Post about Joan Therese Seivert and Connections Unlimited, LLC

This is the first of a series that will showcase some of my colleagues, their businesses, expertise, etc. because  the DenverElderLaw.org blog isn’t just about Barb!  Today I’m writing about Joan Therese Seivert – her website is www.joantherese.com, her company’s name is Connections Unlimited, LLC and she regularly tweets  and posts Facebook updates as well as youtube videos about what she does for Denver area families.  Joan Therese runs Connections Unlimited, LLC, from her home office in Edgewater, but she typically visits with people in their homes.  Joan Therese has had her company for twenty-three years and before starting Connections Unlimited, she worked in special needs advocacy and a variety of different settings in aging and retirement communities, which she describes as excellent preparation for her Connections Unlimited work.  When she started Connections Unlimited , she needed a flexible work schedule because she had young children.  Her kids are now grown, but she still enjoys the flexibility of running her own business and doing work she knows she is meant to do.

Helping families sift through the options available for an aging parent, whether that involves independent or assisted living, and asking the questions that are sometimes the most difficult for family members to ask are all part of what Joan Therese does.  She asks lots of questions to find out what people are concerned about, and she listens carefully to their answers.  She is a consummate networker, and prides herself on being familiar with a variety of people and resource providers, so that she can offer different people different options.  Nearly all of the work she does with Connections Unlimited is about helping families with elders work together to maintain quality of life and strengthening community.

What Joan Therese finds most gratifying about her job  is being of service to others, especially helping them make the space to ask the hard questions and assisting them through the process of making their own choices about how they want to proceed.

Joan Therese hasn’t written a blog post before, but she does regular updates on Facebook  (her fan page has over 100 likes!) and lots of tweets.

I asked Joan Therese about some of the biggest challenges she faces in her line of work.  She answered that is thinking about the huge number of boomers aging, keeping people living independently by fostering their connections to the community, and locating available resources for the large number of older women of fixed (low) incomes.  She typically asks herself, along with her clients, to think about conceptions of aging and consider whether someone is “settling into old age” or whether they are becoming an elder – an engaged member of the community.

I love chatting with Joan Therese and hearing about her work, which she infuses with much joy, meaning and purpose.  Be sure to watch one of Joan Therese’s(latest) videos here!