Loneliness to Laughter and the Power of Community for Older Adults

Community is crucial for older adults. It’s a powerful antidote to isolation and depression. Strong community connections can boost mental health, stimulate the brain, and even lead to a longer life. We’re discussing how social connections are vital to well-being. Discover the physical, mental, and social benefits of staying engaged – from boosting mood and reducing loneliness to improving longevity. Plus, we have advice for finding purpose and building a strong social circle whether you're considering a senior living community or exploring local resources. Tune in to learn how to turn loneliness into laughter and embrace a more connected and vibrant life. 

Chapters

• 2:18 What are the mental health benefits of social connection?
• 5:26 How does socialization increase longevity?
• 9:04 How does senior living help with social connection?
• 11:45 How can older adults improve their socialization and connection with others if they aren't ready to move to senior living yet?
• 16:40 What services do senior centers offer? How do I find a senior center near me?
• 18:40 Closing Thoughts on Growing Social Connections

Transcript

0:06

Hi everyone. Welcome back to another episode of Senior Living Today. Joining me for today's episode are Samantha Loy, Brooke Simonson, and Melissa Todd. Ladies, thank you all for being here today. It's great to be back. Before we dive in, would you all mind telling our listeners a bit about yourselves and your connection with senior living? Samantha, would you like to start? Oh sure. It's a pleasure to be here. I am the director of the Resource Center, and I've been with The Ohio Masonic Communities for ten years. I assist the team as well as serve clients and our community members in Northeast Ohio. My background includes experience in the health care industry and community and social services. I enjoy helping people. That's really what I like to do. I hold an MBA in healthcare management, and I am also an Ohio Eastern Star member of Ashland chapter 92. Brooke, would you like to go next? Hello, everyone. My name is Brooke Simonson and I also work with the Resource Center. I am the Central Ohio coordinator for them, and I also hold an LISWS and provide mental health services for the Resource Center. And last but not least, Melissa. Yes, I am Melissa Todd. I am currently the corporate sales manager for all of The Ohio Masonic Communities, and I started as our sales manager at the Western Reserve Masonic Community Campus during our expansion project. But before that, I have about ten years of senior living industry experience in different communities, different independent standalone communities. And I just really enjoy working with seniors. It's been something I've been doing for quite some time. Well, I'm very excited to have you with us all for today's episode. We are going to be discussing community connections for seniors and the importance of these connections. It has been proven that community connections are vital to seniors’ well-being. And they offer numerous physical, mental and social benefits. So we're going to dive into what some of those benefits are today. Social connections have been shown to have positive effects on mental health for older adults. Would one of you like to share what some of those benefits are with our listeners? I believe that social connections can really foster connections with our seniors, and it can help reduce loneliness. It boosts mood, provides emotional support to each other. We know that we are born for connection, even in when we are young. When babies don't receive connection, they have failure to thrive and they don't grow. So I tell people that doesn't go away as we get older. We need to foster those connections. It really is the antidote to depression and isolation, which is common in our older adult population. It also has physical benefits so it can reduce chronic conditions like stroke, cognitive decline, and help with things like Alzheimer's and dementia and improving the quality of life. Brooke, I like that you use the term failure to thrive. And it's, you know, not a pleasantry. But when we're talking with families and, you know, they're calling one of our communities for the first time, what they are describing is this overall mental health concern of a failure to thrive. And they're describing, you know, limited interactions of their loved one, social circles getting smaller and smaller, and absence of doing things that they love. And I'm kind of walking them through the steps of this could all be different, and they could have purpose and not have this sense of failure in a thriving, lonely, isolated home just by living in a community setting. So that really is a key term. I think that's important to share with our folks. And, Brooke, the other thing that you mentioned that I think is interesting is, you know, the impact that it can have on one's physical health as well. You know, we know, as you mentioned, that socialization promotes cognitive stimulation. So it really does help reduce the risk of cognitive decline as we age and conditions like developing dementia or Alzheimer's. And being a part of the senior community, we get a front row seat. And when people come in and they've been struggling at home alone and they come into our communities, we really get to watch them blossom and see what social connection can do for for our seniors. Even even if people are still living at home, through the Resource Center we can help connect seniors to community programs and resources to help reduce that social isolation and loneliness. So maintaining those strong social ties can reduce the likelihood of experiencing those events. And many studies find that social interaction stimulates the brain and is a beneficial activity for brain health, potentially reducing the risk of cognitive decline in conditions like dementia or Alzheimer's. So staying socially engaged helps you to better manage stress. It keeps the brain active. It boosts your mental health, and it even facilitates learning. I think another thing that's really interesting is the link between socialization and increased longevity. So how are those two things linked? Can one of you explain that a little bit for our listeners? I can talk on a few links that I've noticed just from some personal stories. Seeing a senior develop through the move-in process and get integrated. I remind the families we're working with that, you know, we're humans. People need people. Something as simple as how many times a loved one has had a welcoming greeting or a smiling face show up in their presence. Right? You know, home is just four walls, and there's so much more outside of it. But really the link to defeating the isolation is all about the access to help sooner. Because when you're around people and you're integrated into a community, it's it's all about access to health services before they become a huge problem. And when you're in this community pod and you have peers