Faces Of Coronavirus: Husband Sees Wife For 1st Time In 6 Months

BRIARCLIFF MANOR, NY — "Here's your Christmas present," Gordon Yunge said, sliding a gift bag across the table to his wife, Jane.

Due to the coronavirus pandemic, Monday was the first time he had been able to see her since Thanksgiving. For Gordon, it's been hard. He's been visiting Jane, who has Alzheimer's disease, just about every other day since she moved to the Briarcliff Manor Center for Rehabilitation and Nursing three years ago.

After the pandemic started, the 82-year-old kept coming, taking advantage of the nursing home's tent set-up, which provided shelter for visitors to sit outside a designated ground-floor room and talk through the window.

But then the pandemic and winter weather shut the nursing home down to visitors, and Gordon has been waiting ever since.

"I was devastated," he told Patch. "I know it's best, to protect her and me, but that doesn't mean you have to like it."

He got his hopes up after Christmas — "I was supposed to see her New Year's Day," Gordon said — but then someone tested positive. "And they've been quarantined ever since."

"The last time I was able to touch her was March 8, 2020," he said. "The last time I saw her through the window was two days after Thanksgiving."

April 4 will be their 57th wedding anniversary. They met at Glen Island — dragged along reluctantly as wingmen by friends who had been eyeing each other. "We've always told the story that we were bribed to meet one another."

On their second date, at a club picnic, an older member warned Gordon that Jane, a healthy eater, would cost him more in food than clothing.

Not so, he said, his eyes crinkling in a smile. An executive assistant at Dun & Bradstreet, she shopped at B Altmans. She was the commuter while Gordon, a pressman, worked for The Journal News in Westchester County until his retirement in 2001.

Jane entered Briarcliff Manor after her care became too complex to manage. He wanted to keep her in White Plains, where they've owned a house for years, but everyplace was full.

"That was a blessing in disguise," he said. "This place has been like family."

Gordon is a member of the family, said A.J. Thomas, director of community relations at the 120-bed facility.

"We have become family to a lot of these residents," Thomas said. "We had a lot of heroes here. People who stepped up out of the realm of their own jobs, giving more personal contact."

Because as important as visits are to families, they're important to the staff too.

So nursing homes like Briarcliff Manor are adhering to the state's standards with layers of protection for residents and staff — from strict PPE and infection control protocols to vaccinations and rapid testing — in an effort to reopen for visitors.

Briarcliff Manor is a member-facility of Excelsior Care Group, a healthcare management firm that provides management consulting services to subacute rehabilitation and nursing centers in the tri-state area. Excelsior has able to reopen seven of its 12 facilities in New York and New Jersey.

"It's a very, very high threshold to meet," said Excelsior spokeswoman Jackie Kreismann. "A lot of hard work went into getting us to this point."

The families have been very understanding — everybody wants to put residents' and staff's safety first, she said. Now, the anticipation and excitement are growing, specially for those like Gordon Yunge who have been coming regularly for a long time.

"They were a very big missing piece in our puzzle this past year," Kreismann said. "We get attached to our families. It's emotional for us. We felt our residents' pain and we're feeling their happiness as well."