The number of adults age 50 and older living alone reached approximately 24 million in 2025. As this population continues to grow, so does concern about home safety for older adults. The home environment can present risks involving security, physical safety, and health, many of which we don't think about when we're younger and more agile.

Fortunately, there are many ways to assess and improve home safety for an aging family member. The following tips can help you get started.

By addressing potential hazards early, families can help older adults maintain greater independence while enjoying the comfort and familiarity of home.

Each glance in the mirror shows us we’re getting older. We feel it in our bones, in our energy level, and as we witness our own parents aging and, in many cases, losing their vitality. This stage of life can be challenging, that’s for sure. There are many difficult conversations to have around healthcare, finances, and end-of-life planning. It is all too easy for fear, grief, and even resentment to creep into the space between family members. But there’s another way to approach this delicate stage – one that allows this unique time in life to be shared with reverence, gratitude, and grace between adult children and their aging parents. The tips below will help you plan a path forward with loving intention, courage, and clarity as the time to make critical decisions nears.

Embrace Blessings, Find Peace.

The challenges inherent in interacting with our aging parents can be balanced with unexpected blessings if we focus on finding peace. It’s hard work to rise to this challenge, but well worth the effort. You have the opportunity to discover one another anew by understanding the life choices your parents made through the lens of your own adult life. This change in perspective also invites your aging parent into a different way of seeing your choices and relating to you – one that comes from a new shared perspective. If needed, seek out an eldercare mediator, professional counselor, or support group that specializes in strengthening the bond between adult children and older parents.

Helping older adults declutter requires a patient, respectful approach that honors the memory and meaning held in their personal possessions. 

It can be incredibly difficult to get an older adult family member to let go of the “stuff” that has collected in their living space. They may view your attempts to help them clean up as an intrusion of their privacy, leading to feelings of anger, sadness, and fear of losing a vital part of their personal history, and even their autonomy. Helping an older family member declutter their living space requires a gentle, respectful, and slow-paced approach that makes them feel like a partner in the process.

Cluttered Living Spaces: A Hazzard for Older Adults

A wonderful way for older adults to add meaning and joy to life is to initiate new friendships in the New Year. Studies show that friendship provides vital social connections that support mental and physical health. As people are living longer, it's important to establish habits and routines that add quality to the Golden Years. Studies show older adult friendship is vital to lowering risk for and reducing the impact of existing chronic illness, such as cognitive decline, loneliness, depression, and heart disease. It's never too late in life to make a new friend…the tips below will help you get started! Health Benefits of Friendship for Older Adults Throughout our lives, and particularly during older adulthood, friendship provides vital social connections that offer protective health benef...

It’s easy for anyone to overheat in the summer months. Older adults, especially, are more sensitive to fluctuations in temperature. It’s important to stay aware of how you’re feeling during hot weather, or you can quickly overheat and be at risk for a serious—and potentially dangerous—heat illness.

Why is Hot Weather Dangerous for Older Adults?

People age 65 and older typically do not adapt easily to changes in temperature, particularly the sudden and extreme bouts of heat that we’ve been seeing in recent years. Unlike younger people, older adults don’t have the physical resilience to adapt quickly, produce sweat and regulate their body temperature.

There are few reasons why this happens. including:

Today’s older adult is often on the move, and summer is prime time for outdoor activities under the sun. Whether you’re beaching, biking, hiking, gardening, or just relaxing, you’ll want to take extra precautions to protect your eyes from sun exposure. That means investing a little time in choosing quality eyewear designed to counter the sun’s UV rays as well as nourishing and exercising the eyes.

Three Ways to Protect the Eyes

• Proper Summer Eyewear
• Nutrients to Support Eye Health
• Yoga for the Eyes

Proper Summer Eyewear for Active Older Adults

UV-protective eyewear is essential year-round for everyone, particularly in the summer months when we spend more time near bodies of water and other reflective surfaces. Summer days are longer and sun exposure increases as we spend more time outdoors. UV light waves are the damage-causing rays emitted by the sun—too much exposure to UV waves can cause serious problems for the eyes: sun damage, sunburn, cataracts, macular degeneration, and even eye cancer or blindness.  If you have any health conditions of the eye, or take certain medications, your eyes may be at higher risk for sun damage.

There are plenty of benefits to becoming an active older adult, such as: 

• wisdom acquired from life experience and sharing that with others
• time to explore new interests
• opportunity for leisure travel and entertainment
• quality time with friends and family
• feeling more accepting of who you are

Yet, these positive aspects of older adulthood rarely get the attention they deserve. To address this, as a nation, we observe Healthy Aging Month every September. 

Never Too Late…

This month’s topic for Gym Talk is "Heat Safety Awareness".

Hot weather can be dangerous, and seniors over the age of 65 are among those most at risk for heat exhaustion. Now that the hot weather has arrived it's important to know the signs of heat exhaustion and how to stay cool.

The human body regulates temperature through sweating, until exposed to more heat than the body can handle. As you become older the ability to notice changes in your own body’s temperature decreases. Others at risk for heat illness include infants and young children, people who are ill, those with chronic health conditions or on certain medications, and people who are overweight. Health conditions can make the body less able to adapt to the heat. Also, some medicines can contribute to dehydration.

Residents in senior living communities often delight in receiving visitors, especially when those visitors include children. Even so, it can be quite difficult, emotionally, to bring the kids along to a long term care facility. With a little preparation, patience and compassion, a family’s first visit to an elder care community can be made meaningful for all family members—especially for the elder and grandchildren.

Your aging loved one, who is residing in long term care, may have changed a great deal as a result of their physical and emotional health. They may display different behaviors, personality changes, and memory deficits that even the most well-prepared adult can struggle to see. So, how do you prepare a child for their first visit with a grandparent who is residing in an elder care community?

Prepare the Kids Before they Arrive at the Senior Living Facility

Talking to a teen about a family member diagnosed with dementia can be incredibly difficult for caregivers. The approach taken when you have this conversation can help your teen cope effectively with the news and empower them to preserve a meaningful connection with their loved one. 

When to Tell a Teen About a Loved One Diagnosed with Dementia

For most teens, the family member with dementia will be a grandparent or older family member, but for some it may be a parent.  Even if, at some level, a teen had some awareness that the diagnosis was coming, hearing it spoken aloud is a hard-hitting reality. It’s imperative to have the conversation as soon as possible after a diagnosis of dementia is confirmed, so that your teen does not find out “accidentally” from someone else in (or outside) the family; this would compound stress for all and may feel like a breach of trust to the teen.

Ahh…Autumn in New England. It’s the perfect time of year to fall into the pages of a good story. 

What’s your reading pleasure? Is it a heart-pounding thriller or a poignant romance? A perilous adventure story or a hilarious whodunnit? Maybe you’re one for historical fiction or true crime? 

No matter the genre, stories are a powerful vehicle for transporting you out of real time and into imaginative places and encounters. But there’s more power in reading than just spurring the imagination: Older adults who are avid book readers are doing a lot to support their health—and they may live longer lives as a result! 

There are many simple ways for an older adult to make, and keep, a New Year’s resolution. Whether you want to exercise more regularly, drink less soda, or learn how to draw, the following tips can help you be successful with your resolution for 2024.

Resolution Making: Getting Started

First, kudos to you for recognizing it’s never too late to make a change, try something new, or otherwise enhance an area of your life.

Perhaps the most important thing to know is that change is a process. The more ready you make yourself for it, the easier it can be to follow through to successfully keeping your New Year’s resolution.