Prepare to age in place? Been there, done that

I read an article the other day encouraging seniors to make plans to age in place. Aging in place means to stay in our own homes as we get older so we can maintain our independence.

Planning for it means making whatever changes are necessary to ensure that our homes are safe. Planning also can include surrounding ourselves with a network of people and services for support.

My first thought was … that’s what we’ve been doing for the past two years, and we certainly didn’t have time to plan for it before COVID sent us all into lockdown. Yet here we are … we survived.

And how did we do that?

We created our own little support networks, mostly by phone since our meetings were canceled. We checked in with each other when the store finally stocked long-missing items. We baked and left cookies on the porches of those we knew would appreciate them.

We learned Zoom and other online video conference programs so we could have face-to-face meeting with family and friends.

We beefed up our computer skills, at least enough to enable us to place to-go grocery orders at the store or arrange for delivery and to make purchases that Amazon could bring to our door. We roamed YouTube in search of exercise videos for seniors and took free classes of all types.

We took up the scatter rugs that could cause trips and falls because we knew that the EMTs who came to our rescue would be leery of COVID and come through the door fully outfitted in biohazard suits.

We dared to ask questions and learned that the library will deliver books and the pharmacy will mail prescriptions.

All in all, we survived our forced aging in place just fine. We seniors are a tough bunch.

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