About community living.
“All people, regardless of age or disability, should be able to live independently and participate fully in their communities. Every person should have the right to make choices and to control the decisions in and about their lives. This right to self-determination includes decisions about their homes and work, as well as all the other daily choices most adults make without a second thought.
Why Community Living?
“In survey after survey, when older adults and people with disabilities are asked where they would prefer to live, they say they want to live in their communities, not in institutions. People also are happier and healthier when they live in community settings.
“Inclusion of older adults and people with disabilities also offers many benefits to communities themselves. Communities miss out on valuable voices and perspectives when people with disabilities and older adults are left out. They are deprived of co-workers, volunteers, mentors, and friends who offer new ways of thinking about, and navigating, the world. When older adults are excluded, communities lose wisdom collected over many decades, and their connection to history.
“Community living also happens to be less expensive than other options for most people. Skilled nursing facilities can cost an average of $75,000 a year and public residential facilities for people with disabilities average $225,000 a year. In most cases, these costs are not covered by Medicare or private health insurance.
“Finally, a series of laws, court decisions, and administrative rules have established community living as a legal right. Most notably, in 1999, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Olmstead v. L.C. that people with disabilities must receive services in the most integrated settings possible. This landmark decision has been a critical tool in protecting the rights of people with disabilities and older adults alike.”
There’s more here at the Administration for Community Living Website: https://acl.gov/about-community-living
The Pennsylvania Link to Aging and Disability Resources is an initiative of the Administration for Community Living.
“Aging In Place: A Great Way To Extort Payback From Your Adult Children” – Forbes
by Sara Zeff Geber
“If you have bought into the idea that aging in place in the home you’ve maintained for 30+ years is the best answer to the question of where to live as you age, I can only conclude that you have decided it’s payback time for your children. Did your own parents live into their late 80s and 90s? Did they age in place? If so, how did that work out for you? Maybe you were one of the lucky ones whose parents lived happily on their own into their old age and then just died in their sleep one night, and now you are absolutely sure that is exactly what will happen to you. But what if it doesn’t?
“Moira knows first-hand what it’s like to have a parent who refuses to move out of their home of 50 years. Her mother, Pat, has a home is debt-free and there is enough money coming in from social security and a small pension to meet expenses every month. In addition to that, Moira’s parents saved a substantial amount of money over the course of their lives and were planning to leave Moira and her brother, Will, a nice inheritance. However, both Moira and Will are in good shape financially and would rather their mother used the money to ensure herself a comfortable and safe life as she gets older. They have toured several assisted living communities and eventually even persuaded Pat to come along on one of their visits. But it didn’t change her mind.
“No matter what Moira or Will said to Pat, she clung to the idea of aging in her two-story home. She claimed the stairs were good exercise and refused to even relocate her bedroom to the lower level.” Continue reading this article at Forbes, click here.
“The Staggering, Heartless Cruelty Toward the Elderly”
“A global pandemic doesn’t give us cause to treat the aged callously.”
GETTY
by Shai Held, President, dean, and chair in Jewish Thought at Hadar
“Crises can elicit compassion, but they can also evoke callousness. Since the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic, we’ve witnessed communities coming together (even as they have sometimes been physically forced apart), and we’ve seen individuals engaging in simple acts of kindness to remind the sick and quarantined that they are not forgotten. Yet from some quarters, we’ve also seen a degree of cruelty that is truly staggering.
“Earlier today, a friend posted on Facebook about an experience he’d just had on the Upper West Side of Manhattan: ‘I heard a guy who looked to be in his 20s say that it’s not a big deal cause the elderly are gonna die anyway. Then he and his friend laughed … Maybe I’m lucky that I had awesome grandparents and maybe this guy didn’t but what is wrong with people???” Some have tried to dress up their heartlessness as generational retribution. As someone tweeted at me earlier today, “To be perfectly honest, and this is awful, but to the young, watching as the elderly over and over and over choose their own interests ahead of Climate policy kind of feels like they’re wishing us to a death they won’t have to experience. It’s a sad bit of fair play.’”
