When It's Time for a Senior Residence

A Friday Open Thread about moving—our parents, or ourselves—to facilities that are more supportive for elders. A collaboration with Claire Zulkey's "Evil Witches" parenting newsletter...

Tenor

Readers,

Today we’ve got our second collaboration with Claire Zulkey’s parenting newsletter, Evil Witches Newsletter.

We’re talking about something that affects both of our readerships: figuring out when, and how, to make a move (for ourselves, or for our parents) to some form of senior housing, whether it’s an “independent living” facility, or “assisted living,” or a nursing home of some kind.

Oldster has subscribers from every age group, including:

• elders of advanced age;

• Boomers and Gen Xers who are involved in their parents’ decision making and/or care;

• “the sandwich generation,” those in middle age who are involved in caring for both their parents and their children;

• and younger readers who are involved in the care of grandparents and other family elders.

Claire came to me looking for advice and perspectives on when and how to move parents to senior housing, and I thought it would be an interesting question to throw out to all of you, from multiple perspectives. In the comments, please tell us:

How old are you? Have you dealt with moving yourself or elders in your life to senior housing of some kind? Or are you making decisions about this now? How do you know when it’s the right time? How do you know where is the right place? How do you persuade an elder who is reluctant to make the move? What needs to be considered when moving one parent, but not the other? Got any helpful resources to share on the matter? (If you’re commenting, please also do me the favor of hitting the heart button ❤️ for algorithm purposes. Thank you!)

Here’s Claire Zulkey from Evil Witches Newsletter on the matter:

While my newsletter Evil Witches is at its core about and for parents, many of the parents I know, including myself, are in the dreaded sandwich generation—worrying about kids and our aging parents at the same time. (To be clear, *just* one of these challenges is plenty!) It's a challenge, to say the least, to walk the line between what we can actually balance/control vs. what we worry about, get angry about, and pre-grieve. Our ability to care for our kids and parents is greatly dictated by where we live, how much money we have, social supports and plain genetics, but that's still only part of the whole picture. This is where the need for knowledge and empathy-sharing kicks in, and where I hope our readerships can help each other.

I received the following question from a reader about helping a parent transition into a new home that can provide them better care/comfort:

"My stepdad is in very poor health and needs more care than my (also aging!) mom can give him, and my siblings and I agreed that it would be best if they moved closer to one/some of us. But if my stepdad goes into VA assisted living, where does my mom live? How do we make sure she isn't more socially isolated in a new place than she is already? how do I make sure I don't end up doing *all* the driving and communicating and coordinating, if my stepsister who's also in the area flakes?

I'd love the advice and perspective of people who've navigated the challenge of how to help aging parents and making decisions about moving them closer to you. I had a call with my sisters yesterday and started googling when we were done and it's one of those cases where even making one decision (or presenting our parents with info and nudging them toward a decision) raises so many other issues, it's overwhelming!"

I got some helpful "been there, done that" input from my paid subscribers that ran the gamut from preparing for worst-case scenarios, setting boundaries, setting up power of attorney, helpful therapists, and unhelpful siblings. But I would love to know what Oldster readers have to share, if you've been through (or are going through) this experience with your older loved ones. What was helpful, either practically or emotionally? What's something you learned the hard way that you hope someone else can avoid? I would love to share your wisdom with my readership who may just be coming into this situation, or will be quite soon.

Your turn:

How old are you? Have you dealt with moving yourself or elders in your life to senior housing of some kind? Or are you making decisions about this now? How do you know when it’s the right time? How do you know where is the right place? How do you persuade an elder who is reluctant to move to a facility? What needs to be considered when moving one parent, but not the other? Got any helpful resources to share on the matter? (If you’re commenting, please also do me the favor of hitting the heart button ❤️ for algorithm purposes. Thank you!)

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Here’s a related essay by Chris Wells, published in Oldster in October, 2023:

Catching the Cat

And here’s the first collaboration Oldster did with Claire and Evil Witches Newsletteralmost exactly a year ago:

How to Be a Good Grandparent

Thanks for reading, commenting thoughtfully as always, and for all your support! 🙏💝

-Sari Botton