Thoughts on Turning 65

 

I've hit that last landmark year for our culture! Growing up it was 5 for starting school, 16 for driving, 19 for being able to drink. Then there's the informal ones like 21 for drinking in the States and 26 for getting lower insurance rates. 

Being shuffled into the seniors box has been a drawn out process; anywhere from 50 for golf, 55 for restaurants, 60 for municipal discounts. In spite of being assured there would be no CPP for me after paying into it for my entire working life, here I am on the cusp of getting it deposited into my account every month. We are very fortunate to not need any of the low income or disability supplemental funding. 

So did I/we get here as intended? Definitely on the financial end. We made a "Freedom 55" plan in our early 30s and hit that mark due to a lower key lifestyle. I retired at 58 (spouse at 55) to a debt free life. I think we pretty well hit our health goals. We have all our teeth😁and I'm on no daily medications but I do have mild tinnitus and annoying eye floaties. I did regain activity levels after my accident although I shifted away from impact and ankle twisting sports - a convenient out for pickleball.

What now? We've been watching neighbours and family navigate their 80s so we're looking ahead there. We'll be moving out of our house eventually but where is the question. In the mean time I'm looking for more volunteer opportunities. I like to have an anchor activity most days. 

I started this blog when I was 45, in spite of being a very poor at journaling. Life has actually changed very little here although the population has gotten more diverse. Income inequality is more visible as there are lots of high end vehicles like BMWs and Cadiallacs but like everywhere, there's homelessness that long term residents are trying to shuffle away. The City has tried to maintain free/low cost activities to build community as it goes through boom and bust times as an O&G town. I feel like truth and reconcilation is progressing as schools include indigenous liasons and activities, Treaty 6 and Metis fly along side Canada and provincial flags and city events include smudging ceremonies. How does this translate? I don't know. 

Aging Parents #BoomerLife

I read an article the other day about people choosing to retire in their homes rather than going to retirement facilities or care homes. I know my Dad loved his house and didn't want to leave it. Fortunately, he didn't have to. Our neighbours are in their mid-80s and make noise about moving but instead end up changing their yard to make it easier to manage. Like us, they live in a raised bungalow so everything you need is on the main floor.

The in-laws', very reasonably, don't want to leave their home. We don't want them to either but it came out that bills weren't being paid and there was forgetfulness so options had to be explored as none of us live in the same city as they do. They need companionship and a housekeeper more than medical care so that's what was looked for. Despite their hometown being a huge draw for retirees, there are surprisingly few service options...like 1. As part of the service, the elders get audited by Alberta Health Services (or whatever they become) to see what reimbursements they are eligible for.

And we're next - though not for a couple decades with any luck. What will services look like for us? 

Professionalism, Aging and doing what you love

I trained in medical imaging right out of high school, abandoned it for computers then landed on lab work for a profession. At times it was pretty repetitive and that's when it took skills more than put a sample in an instrument to get consistent results. Did I love it? Was it a "dream job"? No, but I enjoyed how it kept me busy and the pay was ok. And I never had burnout because I didn't expect to be married to my work.

In this age of "do what you love" I thought I give a peek into a day of eldercare so people can say how much they would need to be paid to do this job for strangers who you don't necessarily like.

Keep in mind, to avoid complaints you really need 3 people, one listening all the time avoid accusations of neglect when demands aren't instantly met. He has physical hearing & vision loss as well as selective hearing.

In Canada, we rely a lot on people from cultures of multigenerational families and duty cultures to take care of the elderly in homes. They are short-staffed, not super well paid, and absorb a lot of verbal abuse. What solution does the "do what you love" advocates propose? My dad has a much younger wife who is able to look after him. Her friends spell her off and helped arrange night care but really it would take 2 people to take care of him in waking hours as he has no sense of time but can do the bathroom by himself. 

Now think of all those people who couldn't even handle not having access to hair cuts. Imagine their level of patience with aging...

The value of work as a distraction

My dad is dying.

It's a long slow process where he keeps getting medical interventions (valve replacement surgery, diabetes pills, water pills) that improve his quality of life for a little longer. He's at the age where many of this friends have already passed away, some a lot younger than him, so he has fewer resources. He calls when there are any setbacks just to vent or to hear me say positive things.

As icing on the cake, his wife was recently diagnosed with breast cancer. Luckily she's not where I live or they would have delayed her mastectomy as non-essential as hospitals clog with COVID patients pursuing immunity through infection.

I'll admit I've been lucky to have a couple decades of a relatively stress-free life. My mom's death fell along, to me, a predictable path. Since she told me she had cancer by showing me a diagnosis that said it had metastasized to her lungs, I felt anything over 18 months was a bonus. I was working on very interesting projects with a great boss so I could leave quickly as needed to fly home. She was good until she wasn't. She went from getting into a car on her own to go to an appointment to not being able to get out of the car then slipped into a final coma a couple weeks later. And my dad took care of the post mortem details.

This time around, I am still away but without the distraction of work along with pandemic living in an area with a ridiculous 4th wave where there is only ICU space because people keep dying and the knowledge of being the executor with some hard decisions to make. There is no distraction from death and a government intent on overwhelming the medical system to implement private hospitals. Bennie has something going on with his foot and has to wear a cone so he stops licking. It's harder to focus on the good things from being financially secure to having great weather. 

I think the problem is there's nothing I can control...I just have to get over it.

The trial of aging...and I don't mean my aging

When I started this blog, I was 45 and feeling life was finally settling down and it really has. Aside from getting hit by a car the worse thing to happen to us is the passing of our canine companion. That's likely to change soon as our surviving parents are past their mid-eighties and deal with hearing/vision/mobility loss. It sure seems like life has changed to make things as annoying as possible for them and really shines a light on accessibility.

While we celebrate online accessibility, in no way is this seamless for seniors who don't have someone computer literate to help them. For instance, my dad decided he wanted to donate an old vehicle to Kidney Car - a group I'd never heard of. I had to search, make sure I hit the right link, fill in the information, etc. My dad is vision impaired to the point of near blindness and crusty. His wife is busy working and doesn't seem that good with reading comprehension. This took about 5 minutes to complete but would have taken him ages.

My dad can't easily dial phones so I thought I'd set up an old Google Home for him so he can just ask it to call people. Google seems to use Duo unless you just tell it the number. He doesn't have a cell phone or Google account. His wife doesn't have a Google account. His contacts don't use Duo. This is annoying. We're with Alexa (despite Jeff Bezos) and it just didn't seem as big a deal to set up.

The worse is his hearing aid. I'm pretty convince hearing aids are a big scam. Elderly people keep getting sold hearing aids for thousands of dollars that they use pretty inconsistently because they tickle or their voice echoes or some other reason. Dad's hearing aids came with a plastic remote, but he used his wife to change the volume because it wasn't set up and he didn't have the dexterity to press the buttons. The remote is poorly designed for elderly people with flat buttons that have no click or edge, one little nipple to landmark a programmable middle button that wasn't programmed (probably a good thing).

And I get it, old people are annoyed because things have changed but pretty well nothing is meeting expectations and they can't get it resolved. They don't seem to be able to answer questions and if you can't understand, they just get irritable. And service people have to learn to not to take things personally which can be hard.

We really need a diverse group of designers for all equipment and tools. It can only benefit all of us.