Mythbusting: “CCRCs are filled with old people who are sick and dying.”

This is our final post covering Age Wave’s Five Myths & Realities of Continuing Care Retirement Communities (CCRCs). This myth is a bit more somber than some of the others, but it is equally important to talk about. The myth is “CCRCs are filled with old people who are sick and dying.”

The simple answer is that there is no simple answer. There are people of every health stage in any community, whether it is a neighborhood, a town, a CCRC, a city, or a state. However, when you live in a senior living or continuing care retirement community, there are opportunities and options for people who need more care, whether on a short-term or a long-term basis. Many communities offer assisted living services and higher levels of care, including skilled nursing services and memory care. Many residents, however, live in the “independent living” areas of the community, and are still extremely active like me.

Declaring your Independence! Is your move also liberating your children?

By: Ann Burnside Love

Before I moved to my independent living retirement community, I admit I was bugging my children for information or assistance undoubtedly more than I realized. They have always been good-natured about this, but their demanding professional and family schedules didn’t really have room for things I impulsively just picked up the phone and asked about. (Especially irksome to them when I didn’t remember I’d already asked………….) Anything sound familiar yet?

Myth-Busting: “My current home is the best option to continue an active social life and to stay connected with friends in the years ahead.”

Did you know that just like eating your vegetables and getting exercise, maintaining friendships is one of the primary ways to continue living an active, healthy lifestyle? It’s true! In an article about the health benefits of friendship, the Cleveland Clinic notes that friendships have been found to increase longevity, delay memory loss and reduce stress.

But we already felt that in our bones, didn’t we? Since having an active social life is so important as we age, we must consider our social lives as a factor when deciding where we will spend our retirement years — even if socializing doesn’t come easily.

Spring Cleaning: At your house or mine?

By Ann Burnside Love

Do I mean heavy-duty spring-cleaning, where you roll the rugs, carry them outdoors and beat them with a tennis racquet? Hardly. Though some of us may have traces of memory about that. For myself, I can’t remember when my mother did not have a vacuum cleaner, although the cooling process in the kitchen was by icebox, until the amazing Frigidaire came along.

When I think about spring cleaning, I’m certainly relieved not to still be living in the six-bedroom house where I raised my children, although it was emotional agony leaving it, or the three-bedroom house on the edge of the park I bought when they were grown, or even my first retirement house in a 55-plus community. I remember them all. And I remember spring cleaning in all of them.