The “Operational Truths”… According To the Retiree … Continued!
I suppose the financial piece that I just covered is the most intuitively obvious operational aspect of retirement that would come to mind, but there are several others that perhaps are not quite so obvious.
Again, to get you thinking about these things, I will pose each in the form of a question. Let us start with one that is almost a Maslow-ian basic need… shelter!
Where Will You Will Live?
“Again Sherlock, you ask about the obvious. I own/rent my own house/condo/apartment and that’s where I’ll be living in retirement. This is a non-issue.”
I do agree that this sort of sounds like a bit of a non-issue, but I assure you that across the length of your retirement you will probably need to ask yourself the question… is it time to move because my situation has changed? And asking yourself that question for the first time might even begin before you retire. I know it did for us.
People Move for Various Reasons – Many people consider moving before or shortly after they retire for various reasons. They may have been living in a part of town that was ideal for commuting to work, but they don’t want to spend their retirement years in that area. They may want to move closer to family now that they don’t have to live close to their work. Some folks may want to downsize from a large family home to a much more manageable smaller space.
Some retirees may simply wish to move closer to better medical services if they already have health issues or expect to have their health decline quickly. Or others, like the Love-goddess and I, might want to move from the suburbs to the downtown area because it is closer to the amenities they see themselves using more frequently in retirement. All sorts of reasons can lead to the decision to make a move.
The decision to move may well occur even later in retirement. An example of this might be a couple who are in their early 80s and would like to escape the busyness and fast pace of the big city they are finding stressful and move to a smaller town or city. Another situation might be someone who finds themselves in a position where they can no longer physically maintain a house (or don’t wish to) and choose to move into an apartment or condominium.
Others may ultimately move because they can no longer take care of themselves, and the move is necessary. Yes, I think it’s safe to say that most of us would like to spend the final third of our retirement life in our own homes, but that is not always possible. I think that late life accommodation needs deserve separate consideration.
Don’t Shun Retirement Residences – There will come a time when many of us will either be unwilling or physically unable to do as much as we want to. And some of us will arrive at a point where we need assistance with our day-to-day activities and are having someone come in to assist us with our day-to-day needs. This may be followed by a period where we may require constant ongoing care. At that point, it will become necessary to move into a supported living situation, or a long-term care facility with other retirees in the same situation.
I mention this not because I have had personal experiences with it but many of our friends who are in a similar demographic, went through a process where their parents who were 20 or 30 years older than they, had arrived at a point where they wanted to stay in their own homes to the bitter end, and multiple attempts to talk them into moving into an assisted living situation, fell on deaf ears – until it became absolutely necessary.
The interesting thing in all of this, is that, in virtually every one of these situations, the individual who was forced to move out of their own home and into a residence, grew to love their new situation. Obviously, part of the reason was they got to meet a large array of other seniors who were in the exact same position as they were. They found lots of people to enjoy and interact with.
Living alone in your own home until you reach the finish line sounds like a great thing to do, but keep in mind that there might be a better choice available. We should all be willing to recognize when that point in our life arrives and consider that final move with open eyes and not simply dig in our heels.
And yes, it is true that some of us will remain in the home we lived in while we were employed and spend our last days there. I suspect for most of us even that will not be the case. At the very least, all retirees will have to give some thoughtful consideration to moving and changing their living situation at some point.
How Will You Get Around?
“Sherlock, pleeeeeeeze! I will get around in my car… of course!”
Yes, you will… until you won’t. I say that knowing that it is not true for all retirees, but your approach to your transportation is likely to change somewhat in retirement. The broad commonality here to all retirees is that we do have to have some methods of transporting ourselves from place to place, either for short distances or for long distances.
Driving at 80 and Beyond – Let’s deal with the worst-case scenario that will probably pop up for everyone… everyone who survives ‘till the age of 80 at least. Although, I should point out that I am only currently speaking about folks in Ontario, Alberta, and British Columbia. When we reach the age of 80 in those provinces, we are required to take a test before our license is renewed. If we fail, our license is yanked, and our driving days may be at an end. At the least, vision tests are required for license renewal in most provinces in Canada when we reach the 80-year mark. In Quebec, apparently you have to file a statement of health when you reach age of 75.
