I recently did an open online search cross-matching the terms ‘home’ and ‘older adulthood’. The top (non-commercial) hits using three different search engines were topics focused on health changes, aging-in-place, and in-home care providers. Not far down the list came recommendations for home safety, home exercise programs, and home modifications. The importance of these things notwithstanding, it seems home has become – like so many things related to aging – a site for intervention.
In this month’s blog series, we will focus on the concept of home in later adulthood, spotlight a community partner with a focus on senior housing, and critique – as well as hopefully expand – the concept of Aging-in-Place. We begin this conversation, however with a question generated by those search results: Does the purpose of home in later life change to that of a clinical space? I use the word clinical not only in the sense of something related to medical treatment or health, but also in its fullest meaning as something objective, scientific, unemotional. As home becomes a space where we introduce the trappings of declining capacities and open the door to those who broker them, does the meaning of shelter and comfort and home-making give way to a portrait of infirmity?
I have worked for more than 30 years as an occupational therapist and have had the privilege of visiting many people in their homes, most of whom welcomed that visit and some of whom reluctantly tolerated it as an intrusion into their private sphere. I can’t blame the latter group and wonder if I will also react that way when someone comes in to suggest that I remove a throw rug or reposition my furniture, or move my bedroom to the first floor. My throw rug, after all, was woven by a dear friend from the discarded blue jeans of her children. My furniture sits where it sits so I can look out the front window and see visitors coming down the driveway, and our bedroom is on the second floor because we like the feeling of being in a treehouse in those late-night hours before we sleep. And I know from those 30+ years of home visits that I’m not alone in these meaning-laden choices.
Delores, whom I visited on her farm in the rural outskirts of our county several years ago, met me out on the steps by holding onto a black rubber handle screwed onto the door frame. Delores had fashioned her “grab bar” out of old tires in her shed, cutting them into strips with industrial-strength pinking shears so that they had a fancy edge to them. She told me that she didn’t want those “metal things” that had been recommended to her, preferring to make her own “retired tires” into grab bars because she always tried to make everything on her farm come from her farm.
When I worked in an apartment building designated for older adults with limited incomes, I was tasked with convincing Charles, who had amassed three households-worth of goods in his 700 square foot apartment, to part with some of his items due to fire code and concern about insect infestations. Twenty-five years later, I still recall debating with Charles his need for the stack of 5 unopened pump sprayers in the corner given that he lived in an apartment without any outdoor space to maintain. At one point 87-year-old Charles yelled at me “I need them because my Daddy was a landscaper and they always got stolen! You always need a backup!” Now, I’m sure some of you reading this will start to wonder, as did I, about Charles’ reasoning, or his problem-solving; some of you might even want to label him a hoarder and intervene to prevent him from becoming enveloped in “stuff”. These are real concerns and I was right there with you. But today I think about Charles and wonder why I became so concerned about removing things that obviously held meaning for him. His home provided shelter not only for him but for the backup supplies – and the value of being prepared – that he learned from his father.
Do I think that home can remain a place only defined by those who inhabit it? Not when we also value the intersection of staying in valued places, extending longevity, and shifting the ways in which we sustain our bodies and minds away from medical spaces. And home has always been a contested space, as pointed out by reviewers of related architectural research. It is not a static space, not pristine or protected or fully agentic, even in the most well-resourced situations. I do think, however, that as we consider the intersection of age and home, we can listen a minute longer to the complexities of meaning and decision-making related to our spaces, and move away from formulaic recommendations about how home can better “support” our aging. I’d rather my home acclaim my aging – and I am not removing my throw rug!
©2021 JLWOMACK, Professor, Division of Occupational Science & Occupational Therapy UNC-Chapel Hill
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