LIVING IN ASSISTED LIVING -- A RESIDENTS PERSPECTIVE by Lon Tanner
Prologue--

Preparing For Assisted Living—
If you are now in your 50’s /60’s you stand a excellent chance of requiring some kind of Assisted Living in your later years. Why take the chance of having to sell your home and liquidate your assets & income.
The best thing you could do would be to buy a Long Term Care Policy through your employer if available, or independently on your own. Having such insurance will help preserve your assets and income. Such insurance is expensive, but considerably less so if purchased in your 50’s & 60’s.

The Move--
Since my moving into the Oakmont Assisted Living/Memory Care/Alzheimer’s facility two years ago I have had to go through a substantial learning experience. I made the arrangement my self instead of everything being decided on by a CARE TAKER/Friend/Family Member which is the usual scenario. I live in a very comfortable one bedroom/one bath/living room/kitchenette apartment on the second floor of a two floor facility. I am fortunate to have retained some degree of computer and technology experience which has made my life easier and more comfortable and will be discussed in another chapter.
Health & Mobility.
Like most of the residents, I am living here because of health issues that create symptoms requiring some degree of assistance. Many of the residents have some degree of hearing loss and wear one or more hearing aids My hearing loss is severe and makes certain social interaction difficult if not impossible.I cannot hear music and sorely miss it. Two of my medical conditions make it necessary to use a walker. A cane would be nice but balance difficulty requires a walker. Many of the residents use walkers and some wheel chairs, electrical & mechanical. I some times think we could use a traffic cop to direct walker and wheel chair movement in hallways and elevator. I am envious of some of the 90 year olds that are very mobile.