Click here to continue reading this opinion piece at The Atlantic.
“You missed your chance to be a prodigy, but there’s still growth left for grownups.” – The New Yorker
“The joys—and occasional embarrassments—of being a novice could be an antidote to the strain of being a perfectionist. – Animation by Luke Wohlgemuth
by Margaret Talbot
“Among the things I have not missed since entering middle age is the sensation of being an absolute beginner. It has been decades since I’ve sat in a classroom in a gathering cloud of incomprehension (Algebra 2, tenth grade) or sincerely tried, lesson after lesson, to acquire a skill that was clearly not destined to play a large role in my life (modern dance, twelfth grade). Learning to ride a bicycle in my early thirties was an exception—a little mortifying when my husband had to run alongside the bike, as you would with a child—but ultimately rewarding. Less so was the time when a group of Japanese schoolchildren tried to teach me origami at a public event where I was the guest of honor—I’ll never forget their sombre puzzlement as my clumsy fingers mutilated yet another paper crane.
“Like Tom Vanderbilt, a journalist and the author of “Beginners: The Joy and Transformative Power of Lifelong Learning” (Knopf), I learn new facts all the time but new skills seldom. Journalists regularly drop into unfamiliar subcultures and domains of expertise, learning enough at least to ask the right questions. The distinction he draws between his energetic stockpiling of declarative knowledge, or knowing that, and his scant attention to procedural knowledge, or knowing how, is familiar to me. The prospect of reinventing myself as, say, a late-blooming skier or ceramicist or marathon runner sparks only an idle interest, something like wondering what it might be like to live in some small town you pass on the highway.
“There is certainly a way to put a positive spin on that reluctance.”
Read this article in its entirety at The New Yorker, click here.
What’s the Ticket to Work program?
Download the Ticket To Work three page file; click on the graphic or here.
“Not All Trauma Is the Same” – Psychology Today
Many factors explain how trauma affects survivors differently.
by Mellissa Withers and Kathryn Maloney
“Human trafficking survivors often have to deal with the aftermath of complex trauma for the rest of their lives. What exactly is trauma? The first thing that comes to mind might be an unusual event characterized by extreme violence or emotion, such as a terrorist attack, a natural disaster, or the unexpected death of a family member. However, trauma also applies to a much broader range of events that people can experience in their lifetimes. Trauma manifests itself in many forms. Often, trauma is not limited to a single, acute event, but rather a culmination of factors and experiences. A trauma-informed approach is one that takes into consideration the range of reactions of people who have experienced child maltreatment and abuse, intimate partner violence, and even human trafficking.
Forms of trauma can include:
- Complex trauma versus single incidents: Complex trauma is usually prolonged trauma that occurs between people, often beginning in childhood or adolescence. Since the events often happen in secrecy, the victim may suffer in fear and silence.
Click here to continue reading this article at Psychology Today.
“Village doctor in Ukraine faces coronavirus challenge” – Associated Press
“Dr. Viktoria Mahnych, walks on country road to attend to her patient near Iltsi village, Ivano-Frankivsk region of Western Ukraine, Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2021. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)“
by Mstyslav Chernov and Yuras Karmanau
“VERKHOVYNA, Ukraine (AP) — Riding a horse-drawn cart, Dr. Viktoria Mahnych trots along country roads to attend to her patients in several villages nestled in the Carpathian Mountains in western Ukraine.
“The country of 42 million has recorded more than 1.1 million confirmed COVID-19 infections and nearly 20,000 deaths. Mahnych, 30, now fears that the long holidays, during which Ukrainians frequented restaurants and other entertainment venues, attended festive parties and crowded church services, will trigger a surge in new coronavirus infections and make her job even more difficult.
“Starting Friday, Ukraine imposed a broad lockdown aimed at containing a surge in infections, but many medical workers say that the move came too late.
“The streets of Ukrainian cities swarmed with festive crowds during the holidays and thousands flocked to churches to attend Christmas services Thursday in the mostly Orthodox country without worrying about social distancing or wearing masks.”
