Meet Our Care Mentors
and Care Sheppards
Meet Our Care Mentors
Care Mentors are compassionate companions on the caregiving journey. With lived experience, they offer emotional, prayerfull and spiritual support to foster resilience, reduce loneliness, and help you navigate the complexities of caregiving with newfound confidence in community connection and dependence on God.
Tina Yu
I am an achiever; I like to fix things. When my sister was diagnosed with cancer, I found myself helpless unable to fix anything. Caregiving became a challenging, on-the-job training. I was grateful when that season ended with my sister’s remission.
But then, my-kid brother developed cancer. God, it seemed, had enrolled me in a more advanced course. I brought him into my small apartment so I could care for him.
My third caregiving chapter came when my mother became ill with cancer. Learning how to care for her while respecting my father’s role taught me lessons, I had not anticipated. These experiences taught me that each caregiving journey is unique.
If chosen as your care mentor, I will not come with ready answers, but with listening ears and thoughtful questions helping you glimpse light at the end of a long, emotionally demanding day.
Margaret Habashy
Shortly after our wedding, my mother-in-law’s health declined rapidly. Looking back, during the first year of our marriage, we shared more meals in a hospital cafeteria than in our small apartment. Because she did not speak English, providing her with the care she deserved was especially challenging. As a newly married, working 25-year-old, learning to set realistic expectations while balancing marriage, work, and caregiving stretched me in ways I had not anticipated.
These challenges deepened later when my husband and I became the primary caregivers for his older brother. While my mother-in-law was gentle and compliant, my brother-in-law had high expectations, leading to many family conflicts.
In my most difficult moments, I knelt in prayer and sought wisdom in God’s Word. If you want me to be your care mentor, I will pray for you—and with you—trusting God to supply all our needs in Christ Jesus.
Karen Ling
God has used my family life, church life, and professional life to shape my heart as a caregiver. He helped understand the toll that caregiving can take on our minds, bodies and spirits.
The Lord has also used my own health challenges to teach me what is it like to be the on the receiving side needing care instead of just giving care to others. As a result, I have a deep respect for the limits we all face when our love exceeds our capacity.
As your care mentor, I will walk beside you with compassion and understanding in your caregiving journey so that you know you do not walk alone. I will listen without judgment, praying with and for you, encouraging you to find strength in God’s Word, and gladly sharing the promises I myself have held onto in my own moments of need,
Baha Habashy
I was only 18 months old when my father died, leaving my mother to raise seven children on her own. At age 25, I immigrated to Canada from Egypt, and my mother came with me seeking medical care for her declining health. I became both her power of attorney and her caregiver until she passed away eight years later.
As the youngest of seven, caregiving was often assumed to be my role, especially for family members living far away. Caregiving from hundreds or even thousands of miles away raises its own painful challenges.
From experience, I know this: if there was something you could have done, you have likely already done it. My role as a care mentor is not to provide answers, but to ask thoughtful, honest questions. With God’s help, those questions may reveal insights you have not yet considered. And once clarity comes, I will walk with you, encouraging realistic expectations and offering steady support.
liz russell
God has been my constant source of comfort, wisdom, and strength throughout the many joys and challenges of my caregiving journey. He faithfully sustained me as I cared for both of my parents during their battles with terminal cancer and, more recently, while supporting a relative living with dementia.
Those experiences taught me the importance of depending on God’s grace each day and accepting encouragement from others. Having trusted friends with whom I could openly talk, share my burdens, and pray together brought comfort to my heart, peace to my mind, and renewed hope during difficult seasons. Those conversations continue to encourage me today.
As your care mentor, my desire is to provide a safe, compassionate, and confidential place where you will be heard, understood, and supported. I will listen carefully and ask thoughtful questions that encourage your personal and spiritual growth as you faithfully care for your loved one.
Cindy Byron
Profile Pending
Care Sheppards
Care Shepherds offer vital spiritual support to Care Mentors. Navigating the complexities of caregiving requires deep wisdom; we believe God is calling retired pastors to steward their lifelong experience by guiding and nurturing the next generation of care mentors.
Rev. Sample
At 75 years of age, this pastor brings a gentle presence shaped by more than five decades of faithful ministry. His life has been marked by deep compassion, careful listening, and a steady reliance on God’s wisdom—qualities refined through years of walking alongside individuals and families in seasons of joy, grief, illness, and loss.
Having shepherded congregations through countless life transitions, he understands the emotional, spiritual, and relational weight caregivers carry. He does not rush to provide answers, but offers discernment, prayerful guidance, and the reassurance that comes from long obedience and lived experience.
As a Care Shepherd, he provides vital spiritual support to Care Mentors, helping them navigate the complexities of caregiving with clarity and grace. He sees this role as a sacred calling—an opportunity to steward a lifetime of pastoral insight by nurturing, encouraging, and strengthening those who now walk with caregivers on the front lines.
His calm wisdom, compassionate heart, and enduring faith make him an ideal guide for this ministry.
