Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Assisted living and CoHousing

[R Philip Dowds (rpdowds]

Actually, speaking as an architect who has designed plenty of independent 
living retirement housing and also assisted living facilities, that’s not 
exactly how things sort out.  Assisted living is for the frail elderly who 
don’t need daily nursing attention, but for whom driving, shopping and cooking 
are no longer realistic.  All assisted living facilities I know offer three 
meals a day, plus a bit of coaching or assistance in the ADLs, plus a range of 
activity / stimulation programs.  True, not everyone in a facility meets this 
profile or subscribes to the meal plan, but those of higher capability are 
definitely a small minority.  Most elderly who can still drive, shop and cook 
(like me) strive to stay out of assisted living as long as possible.  That’s 
where cohousing comes in.  Maybe.

Incidentally, live-in helpers — often young couples — that get room and board 
in exchange for non-medical servicing of their elder community is a care model 
invented in Scandinavia, just like cohousing itself.  All of this creativity 
and ingenuity in living alternatives for the elderly has emerged of necessity 
in the last few generations, as average life span in the western world has 
gained more than two decades.  Now, if we could just figure who is going to pay 
for two or more decades of retirement ...

R Philip Dowds
175 Harvey Street, Unit 5
Cambridge, MA 02140

land:     617.354.6094
mobile: 617.460.4549
email:   rpdowds [at] comcast.net

> On Jun 23, 2015, at 8:24 AM, Sharon Villines <sharon [at] sharonvillines.com> 
> wrote:
> 
> 
> 
>> On Jun 22, 2015, at 8:51 AM, Rita Bullinger <ritabullinger [at] gmail.com> 
>> wrote:
>> 
>> 
>> Assisted living, according to Gawande's text, means independence with an 
>> awareness of "changing conditions ahead.”
> 
> All the senior cohousing groups have plans for this. One that has posted here 
> has a guest suite for a common home aid.
> 
> Sharon
> ----
> Sharon Villines
> Takoma Village Cohousing, Washington DC
> http://www.takomavillage.org
> 
> 
> 
> 
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