Read this compelling article at the Associated Press, click here.
From top to bottom: “A medical worker talks with coronavirus patients in a hospital organized in the medical college in Lviv, Western Ukraine, on Monday, Jan. 4, 2021. A medical worker treats Mykhailo Kaldarar, patient with COVID-19 as his wife Oleksandra Kaldarar, left, looks at him in a hospital in Rudky, Western Ukraine, on Tuesday, Jan. 5, 2021. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)”
“LVIV, Ukraine (AP) — A medical college in western Ukraine has been transformed into a temporary hospital as the coronavirus inundates the Eastern European country.
“The foyer of the college in the city of Lviv holds 50 beds for COVID-19 patients, and 300 more are placed in lecture halls and auditoriums to accommodate the overflow of people seeking care at a packed emergency hospital nearby.
“The head of the hospital’s therapy division, Marta Sayko, said the college space has doubled treatment capacity. She hopes a broad lockdown ordered Friday will reduce the burden on the Ukrainian health care system.
“’Considering that now the number of cases is growing, more patients arrive in a grave condition with signs of respiratory failure,’ Sayko said.”
“Five myths about loneliness | The elderly aren’t the people who feel the most isolated.” – The Washington Post
“Few windows with lights on in an office building at Potsdamer Platz in Berlin, Jan. 6. Germany has extended its coronavirus lockdown until the end of the month. (Filip Singer/EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock)“
by Noreena Herz
“Lots of people are lonely these days. Months of stay-at-home orders and other limits on face-to-face contact are taking their toll. But even before the pandemic introduced us to terms like “social distancing,” loneliness was a defining condition of the 21st century: More than a fifth of U.S. adults said in a 2018 Kaiser Family Foundation survey that they ‘often’ or ‘always’ felt lonely, lacking in companionship, left out or isolated. Britain even appointed a minister for loneliness three years ago to confront the problem. Why did we become so lonely? Who is most afflicted? And what harms does it cause? Misconceptions persist around each of these questions; here are five of the most common.
Myth No. 1
The elderly are the loneliest generation
Click here to see all the myths about loneliness in this Washington Post article.
“If you had to pick one healthy habit for 2021, here’s your best choice” – Canadian Broadcasting Company
Numerous studies show that simply walking 30 minutes a day can have powerful health benefits
by Chad Pawson
“If you are thinking about how to get into better shape this new year, why not keep it simple with a proven health intervention that’s easy to do and proven to improve people’s health and extend their lives?
“It’s walking. And before you say “too bad it’s boring” and move on, read on a little more first.
“First of all, let’s get the benefits out of the way.
“Around 30 minutes of walking a day, whether all at one time, or in multiple sessions has been shown through studies to help people lose weight, improve their heart health, increase endurance and improve mental well-being.”
Here’s a schedule of FREE Webinars being offered by the Pennsylvania Link to Aging and Disability Resources | Service Area 2 and Service Area 3.
There are openings in these upcoming FREE Webinars scheduled in other Link to Aging and Disability Resources Service Areas around the state.
In Service Area 2, CEUS are being offered for the Penn Cares Webinars (Behavior and responses, Cultural Linguistic Competency, and Dementia and Intimacy webinars) [CEUs for LSW, LPC, Marriage and Family Therapists]
There are no CEUs available for the Personality Disorders webinar.
February 16 @ 1:00 pm – Cultural & Linguistic Competency Training
March 11 @ 9:30 am – Understanding Personality Disorders Webinar
March 23 @ – Strategies for Understanding Behavior and Applying Responses webinar
April 13 @ 10:00 am – Dementia and Intimacy Training
In Service Area 3, this Webinar Series is scheduled; registration information follows:
January 21, February 4 and 25 @ 9:30 am – Ring in 2021:Let Yourself Explore And Think DIFFERENTLY. Utilizing Key Concepts Of: Curiosity. Divergent Thinking. Freedom to Fail.
