A Little Gift from Heaven

Vivian and her mom Kimberly smiling together beside orange flowers

A little gift from heaven can make a difference in someone’s life!

My older son Micheal introduced me to a classmate he went to school with. It turned out that she was a nurse with experience with dementia. In February and March 2024, she donated her time to be a care companion to my wife Kimberly A Frechette, who is battling Behavioral Variant Frontotemporal Dementia Stage 2.

Ironically, her name was Kimberly as well. So, she called my Kimberly “Miss Kimberly,” and Miss Kimberly called Kimberly “Kim.”  And they get along excellent. But at the end of March, it was a sad day as we bid farewell to Kim, who took a job in Seattle for a three-month gig as a traveling nurse.

But not all was lost. She had her daughter Vivian come in for a day to watch her mom work with Miss Kimberly so she could take over for her mom for about six weeks while she was in between jobs.

Vivian had been here a couple of weeks when I discovered her middle name was Marie. When I talked to her about her middle name, I asked her if she knew that Miss Kimberly’s daughter, who she lost to sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) on May 31, 1976, that her name was Michelle Marie.

Then Vivian said, “Her mom’s middle name was Michele.”  At that moment, the hair on the back of my neck rose—a spiritual feeling that was hard to explain came over me.

I commented at that point, explaining why Kimberly remembers your name and your mom’s, especially when she has no short-term memory. It had to be her daughter who circumvented this journey from my son to your mom to you to Miss Kimberly.

Kim and Vivian have been a blessing to our uprooted environment, and Kimberly (my wife) and I (Leon, her husband) have adopted them as our new second family. The love and affection they share with my wife are hard to express, but watching them in action is impressive. If we could clone them many times over as “care companions to the world,” the world would be better for their sincere kindness.

Miss Kimberly’s little angel Michelle was busy at work taking care of her mom and making sure that she was okay while battling her disease. She helped me as the full-time caregiver while bringing two remarkable ladies into our lives. We are truly blessed with these exceptional individuals!

UPDATE: (06/26/2004)

As much as we hate to see a good thing end, we must accept the cards we are dealt. This Friday will be Vivian’s last day here as Kimberly’s blessed care companion. Her mom, who took the travel nurse position in Seattle early this year, got an offer that she could not refuse by taking an assistant director position with the company. Vivian was getting homesick, so she decided to go back to Seattle, where all her relatives and friends are, and move in with her mom.

Kimberly and I will miss both of them, but we wish them the best in the next chapter of their life!

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Leon Frechette

Leon A. Frechette is a Spokane, Washington-based entrepreneur. His expertise lies in home improvement. He’s a publisher, published author, and photographer. A product innovator in home improvement, children’s and adult toys, creative design, and food-related product development. And lastly, a trained cook in the Army National Guard.

To set the stage for one of the most challenging challenges Leon will face down the road, he wrote 3 books that later will help him as he steps into an unpaid spouse caregiver role soon.

1) Bathroom Remodeling (TAB Books/McGraw-Hill, Inc., 1994)
2) Accessible Housing (McGraw-Hill, Inc., 1996)
3) Remodeling A Bathroom (The Taunton Press, 2004)

These books, along with his cooking skills, helped him battle his wife Kimberly’s illnesses that started 05/06/2006 when she woke up on her 52nd birthday with ringing in both ears, known as Tinnitus.

This is also when his life changed forever, as he became an unpaid spouse caregiver on and off for the next 20 years while simultaneously running his own business for 50 years as of March 2026.

From Tinnitus, menopause, vertigo, and memory loss starting in 2020, put on medical leave in 2021, to full-blown anxiety with signs of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), and diagnosed with behavioral variant Frontotemporal Dementia (bvFTD) Stage 2 in 2022. In 2025, her disease was upgraded to Stage 3 (final stage). Her life was cut short as the disease took her life on Monday, July 13, 2026. She went peacefully, and her brain was donated the following day to the Mayo Clinic, and the study came back showing that not only did she have bvFTD, but also progressive aphasia and Pick’s disease.

Leon has been by her side 24/7 since 2021 as her full-time unpaid caregiver in a broken caregiver system that almost broke him mentally and physically at the beginning of 2026.

Leon and Kimberly’s journey revealed just how difficult it can be for families affected by dementia to find the understanding, resources, respite, and financial support they desperately need.

Leon, as an advocate for his wife and bvFTD, is more than qualified to help others who will follow in his footsteps in this difficult, demanding quest. Reach out to him through this website!

This Post Has 2 Comments

  1. Vivian November 18, 2025 Reply

    Hi, I’m Vivian, and I helped care for Kimberly in the past. Caring for her helped encourage me to pursue senior care and grew a passion for memory care.
    I now work for a bigger facility instead of being a one-on-one companion and although there are many differences in dementia, there are also many similarities between people affected by it, as well as healthy people who speak about it.
    I have noticed how many people have limited understanding of the disease and do not work on the abilities that those affected by dementia still have. This is key! Many people with dementia still have fun, and can still communicate in their own ways, adaption is so important. But this is easier said than done when there is so much fatigue involved in caregiving. Having a team is so important but for those who can’t, we need to call for affordable health care and more understanding in dementia.
    I would like to thank Leon for his care in making a page like this. Let’s not keep silent about the struggles of caring for dementia, as well as celebrate the successes.

  2. Leon Frechette December 3, 2025 Reply

    Vivian, thanks for taking the time to comment on this post. I personally enjoyed what you did while you were here in Spokane the summer of 2024 with Kimberly. You have a special gift that allows you to bond and work with individuals with special needs. I’m glad you decided to stay in this field of memory care, and I wish you all the best!

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