick her up to go some place or go to the doctor's, I could go in the garage and pick her up so she didn't have to go out in the weather. They have a library and they have bingo now. When they had some issues with COVID, they didn't have very many activities. The people were locked down in their rooms and they did not spread the virus. When COVID wasn't there they would open their doors to their apartments. They are divided into sections and they would play bingo upstairs, out of their rooms and out of their apartments. They would bring people in to speak or they had a movie theater in there that they could go and watch movies. They had an area for popcorn with the movies. They have a room with a pool table, too. When the virus wasn't in, the people could go in and play pool whenever they wanted. They had an exercise room down in the basement. That was really nice with a lot of weights and that. They have another good-sized room set aside for Christmas. They would set it up, people could go in with their families, and have pictures taken with Santa Claus. They just did a lot of stuff. They had a bus if they wanted to go out for dinner. They would set up which restaurant they were going to and they would take all of those that signed up to go there, eat, and they bring them back. We didn't have that once the virus came. There's a lot of outings and taking out the residents to the grocery store. They just have a lot of stuff to do. I noticed a lot of the people, before all of these with the virus, they would congregate. When you come in, there's a big lobby area with a lot of sitting and there would be a lot of people there. I don't live there but I met an awful lot of the people that were there. They were couples, singles, and they were great. The staff is great. I'm gonna miss some of them. It was very easy to get around and they had a beauty parlor and everything. They kept them very busy and they provided a lot of opportunities for them to interact and move around. The pricing was very reasonable and it's not much different than a hotel.