It’s already the end of Week 5, which means only 4 more meetings with my Life Course Scholars cohort and I’m so sad that the end is creeping up so fast!!! Anyways, this week we were assigned to do an assignment on debunking ageist myths by creating some type of visual that tackles a certain ageist myth. I chose to debunk ageist myths surrounding senior homes because I feel that there are a lot of stereotypes and stigmas surrounding seniors living in senior homes. Growing up, I feel like I witnessed a lot of conversations with jokes from younger generations that they will put their parents in a senior home when they are old. This kind of implied that senior homes were an unpleasant experience for seniors, and I was under this impression. However, from taking this class and talking to many seniors living in senior homes, I realized that it is not the case. Senior homes are actually a nice and welcoming environment for seniors to be able to have a community, get supervision/help from people working in these senior homes, while still keeping their independence. I also was under the idea that all senior homes were basically nursing homes, but I have become knowledgeable that there are nursing homes, assisted living, and retirement homes, which all are different from each other. I know now that each place contains a different level of care and supervision from healthcare and social workers, but they are all definitely not an unpleasant environment! Before, I used to think that I would never move into a senior home but knowing now that I could still have a sense of independency and gain a community, I would definitely move in once I feel unstable to live in my own personal single-family home.
This quarter, we started reading a new book, Happiness Is a Choice You Make: Lessons from a Year Among the Oldest Old, by John Leland. We have only read 4 chapters, but I have really been enjoying this book! Not only is it a very interesting read, but I can actually take in a lot of information and advice to apply it to my life. Reading different perspectives of seniors has helped put in perspective what is important now as well as dealing with becoming content with life. Personally, I feel like it is difficult to feel content with my life because society has embedded in me that to be happy, I need to accomplish all types of things, from materialistic things to being successful in a career. We tend to depend on the future for happiness and although the future and goals help us become motivated and work hard toward something, it should not be the only aspect to what defines happiness. Always looking into the future for happiness will never stop even if we achieve our goals because then we will just make another goal to work for, and never being content on the present.
On the other hand, an update on my peer and I’s Healthy Aging Project, we have settled on calling it Meet and Mingle, which will allow seniors from different senior communities to talk to each other and build friendships and relationships. With the pandemic, many seniors have felt lonely and have had limited social lives so I feel hopeful that this will bring joy to seniors even if it’s just for an hour or two. This past week, we have been contacting people from Seniors Communities and we have gotten an interest from Talmadge and other Wakeland developments, so this is definitely feeling to start real! I am very excited to see how this will turn out |
Ma Kiela OrtineroMa Kiela is a Global Health and Urban Studies & Planning double major from Corona, CA. A fun fact about her is that she has lived in 8 different cities (in 2 different continents) in the past 20 years! Archives
April 2021
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