Why I Do This Work
By Kari Baker, CDP | High Country Senior Advisors | Flagstaff, AZ Category: About / Personal Story | Read time: ~3 min
Her name was Verlon.
She was my grandmother — kind in a way that was almost inconvenient, generous to a fault, and more committed to her church than anyone I have ever known. She was the kind of woman who showed up. For her family, for her community, for Christ Lutheran in whatever town she called home.
When she and my grandfather didn't have much money but she had already committed to help her church build a new sanctuary, she took a job at Arby's. She wore a nametag. It didn't say Verlon. It said Grandma. And every single paycheck she received, she endorsed over to Christ Lutheran. She never deposited a single one into her own account. That was who she was.
And then Alzheimer's came for her.
I watched it take her piece by piece. And I watched my family — good people who loved her deeply — try to do right by her and not always succeed. I knew more than most. I had spent years in senior healthcare. I understood the system in ways that most families don't. And I still made mistakes. We all did. Not because we didn't care — but because caring is not the same as knowing what to do. Because even the most loving family can be underprepared for what dementia actually asks of you.
What calls me to this work
It is not that I got it right. It is that I didn't — and I know what that costs. I know the weight of looking back and wishing you had done something differently. I know what it feels like to have more knowledge than most and still fall short of what someone you loved deserved.
That is what calls me to this work. Not expertise alone — though I spent more than twenty years building it, working at the executive level in senior healthcare, eventually earning my Certified Dementia Practitioner credential. But expertise in service of something more personal than a career. In service of the families who are right now in the middle of what my family went through, trying to love someone well and not always knowing how.
I built High Country Senior Advisors because I wish someone like me had been there for Verlon. And for us.
What I actually do
High Country Senior Advisors is a senior care advisory practice based right here in Flagstaff. I work with families navigating dementia, Alzheimer's, and complex care transitions — some locally, some calling me from out of state because they have a parent here and no idea where to start.
I help caregivers understand what is happening and what to do about it. I help families make sense of their options — from keeping a loved one safely at home, to understanding what assisted living or memory care actually looks like from the inside. And when a family is ready to consider a community, I walk with them through that process from the first conversation to move-in day.
Placement services are always free to families. My consulting and remote coaching services are private pay. But the first conversation is always free too.
Why Flagstaff
I live here. I know these communities, these providers, and the gaps in our local system. When I recommend something, it is because I have seen it work for a real family in this town — not because I found it on a list.
If your family is in the middle of a dementia journey and you are not sure what you need, I want to talk to you. Not to sell you anything. Just to help you think it through.
Call or text: 480.789.1058 Email: kari.baker@highcountryseniors.com Web: highcountryseniors.com
