Nursing home director named Unsung Hero
StoryTerrace chooses Lindsay Sherman for autobiography campaign
BY JASON COHEN
Following months of tireless
work during COVID-19
, a nursing home employee
from the Bronx is getting
her story told.
With their “Unsung Heroes”
campaign, StoryTerrace,
a service that pairs
a person with an accredited
ghostwriter to compose
autobiographies, is
shining a spotlight on
people who helped others
during COVID-19.
Bronx resident Lindsay
Sherman, 38, has been chosen
as one of the book’s 25
featured heroes, selected
from over 400 entries around
the world. Over the summer,
Sherman’s best friend
heard StoryTerrace’s call
to action for first-person accounts
from front line workers
during COVID-19.
Sherman is the director
of social work at a nursing
home in Manhattan. After
the majority of her staff
quit due to their own health
fears, she took on her whole
team’s workload. She helped
families cope with deaths,
provided support to dying
patients, made hospice referrals
and coordinated Skype
video calls for residents to
communicate with family.
She never talked about her
fears of going into work, despite
suffering from asthma
and chronic bronchitis.
“It was a very difficult
time,” Sherman recalled. “I
never thought in my career
I would witness something
like this.”
Sherman has worked
at the nursing home for 10
years and spent three of
them as the social work director.
According to Sherman,
there was nothing that
could have prepared her for
the devastation of the pandemic.
She described it as a
“war zone,” and witnessed
the death of a co-worker and
numerous patients.
She said that she felt an
overwhelming sense of sadness
throughout the past
months that she hopes she
will never feel again.
“People were scared to
come to work,” she said.
BRONX TIMES REPORTER,16 OCTOBER 9-15, 2020 BTR
Sherman told the Bronx
Times how she would sit
with COVID-19 patients
and do her best to comfort
them. Knowing they could
not see their family hurt
even more.
Throughout the pandemic,
she was fearful she
would catch the coronavirus.
In fact, because of her
job, she had not seen her
parents in six months, but
she did her best to keep her
composure and persevered.
“We just did it,” she said.
“I helped the staff however
I could.”
Sherman explained that
her training from Fordham
University set her up on how
to work with people and be
caring and supportive.
She shared that things
are slowly improving in
the nursing home as there
are less COVID-19 residents
and visitors can now see
their loved ones through a
plexiglass door.
Sherman was close with
her late grandparents Sylvia
Paroff and Charles Sherman,
so working in a nursing
home felt right.
“I always knew I wanted
to work in a nursing home
because of the relationship
with my grandparents,”
she said.
Bronx resident, Lindsay Sherman has been chosen as one of the book’s
25 featured heroes, selected from hundreds of entries around the world.
Photos courtesy of Lindsay Sherman