Aging in place

Can we do it gracefully?

I was struggling mightily with the decision to move or not to move to a wonderful senior living community. News flash! We have just made our decision. We’re not moving!! This is big!! I thought the idea of continual care was right for us. But it also felt like putting ourselves in a situation that we would never get out of. We cherish our freedom and are not ready to put ourselves away just yet. Because of the financial aspect alone, it felt like a one way ticket and that frightened us.

I am feeling some amount of uneasiness about the decision. The road not taken and all that. There is an entire community of people that we will not get to know, new lifelong friends we won’t get to meet. But at the same time, it is an opportunity to deepen the friendships we have been building here for the past few years since moving into town. I realize that we have not been putting all we could into the relationships that are right in front of us, for a variety of reasons, but mostly because we had one foot out the door.

So here we are. This is our new reality. If and when life reveals other needs, we will deal with them as they come. One idea is to remodel the garage so we have a bedroom on the first floor. This is one of our great strengths as a couple... projects! And without giving over $860K for an ‘entrance fee, we can now afford to do things to our house. We struggled with the idea that we wouldn't have any more projects. Don actually panicked thinking about getting rid of his tools which we definitely wouldn’t have had room (or need) for if we moved into an apartment. We have several projects around here that will make this house work better for us as we age. We have always improved the places we live and we will get to continue doing that here.

I am starting to feel better about the decision just writing this. I had put a lot of thought, consideration and time into the idea of selling our home and moving there. This reversal is primarily because I never quite got to ‘Yes!’ in my heart about the idea. It was fraught with too much loss! I am happy to honor that part of me that wasn’t on board. She’s pretty wise. No need to push the river.

Thanks for taking the time to read this, and for being who you are.

with love,

Ilene