Lindo: I was lucky not to have been killed

A young entrepreneur has taken over her first business venture — less than a year after a car crash that could have left her paralysed or dead.

Alex Lindo, who broke her spine in five places after her car flipped over a year ago, has taken over iCare, a service that goes to the homes of the elderly and infirm, with business partner Lena Campbell.

Ms Lindo, 30, of Pembroke, said she suffered five fractures in her lower spine and broke two vertebrae in the crash, which happened last April as she was on her way to work as a community support worker at the Mid Atlantic Wellness Institute (MAWI).

She added: “It could have been a lot worse — my back specialist said if I had twisted a little bit more, I would have been paralysed. And I was lucky not to have been killed.”

Hospital

Ms Lindo said: “When I woke up, I was in the hospital and I was there for a week-and-a-half or two weeks. I had a back brace, but other than that, I was at home, where I spent ten weeks in bed.

“Everybody was asking me if I was okay when I was on bed rest — I was joking a lot in the hospital and at home — if I hadn’t, I would have been depressed and crying.”

But she added: “It opened my eyes that life is kinda short. I decided to live one day at a time and take opportunities when they came. This opportunity came and we took it.”

Ms Lindo and Ms Campbell, who met at MAWI, where Ms Campbell still works, took over iCare officially at the start of the month, although they had been running the firm since February.

Ms Lindo said: “Lena approached me about iCare and I said I would think about it — five minutes later, I called her back and said let’s do it.”

She added: “It’s been a lot of work — the first two months has been very hard work. We have been working with the hospital because there were new policies and procedures we had to put into place.”

She said these included the firm and staff being up-to-date on clients’ medical history and personalities.

Ms Lindo added: “We don’t want to put any of our caregivers in a home where they don’t know the medical history and they’re just going in blind.”

Needed

iCare offers both live-in, round the clock care and a live-out service, with a flexible approach based on the needs of the client.

The firm’s owners also double up as on-call caregivers themselves when needed.

The company, which has six employees, has already added two people to their client list since March and Ms Lindo said it was hoped to continue to expand.

But Ms Lindo said she had become interested in the caring professions after she had been unable to use her degrees in sociology and history and criminology when she returned to Bermuda after university.

She added: “I had been caring for my family all my life, but I didn’t see it as profession or a career. But my co-workers at MAWI were awesome and it really worked out for the best.”

Ms Lindo, from Pembroke, studied at Mount St Vincent University and CompuCollege, both in Halifax, Nova Scotia, before coming back to Bermuda.

She worked at MAWI for three years, while Ms Campbell, also a community support worker for people with learning difficulties, has notched up 15 years on the job. n