During a Senior Move, a Client Becomes the Caregiver

Emotions can run high on moving day, especially for seniors. When you've spent most of your life in one home, it almost always hurts to leave it behind. Movers, then, are adequately prepared to handle these situations with grace and care and they know that the clients themselves might need a little extra attention and reassurance. And then sometimes, the tables get turned.

Two Small Men mover Landon Woodrow says there was one senior move he worked on that stands out from the others, not because of it's difficulty, but because of how remarkable the client was.

It all started off a few years ago with what should have been a standard senior move. The client had been in the same house for 30 years and, after the recent passing of her husband, she was preparing to say goodbye to this home as a new life awaited her elsewhere.

Disaster struck when, part way through the move, Landon suddenly sustained a leg injury. In a total freak accident, he had managed to tear multiple ligaments and tendons between his shin and toes and the soft tissue of his ankle. Somehow it didn't feel that bad at the time and Landon thought he could press on.

“I thought I’d just rolled my ankle,” he says.

He decided to keep going and as a coworker and he were carrying a couch into the home, the client took a glance at him and immediately called for a timeout.

“You hurt yourself, didn’t you?” she asked.

Landon tried to tell her it was nothing; that he had just rolled his ankle. But after seeing him limp around for a few more seconds, she knew the score. After all, she was a career nurse who had only recently retired. She was familiar with this kind of thing.

“No,” she told him firmly. “You did more than that. You’re going to sit down now.”

Landon explained he was there to do a job and she shouldn't concern herself.

She again persisted: “Now I’m paying you to sit down.”

There was no arguing, especially when the woman's adult son got involved. He also recognized the injury and shared his mother's concern. A larger man, he quickly grabbed a chair and convincingly guided Landon to a seated-position where he could rest. The elderly woman even told Landon that if he kept trying to work, she'd call his superiors and make sure he was immediately taken to the hospital.

Instead, Landon himself called Two Small Men HQ and, in short order, a new mover was dispatched to fill in for him. In retrospect, he realized how the situation could have been so much worse for him. Other clients may have simply not cared at all about this injury. He was grateful for this client's empathy.

Despite the extent of his injury, Landon only went to the hospital the next day, at which point it became clear how badly he was hurt. It would take weeks for him to recover fully. But the connection he had made with the client would last much longer. They even met for coffee a week after the move.

He just wanted to make sure the rest of her move had gone smoothly. But soon they were talking about life in general and she shared stories from her nursing career and her marriage. Landon told her more about himself. It blossomed into a friendship in which the two would stay in touch, meet, and even text back and forth occasionally. This wasn't what happened with every client by far, but this one was special.

As the years went on, Landon stopped hearing from her as much. And then, a couple of years ago, word got to Landon that she had passed away. He still speaks of her with a high level of regard. She had shown compassion towards him in a moment where the focus was supposed to be on her own stressful transition.

The experience left Landon with an understanding the moving isn't always just about moving. It's about caring for the people as much as their possessions. Because sometimes when you show that much care, you get a little of it back.

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