Today we’d like to introduce you to Katie Stippec.
Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
My path to home care started in Hollywood. I spent more than ten years producing television: daytime TV at Hallmark, casting on shows like Blue Bloods and Nurse Jackie, working with celebrities like Shaquille O’Neal and eventually executive producing an animated series. I loved that work, but the thing that changed my life happened off set. In 2016 my sister was shot. I left my career, came home to St. Louis, and spent close to 90 nights in the hospital with her, making sure someone was always in her corner. Asking the questions, tracking the medications, speaking up when she couldn’t speak for herself.
What stayed with me afterward was this: most people going through a health crisis don’t have a person who can drop everything and do that for them. My partner Michael and I had been caring for people our whole lives in one way or another, so we decided to make it our work. Enter Here at Home Healthcare, established in 2021, so families in St. Louis would have caregivers who show up the way family shows up.
Today we’re a team of 36 caregivers helping our clients stay safe and independent in their own homes across the St. Louis area. We’re a Black-owned, woman-led company, and we’ve grown almost entirely through word of mouth from the families we serve. I still run operations every day, and my sister’s story is still the reason the phone gets answered the way it does.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
Not smooth, no. I grew up in Missouri and broke into Hollywood without connections, which meant years of working my way up through casting offices and daytime TV sets, proving myself one job at a time in an industry that runs on relationships I didn’t have yet. I built a real career doing it: Emmy-nominated, executive producing by the end, over a decade of work I was proud of.
Then in 2017 my sister was shot, and I walked away from all of it. That was the hardest chapter of my life, and it wasn’t a career decision, it was just the only decision. I spent close to 90 nights in a hospital and came out of it a different person. There’s a version of grief that comes with leaving a career at its height, and I felt it, even knowing I’d do it again without hesitating.
Starting over in St. Louis meant reinventing myself in my thirties. I went from running animation pipelines to learning payroll, insurance, and healthcare compliance from scratch, usually by getting it wrong once first. Home care brought its own struggles: finding caregivers who are truly built for the work, keeping them, and carrying the losses that come with loving clients in their eighties and nineties. The thing entertainment did teach me is that hard is normal. Every set I ever worked on was a series of problems solved in real time, and it turns out that’s exactly what building companies is too.
Appreciate you sharing that. What should we know about Here at Home Healthcare?
Here at Home Healthcare is a private-duty, in-home care company serving the St. Louis area. Our caregivers help people stay safe and independent in their own homes: personal care like bathing, dressing, and hygiene, medication reminders, housekeeping and laundry, meals, transportation, and companionship. Some clients need a few hours a week, some need care from morning to evening, and we build the schedule around the family, not the other way around.
What we’re known for is showing up the way family shows up. The company exists because I spent months in a hospital advocating for my sister and saw what happens to people who don’t have someone in their corner. That’s the standard we hire against. Every caregiver is bonded and insured, but the thing we actually screen for is whether this is the work someone is built for, because skills can be taught and heart can’t.
What sets us apart is that we’re small enough to know every client and every caregiver by name, and we like it that way. When a family calls us, they get a person who knows their situation, not a call center. We’re a Black-owned, woman-led company, and most of our growth has come from families telling other families about us, which is the only marketing that means anything in this business.
What I’d want readers to know: if you’re watching a parent start to struggle at home and you don’t know what to do next, call us even if you’re not ready for care yet. We’ll tell you honestly what we see, and if we’re not the right fit, we’ll point you to who is.
Is there anything else you’d like to share with our readers?
Just this: the plan you had for your life isn’t the only good one. I thought my story was Hollywood, and then life handed me a different one in a hospital room in St. Louis. It took me a while to see it, but the years I spent producing weren’t wasted, they were training for what I was actually supposed to build. If your life just changed direction on you, you’re not starting over. You’re carrying everything you learned into something new.
And one more thing. Caregivers are some of the most skilled, least celebrated people in any room. If you’ve ever cared for a parent, a neighbor, a friend, you’re doing the Lord’s work. It’s real work, it matters enormously, and you are seen and loved and appreciated!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://hereathomehealthcare.com
