OneFamily, OneCare · Origin Story

In DevelopmentThe Spreadsheet That Became a Product.

I wasn’t looking for a product idea. I wasn’t even looking for a problem to solve. One day, I walked into a situation that made me start asking questions.

One small fix led to another, and eventually became something I never planned to build.

A pencil drawing of dominoes mid-fall. One very small domino has toppled the next, and the chain curves away into the distance, each piece larger than the one before it.

How it happened↓

It Started With a Notebook

What I walked into

One day, by chance, I started taking care of a patient with dementia. On the counter was a notebook, a medication log. It was chaotic: incomplete, inconsistent, and impossible to hand off reliably. Entries were missing. Handwriting changed from one shift to the next. Some days had two lines, some had none at all.

The notebook was simply the only tool anyone had been given, and it Could Not Carry the Day.

A spiral notebook page, handwritten. Each line lists a medication followed by the days of the week, with the days ticked off in green and orange highlighter.

I Needed a Better Way

The fix I improvised

My first fix was simple. I opened Excel and organized the medications into something I could actually follow. I printed the sheets at first, but I quickly realized I was going to go through a ridiculous amount of paper. So I took the structure I had made in Excel and drew it into the notebook by hand each week.

As time went on, I started adding other things I needed to keep track of: her weight, exercises and physical therapy, and notes for the next caregiver.

Same notebook. Better system.
And for the first time, I had a little peace of mind.

A recreated notebook spread, hand ruled. On the left page, Morning and Afternoon medications with their times and a column for each day Monday to Sunday, ticked off in coloured pen. On the right page, Night medications, then rows for walking in minutes, foot bicycle in minutes, weight in pounds and physical therapy exercises, and below them a short list of notes for each day.

Then I Noticed Something Else

It wasn’t only about keeping track

One day I asked her husband if she liked music. He said no. Her daughter gave me a completely different answer: she loved Motown, and she loved to dance.

So I played some music. She tried to sing the choruses and danced in her wheelchair. A long, boring day suddenly became fun.

That made me wonder:
what else did the people caring for her not know?
The information existed. We just didn’t have it.

A pinned board of handwritten notes. Asking her husband if she liked music, and being told she doesn’t. Asking her daughter later, and being told of course she does, she loves Motown, she loved to dance. Putting music on, and her singing the choruses and dancing in her wheelchair. A long boring day becoming fun. Then the question: what if caregivers knew these things before walking through the door? Circled in red: the information existed, I just didn’t have it.

What If There Was a Better Way?

How can I do it

After I stopped caregiving, I decided it was time to go back to work. I had a degree, but after almost 20 years, I knew I needed an upgrade. While looking into UX/UI, I learned that I would need case studies.

And immediately I thought about that notebook. Not just the medications, or the exercises, but the things caregivers didn’t know. The things families knew but we didn’t. The information that existed somewhere, but never seemed to reach the person who needed it the most.

So I started connecting the pieces.
Care isn’t only knowing what happened. It’s knowing who you’re caring for.
Two and a half days later, the idea had become a system.

A pinned board of handwritten questions. What else didn’t I know? What did the next caregiver not know? What did her family know that we didn’t? What gets lost when the person can no longer tell us? Circled: what if that information could arrive before the caregiver did? Below, notes reading what someone liked to listen to, what their routines had been, what they enjoyed doing, what made them laugh. Underlined in red: care isn’t only knowing what happened, it’s knowing who you’re caring for. At the foot: one question led to another, two and a half days later I had a whole system.

That Became OneFamily, OneCare

My mission

All those questions eventually became OneFamily, OneCare, a system designed to connect the people involved in someone’s care, so the information they need doesn’t stay scattered between notebooks, caregivers, and family members.

It started with one notebook and one patient.
Now we’re building it for more than one family.

Where it stands

OneFamily, OneCare is currently in development under Meridian Works LLC. We’re continuing to design and develop the experience for caregivers and families with one goal: helping people stay connected not only to their families, but to who they are and the things that matter to them.

If that knowledge travels with their care, they don’t lose those pieces of themselves just because their memory does.

In development · onefamilyonecare.com

Even if they forget, we don’t.