who are looking out for one another, when you have staff looking out for one another, those are all a great start. But we are also embedded in health care, like home health or physical therapy, where we're noticing things that are changing very slowly. And a families’ snapshot is going to be a little bit different, you know, when they see their loved one week to week. You can't see some of those physical changes, you know, just by calling mom or dad every day and saying, how are you doing? Because the answer you're going to get is fine. But when I physically see someone move in and I watch them walk down to the dining room and I'm noticing some balance issues, or I'm noticing, you know, that they're not going out to an activity, a program, or being, as you know, integrated into their social circle as they once were. Maybe they're not joining bus trips and they once were. We can capture those things so much sooner and introduce support services like therapy, physical therapy, occupational therapy. We get it to them quicker. And that's the access that, you know, connects them within our community. So it's that's really what I get to see from an overall benefit when I work with someone. And really their life kind of changes in about 90 days of being integrated because there's just so much purpose. You know, they're they're not staying in their pajamas until 2:00 because they wanted to come down and have a cup of coffee and read a book in the lobby. So they got dressed and ready for the day. It's really about building that good routine. And folks do that every day with us. I agree, Melissa, I think a sense of purpose, what you're saying with the sense of purpose is such an important point, because we also know that building routines in people's lives when they are coming to somewhere different and new it really helps to stabilize and create those connections as well. So it all kind of links together to create that social connection and that antidote to that depression and that loneliness, those routines and that sense of purpose is a good point to that. Studies suggest that loneliness and social isolation can increase the risk of premature death by as much as 26 and 29%, respectively. So, according to many studies, it suggests that engaging in social activities can extend your life and your longevity by as much as 29%. So next, I want to dive into the role a little bit more that senior living communities play in fostering those social connections in older adults. We know that an active social community can help seniors stay engaged and improve their well-being in a variety of ways. So would one of you mind sharing some ways that a senior living community can help increase peer to peer relationships for older adults? I can speak to the life enrichment calendar piece of it. I think that's a really big piece that we focus on in the move-in process and educating families about the benefits of a senior community. You know, independent living is all about this active social lifestyle. We want to keep folks as independent as long as possible. And it's kind of that triangle effect, right? Social, physical, emotional. We're supporting you from all sides of that. And I can be a great support mechanism, but I think connecting, you know, like-aged, like-minded, like-interest, those are the pieces that we all strive for at any age. We all have, you know, that one friend that we know we can call, we formulate, you know, those connections when someone moves in in a variety of ways. Something as simple as, you know, talking about someone's hobbies and interests are and having a general understanding of who they are as a person. We can introduce them to folks that have that same similar interest palette. We also do a nice job with our ambassador programs at our communities because that's just an immediate friendly face, immediate friendly connection. Someone who's, you know, invested in making sure you feel welcomed and that, you know, maybe your first week, you know, you're not eating alone in the restaurants or you're not, you know, unsure where to go grab a cup of coffee or, you know, you have someone to call and say, hey, I need to mail something. Where do I get a stamp? It's as easy as getting the introduction to one person, and that one person has the trickle down effect to, like, grow that social circle around them. And we explain that to families every day to give them the reassurance that, you know, either the community member or the loved one, a family, you know, these are the things we're going to do through our life enrichment team, through our ambassador program, and through the move-in process to make sure that there's like a really nice and seamless handoff so that no one's falling through the cracks and feeling left out. So I know we've talked a little bit about the ways that senior living communities can help improve socialization for older adults. But for those who are maybe living on their own still or aren't quite ready to move to a community, I'd like to discuss how they can start building their own social community. What are some ways that older adults can start to expand their social interaction and and connections with others, if maybe they're not ready to make that move to senior living yet? Some of the ways that we at the Resource Center encourage people to interact with their communities is schedule some regular time with loved ones. Oftentimes people get busy and our schedules get busy, but we encourage them to reach out and call. Invite someone over for dinner. Maybe schedule something to go to a park. I know that's sounds very simple, but we need reminded sometimes that it's okay to reach out. I have seniors often say, oh, my daughter, she's so busy and and she has a busy schedule. And I say, yeah, but she wants you to be a part of that, I guarantee. And when they reach out and call, they, they find that that's more received than they thought. Explore local resources. A lot of times, when we're talking with people, they'll say, I used to go to church, and then I kind of fell out if I lost my husband or I lost my wife. And so we talk and we always talk about how to revisit those connections that they've maybe lost because of life happens. So we will go over some things like that. Like what about church or or joining a club? One of the things that my husband's grandma did as she was aging and at home alone was she joined a bridge club online, and she was able to play cards online and do bridge online. So we encourage to even embrace digital technology. It can be a little difficult, but when you get the hang of it, it can be such a great connection. There's so many things out there now that people can join from an online platform, so we often encourage that. And, and of course, joining a senior living community within where they live. So they're the hub, your senior centers, your your communities, they're your hub. They often know the activities that are appropriate for your demographic. They often know, the ways that you can get transportation