Some talks inform an audience. A few inspire. David Heavens' session at the Senior Living Innovation Forum changed the temperature of the room.
Introduced as a caregiver and content creator, he opened by calling the moment one of the proudest of his life—and then earned it, tracing a story that ran from a village in Nigeria to a viral friendship with a US Navy veteran that’s followed by almost a million people on social media.
His foundation, he said, was his grandmother. Raised by her because his mother was only 15, Heavens learned early that "a child should not raise a child,” he said. His grandmother sent his mother back to school and took him in, raising him with a kindness that made room for people even when she had nothing. That became the blueprint of his caregiving acumen.
His American dream began in 2013 with a single suitcase as he made his way to college in Neosho, Missouri. It was rough. He couldn't afford tuition, his classes were dropped, and he became homeless for the first time. A sales job paid the bills but felt hollow — he didn't want to sell people things they didn't need. Then a chance conversation introduced him to a word he'd never heard: caregiver. The moment it was explained, he knew.
"I want to be in service. I love helping people. Heck, I would do it for free," he said.
The turn in his story came in 2023. Then in Los Angeles, he lost his apartment and everything in it after a sublet situation went south. He drove for rideshare apps and slept in his car, passing his past apartment at night, seeing the illuminated windows. It was, by his own account, the hardest season of his life. But rather than wait for his circumstances to change, he pivoted his perspective:
He said to himself, "I can't fix my life right now, but I can be useful to someone else." He posted on a neighborhood app offering two free hours to walk dogs for seniors.
That post led him to Frank, a 92-year-old Navy veteran, and his partner Pippa. Hired as a weekend dog walker, Heavens noticed Frank needed more – he was slow on his feet and had stopped shaving. So he asked, simply, "Can I shave you?" From that question grew conversations, then a friendship, then a role as Frank's caregiver…and more.
"I don't see Frank and Pippa as my clients," Heavens said. "I see them as my grandparents."
The heart of Heavens' philosophy is that great caregiving is intentional and relational, not transactional. He came into Frank's life "to be a student," he said, leaving his training at the door and asking Frank to teach him how he wanted to be cared for: how he liked his coffee, his hair combed, where he wanted to go for lunch.
A caregiver is "kind, compassionate, patient, and willing to go above and beyond," with the ability "to truly see people how they want to be seen and preserve their dignity through difficult moments," Heavens said.
He was candid, too, about what the senior living industry gets wrong. Caregiving carries a fractured reputation and high turnover, and he laid part of the blame on companies that fail to invest in their people.
"If you don't reinvest into the caregivers, there is no return on investment,” he said.
His most moving point was about dignity. Asking for help, he noted, is often one of the hardest things to do for those who spent their lives being strong and stoic. When Frank once apologized for needing to be lifted after a 3 a.m. fall, Heavens saw a man who fought for his country struggling to receive care. The job, then, is to reassure the client: I want to do this.
Heavens closed on the idea of full circle—that we're all heading in the same direction, and the way we care for our elders is the way we hope to be cared for ourselves. In Frank, he found not just a client but a second chance to connect with his grandmother.
"Be gentle, be present, and be kind to one another," he said.