Before I came to live in the retirement community, I was in my house alone a great deal of the time. I slept alone, ate alone, watched television alone, made messes and cleaned them up alone, walked alone outdoors in the afternoons. Because of covid the fewer people I saw up-close, the safer I was. […]
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Is There a Chaplain in the House? If you are helping an elderly person choose an assisted care community, be sure to ask: Is there a chaplain? This is not a minor detail. It is one of the essentials. Anytime you have a building full of elderly people, as you do in such a […]
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Once a friend of mine, visiting in a nursing home for the elderly, said “Merry Christmas” at the bedside of a woman who then began to cry and said, “I didn’t know it was Christmas.” My friend was angry. She had heard Christmas music in the lobby, but there was none on […]
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If you are getting old and know it and thinking to move yourself to an independent living/assisted care home, you are faced with more questions than you faced when planning your fancy wedding. For instance, to drive or not to drive. In other words, to take your car to the retirement home or not. […]
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What You May Learn If you were compulsive before you came, you will be compulsive when you open your suitcases in the retirement center. Determination to make these rooms feel like home instead of a hotel will lead to the recurrence of the back pain that has already turned you into a drug addict. The […]
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I never expected to be where I am right now. I do, however, remember noticing that sometimes old age advances in sudden events. A woman is 91 and well and active; she falls and breaks a hip, and it is the beginning of the end. Because she can’t walk, she loses respiratory health and […]
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