Providence nursing home resident brought to tears after receiving hundreds of Christmas cards

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WLNE) – The holidays can get a little bit lonely for those in nursing homes this year.

One North Kingstown woman says her family lives out of state and hasn’t been able to visit her at her nursing home in Providence during the pandemic. She says it’s been nine months since she had a visitor.

“It’s been really hard. It gets so lonely and so depressing,” Susan Wendt said. “You really have no contact with anyone except for the phone.”

That’s why she took to Facebook asking for people to send cards to help bring her some Christmas cheer. She says the response was overwhelming.

“Could you please send me a Christmas card so I could decorate my room?” Wendt said. “And boom. It exploded. It went viral.”

Hundreds of Christmas cards were shipped to Wendt, not only from Rhode Island, but around the world including Canada, the U.K., and Australia. People not only shipped cards, but gifts, too.

“These people that I don’t know have cared about me,” Wendt said.  “They send me messages and pens to write back. I’ve got so many pen pals now!”

Wendt says she read card after card and hung them up all over her room until she got so many, she knew she had to spread the cheer to others in the nursing home.

“I’m going to take my scotch tape and a big bag with all the cards in it,” Wendt said. “So, this way, not one person in this nursing home is going to be forgotten. Everybody is going to have Christmas in their room.”

She says she calls her messengers her angels and hopes people recognize just how much a simple note or call means, especially now more than ever.

“People think there’s no joy anymore in the world. There’s no love, that there’s so much hatred and so much more negativity,” Wendt said. “But, there’s not. If you just look, you will see the beauty in this world.”

If you want to send your own note, you can send it to Bannister Center: 135 Dodge St. Providence R.I. 02907.