to and from there if that's an issue. So it can be a really great plug-in to call your local senior centers and just get involved if you're at home and you want to be in a senior community outside of what we can offer at campus. That's great, Brooke, and I was going to say, you know that too. If you're living at home and, you know, I mean, sometimes as we age socialization gets harder. So if you don't have a way to get out there and, you know, get to the senior center or if you need transportation through the Resource Center, we have over 400 volunteers across the state of Ohio. So call us. You know, we can help get you set up with a volunteer. If you don't have a way to get online to do some of those things like Brooke just talked about, call us. We can get you set up with an iPad. We can we can come out and and help explain. You know, sometimes technology is hard no matter what age you are. So, you know, call us through the Resource Center. Those are exactly things that that we can help with. Brooke, I held on to something you said because, you know, I talk to families and seniors every day, just like you two do at the Resource Center. Different platforms, but still in that helpful, nurturing, you know, sense of support. But I find it so ironic the amount of seniors, ladies, gentlemen, anyone who I talk to who make that statement, you know, my daughter is just so busy or my son is just so busy. They've got families, they've got jobs, they're still working. To me, that's one of like almost the biggest cries for help because they're vocalizing how busy life is around them and that like, they're really not as busy as what's around them. And to me, that's kind of like that trigger phrase. It's, you know, not them just sharing that, you know, someone in their life that they love is busy. That's my cue to be like, well, what do you do to stay busy? And like, how can we help support that? Because if your daughter's off being busy, what can we do to keep you just as busy as her? You know, and things that you enjoy doing. And so I'm really glad you said that, because I hear it a lot. And and I kind of take a second to pause when someone shares that with me, and I'm just like, well, they still love you. And they're busy. Yes, but, like, you can be busy too. And the next time you talk to that daughter who's so busy, you can tell her all the fun things you did at a campus or that you have planned that you're looking forward to. Because we looked at our month like we're all looking forward to something. So it's as simple as having it on the calendar and kind of having that little countdown in your heart to be excited about. That's a great point, Melissa. And Brooke and Sam, I want to talk a little bit more about the senior centers that you both mentioned. So there are usually local senior centers in the area, and they provide a lot of services for older adults and also opportunities for social connections. So can you guys explain some of the services that might be offered through a local senior center and also how listeners can find a senior center near them? They're all a little bit different depending on where they're at. But, most all of them, I mean, it's it's a location. It's a great place where seniors can go. They usually have dinners, people get together and play cards or games, you know, they schedule different activities and events and it just creates that that social activity and engagement piece that's so important. Brooke, do you want to do you want to add on to that? I know, the senior center in Clark County is amazing. Yes, we are very lucky in Clark County to have a robust senior center. At that senior center, specifically, they offer transportation. Public benefits counseling is another thing I utilize a lot there. They can help figure out how to apply for food benefits. Maybe help walk you through the Medicare mess that can occur when we're trying to figure out what insurance to accept, what supplementals to accept, things like that. They usually have someone that's in that arena that can really help you figure out how to best pick your benefits when as we age. So I think that's one at the best services. I use a lot. They also have a lot of educational programing. So they'll talk about the latest scams maybe that are happening in our area so that you can prevent falling for one of those. They have such great plug ins for local events and festivals, just all kinds of things to get connected to the community and specifically the senior community. So I know we've had a lot of great conversation today on the importance of forming social connections for our older adults. Before we wrap up, do you have any final thoughts on what we talked about today or advice for ways that our older population can grow those social connections in their lives? For me, a closing thought is, is just don't be afraid to step out. You know, at any age, it's never too late to get involved in something new. And I think it can be very intimidating for all of us to try something new. But sometimes that is kind of the thing that opens Pandora's box for someone. It might be that one connection or a way that you can meet a new friend. And you're really glad you take that step. So I tell people, don't let fear keep you from stepping out. Take the plunge. Try something new and you'll be really glad you did, because oftentimes it leads to a lot of a lot better things down the road. Absolutely. And, you know, I think connections, social connections are so important no matter what your age is or where you live. And I just like to add, if you would like to talk more about this subject or if you need support or resources in your area just call us. We'd love to hear from you. We do have an eight, seven, seven number. So that's (877) 881-1623. Yeah. Don't ever hesitate to reach out. You know, it's it's okay to be honest, you know, with the fact that you might be experiencing or your loved one is experiencing isolation or, you know, indicators of depression, but it's all about being at it with an honest approach. And from the family perspective really ask yourself, you know, how often does my loved one interact? And how many times a week does my loved one get out of the house? Could it be better? Like Brooke and Sam said, get up, get out, make the call. Connect with us. Because all these people here today are genuine, loving people, and we're here to help and just be a lending ear. I think that's great advice. And, Sam, I know you mentioned The Ohio Masonic Communities Resource Center as a resource for our older adults. So I will be sure that we put the website and phone number also in the description for this episode. If our listeners need anything, please feel free to reach out to the Resource Center. They are amazing. Well thank you, ladies, again for joining me today and sharing that advice with our listeners. As always, for those listening, be sure to like and subscribe to the Senior Living Today podcast so that you never miss a new episode. And we will be back again in two weeks.