Anne W. Semmes
Last Friday morning a week ago at the Greenwich Water Club, I attended a talk addressing “The Changing Longevity Landscape: Vibrant Living and Purposeful Aging” in our town of Greenwich. The fact is that the population of Greenwich is approximately 63,500 individuals of which 14,000 are aged 60 and older – slightly over 20 percent of our population. So, as I am in that 20 percent, I was keen to attend, especially as the two presenters are impressive, Lori Contadino, who heads the Town’s Commission on Aging, and Steve Katz, who chairs the Commission while also heading up Sterling Care that he founded.
I owe a thank you note to Steve for sending me those extra-special Sterling Care nurses when I came home from my hip replacement. And now after hearing Lori’s spell-bounding
sharing of what this town is capable of providing that 20 percent, I owe her thanks as well. It is astonishing just how much the Town of Greenwich provides for its senior population. And news to me was that recent gift of nearly five million dollars from the late and retired schoolteacher Mary Louise Wallace that has brought the renaming of the Greenwich Senior Center to the Wallace Center for Vibrant Living and Purposeful Aging.
So, look to a physical renovation of the Senior Center facility and to “infused Wallace Center programming” told Lori, “Centered around what we envision to be the six domains of wellness: communication and information, community support and health services, outdoor spaces and buildings, transportation, housing, social participation and dementia…We want the town of Greenwich to be the community not only that we grow up in, but that we grow old in.”
That talk first centered on how those of us over 60 can live purposefully. Steve introduced how to adopt a “proactive approach to successful aging.” How do we deal with the stressors in our lives, “long-term financial issues, long-term health problems.” Might you need that grab bar in the shower, or need more comfortable shoes for those walks needed every day. And yes, thanks to my daughter I’m now counting my steps every day. (And I’m amazed how many I make on a dull day!)
Then there’s that “proactive illness management. Are you going to see your doctor regularly,” asked Steve, “or are you skipping those doctor’s appointments? Are you taking your medication or are you skipping your medication? …Men are used to being the person that everything is the center of their world… And now if you’re retired, do you find a new center?
Do you find your new kind of role? Maybe it’s volunteering, maybe it’s joining more social groups. Maybe you’re going to the great Senior Center.”
Steve spoke to the need “to live harder, not smarter. How do you stay cognitively reactive? You read, you take courses, you do games, you engage in physical activities. These are all evidence-based things that keep you cognitively reactive, socially engaged.” And here he hit my button, “Make peace with negative items from the past. We all have negative items in the past. How do you make peace with those in your life and respect differences, and have rich satisfying relationships with adult children…And did you do your estate planning? Do you have your financial power of attorney.”
Then it was Lori’s turn to describe what the Wallace Senior Center can provide. “And here are just the sampling of those programs to have physical fitness and physical opportunities. And these don’t have to be aerobic, they can be arthritis mobility, strength, and balance training… For emotional wellness, we have a meditation group…we do memoir writing. We have opportunities to dialogue with folks. And this has never been more important than now coming out of Covid. Think about the older adults that lived alone that didn’t have family. They were reliant on not only the Commission on Aging, but the supportive resources throughout our community to stay active and engaged.”
“So, we always want to have opportunities,” Lori shared, “that we can find that connects to our core sense of meaning. And again, these are themes throughout the life course. We look for that sense of purpose, a spiritual wellness, connecting to a higher power, whatever that is for each of us. And social wellness, just engaging in conversation. And believe it or not, there are people that go days and weeks without really connecting with anyone else. Maybe it’s the cashier in the grocery store. And for us at the Wallace Center, we want to be that welcoming environment. We are happy to see you each and every time you come, and let’s try to make the lives of those that we encounter a little lighter and a little brighter.”
“And also,” she continued, “our range of services include health and direct services, health insurance counseling, caregiver counseling, and assistance with navigating some of the complex resources of the care landscape that exists. We offer subsidized transportation for Greenwich residents. The Greenwich Department of Health, through their family health program, has a nurse that goes out into the community that assists with health maintenance. They focus on adults, seniors, giving vaccines, doing blood pressure screenings at the Senior Center.”
Lori included the extraordinary outreach her Commission provides. “When we look at our community resources, and many of these resources exist right here in our not-for-profit agencies. At Home in Greenwich enables individuals to successfully age in place with a safety net. And they also provide social support. All of these agencies that I’m going to mention work cooperatively with the Commission on Aging and the cornerstone of our success, collective success is that we’re not territorial.”
“We often client share, and that’s to the benefit of the residents of the town. We have Call-A-Ride and also Transportation Association of Greenwich to help individuals with transportation. And we have River House Adult Day Center, which provides support for caregivers and care for the individual that needs that type of care during the day. So, caregivers and care partners can work and know that their loved ones are being cared for by a terrific, not-for-profit agency in town.”
But Lori and Steve in their age-friendly work about town have also had their surprises when they discovered the Department of Parks and Recreation’s age-friendly work. “We learned how age-friendly the Byram Park pool is with its zero-grade entry…the installation of the beach map that enabled wheelchair bound individuals to access the waterline and many other diverse recreational offerings…and the multitude of benches that exist throughout town.”
And then there’s Nathaniel Witherell. “We are the last remaining community in the state of Connecticut,” said Lori, “that actually still owns a long-term care facility that also provides short-term rehabilitation.”
Believe it or not, this is just the tip of the iceberg of what these two speakers shared of what Greenwich is providing to its 20-percent of population. Having age-friendly professionals in the driving seat like Lori Contadino and Steve Katz surely makes a considerable difference. And add Marcia O’Kane who heads the Chamber of Commerce that co-sponsored the talk, who introduced the presenters. She shared a fitting last word. “Our town has an incredible number of resources that our senior population can and should take advantage of in order to live engaged and purposeful lives.”