Perhaps almost as bad is that we are allowed to continue driving past the age of 80 but our faculties may have declined to the point where we are a bit of a hazard to everyone else while we’re out there. So, for whatever reason, not being able to drive later in our retirements is a very real possibility for everyone.
How Many Cars? – Second up, a bit of a discussion around how many cars you should have in retirement. When we are working, cars are basically necessary evils, unless you live in a city that has fantastic public transportation. And given our busy lives, those of us who are in couples typically each have a car.
I don’t have to tell you that owning, maintaining, and operating two cars is an expensive proposition. Retirement brings the opportunity to consider letting go of one of those cars and managing your lives so you can get by with just one.
We have done so, but we did not go down to one car immediately when we were both retired. After we moved into our very urban townhouse in the city core where we could walk to many amenities, I started pitching the idea of letting go of one car to the Love-goddess. She was resistant to the idea, as many individuals in couples will be – given that it means both individuals will be partially giving up unlimited freedom of mobility.
You may have read that in 2019 I was hospitalized for four months. Nasty business, but I survived and have moved on quite nicely. However, while I was in the hospital the Love-goddess was at home alone. She found constantly having to juggle the two cars because our townhouse had a one car garage and one car always had to sit out in the driveway particularly annoying.
Unbeknownst to me, because I was in an induced coma, she decided to get rid of the oldest car. Not the way I would have wanted it to happen, but I was quite pleased to discover that we were a one car family when I regained consciousness. 🙂
This question may well come up for many of you. I suppose I should report that it has worked out fine for us. Also interesting to me is that other couples that we know have also gone down to one car and seem to be having little issue with the situation.
Public Transit & Ride Services – if we are going to talk about couples getting along with one car, we probably should chat about how you replace that missing second car. I lived in Toronto for a goodly part of my adult life and as a former aspiring urban planner I am a great lover of public transit.
One of the reasons we live where we do now is because a new light rail transit system was built in our city, and I pounced on the idea of living in the downtown core within spitting distance of one of the new transit stops. Not only do we benefit from being able to walk to do most of the things we were required to do using a car (e.g. buying groceries etc.), we can now hop on the light rail system to get to lots of other important parts of the city.
When we were going through the process of discussing the merits of downsizing to one car, we always assumed that we would probably need to sign on to a car-sharing program. And in lieu of that, we thought we should be prepared to frequently use ridesharing services like Uber or even our local taxi services. We do use taxis very occasionally, but we have found that we are managing the sharing of one car easier than we expected. So, I would have to say that our primary secondary form of transportation is our local light rail transit system.
I would suggest to you that if you have never been a user of public transit… we boomers have definitely been the “I need a car” generation… so it might take a pretty serious shift to get you thinking about using public transit more. Put it on your radar and maybe go out and try it out at some point get a sense of what using it might be like for you.
Alternate forms of transportation to owning a second car:
• public transit
• taxi or and rideshare services
• carpool with friends and family
• use transportation services offered by community organizations
• use paratransit
How Will You Eat?
“Huh? How will I eat? Sherlock that is the most bizarre question you have asked so far… and they have all been pretty weird.”
I have to agree that this question doesn’t really seem intuitively obvious. I suppose what I really mean when I ask that question is to make you aware that there is a very reasonable chance that our eating habits will change as we move through retirement.
I have to admit that this question would not have dawned on me in the first decade of retirement. Now that I have begun my second decade it begins to gain new meaning. Let me elaborate.
My own eating habits changed for medical reasons. I largely attribute this to the fact that during my four months stay in hospital I received my “meals” through a feeding tube in my abdomen for three of those months. And when I began to receive solid food, it was as bad as only hospital food can be bad. The net result was my stomach became use to a much-reduced food intake which meant I felt like eating far less food than I used to. Sadly though, I regained all the weight I had lost in the hospital. 🙂
I have also noted that like us, many of our friends are now moving into the second decade of the retirements. It has struck me that some of those folks have developed gastrointestinal issues and are on medication for it. I hate to say it folks, but in retirement your digestive system may no longer be the efficient food processing machine that it used to be.
It is generally accepted that as we age, we have lower calorie needs, but we still have similar or even increased nutrient needs compared to younger adults. This is typically caused by changes in metabolism, reduced physical activity, or age-related loss of muscle and bone mass.
Science confirms that our eating needs and habits will most likely change as we age. According to statistics Canada:
“Advancing age may bring diet-related challenges. Among seniors, chronic conditions and the medications used to treat them can interfere with appetite, the taste and enjoyment of food, and the absorption of nutrients. Impaired mobility and dexterity, declining health, and lack of transportation can be barriers to purchasing and preparing food. Poor oral health may also hinder eating. Some older people live in “food deserts” devoid of supermarkets and characterized by convenience stores and fast-food outlets with “empty calorie” choices. Changes in living arrangements due to the loss of a spouse can affect seniors’ diets through loneliness and the logistics of cooking for one.
A paradox of aging is that caloric needs decrease, but the need for a nutritious diet does not. It is important to identify the people most likely to be at risk of nutritional depletion, who, without intervention, may become malnourished, frail, and susceptible to negative health outcomes including functional limitations, poor quality of life, longer hospital stays and readmissions, and earlier death.
Nutritional risk increases at older ages. Thus, with Canada’s aging population, the prevalence of nutritional risk and the associated adverse health outcomes could become more common.”
We all need to be aware that our eating needs and habits will most likely change as we age, and we should pay attention to and understand how we can manage this important aspect of life and retirement.
So, lots of “operational” things might begin to change for us as we move through retirement. And maybe that’s the question I should be asking, how will you and I handle change? My thinking on these things continues.
I Am Still Pondering Things
There may be some other universal truisms about retirement that I simply have not figured out yet. That said, I have figured out a couple of other “questions” that could have, or should have, been on this list… but I am not yet convinced that most of them apply to everyone. However, I am still giving them a lot of thought. And my thought on most of these things is that they are issues that will arise in the second or third trimester of retirement, i.e. as we get older, and older.
Things like…
How Will You Deal with the Health Issues That Will Probably Arise? – Having come extremely close to death while I was still in my 60s, and having spent four months in the hospital, and ended up with no fingertips or toes has made me critically aware that things start to break down as we get closer and closer toward the finish line.
For myself, in the end, that was just a bit of a speed bump, and I am once again living life to the fullest. I can actually say that my golf game has even improved noticeably now that my mobility has been somewhat compromised. No more gymnastic-like flailing away at the ball in pursuit of greater distance. 🙂
It would be great if you could get right to the point where you are crossing “the finish line” in good health, but that probably does not happen for most of us. Just because you hit a health speed bump there is a good chance that you will find your life returning to normal afterwards… maybe a slightly different normal… but you will still have many good years left.
How Will you Address Physical Fitness? – Sure, in an ideal world all we retired folks would use our extra free time to ramp up our fitness game and keep ourselves in great physical shape until we don’t need our bodies anymore. But speaking from experience, that doesn’t happen to the same degree you might hope that it would. And for some folks, their existing health and physical restrictions do not allow them to exercise regularly.
So, we are probably all approaching physical fitness, or not approaching physical fitness, in totally different ways. We all KNOW it’s important to stay fit because it reduces the chances of needing a walker or wheelchair down the line or breaking some bones when we fall. BUT you need to be motivated and actually develop a fitness action plan… maybe I’ll go and wipe the dust off the rowing machine.
How Will You Deal with Personality Changes in Yourself and Your Friends? – I don’t know about you, but I have noticed that many of the people I know who are in the same demographic as I am, are getting a little “quirkier” in their old age. Behaviours have changed in noticeable ways; from being less tolerant of the actions of others, reducing socializing, becoming somewhat defiant oppositional (e.g. refuses to wear hearing aids), becoming more anxious, trying to do too much and failing at it… and my personal favourite… to becoming downright curmudgeonly.
And if it is happening to people around me, I know it is happening to me as well. Perhaps I should ask others what changes they are seeing in me… hmmmmm… perhaps not a good idea. 🙂
It’s never too early to start monitoring your own thoughts and behaviors especially if you’re doing that with others.
How Will You Deal with Change? – So, let’s address the question I suggested might be the one we should really all be focusing on. The big picture issue is that things will change for you as you move deeper into retirement. I suppose an important first step in addressing all of that, is recognizing that it is probably an inevitability for each and every one of us. And if we know it’s coming, we can gird our mental loins and prepare to be aware and accepting, and then move on and live our lives has fully as we can.
How Will You Prepare for Death? – Yes, I have saved the really fun stuff till last. It is time to talk about, buying the farm, cashing in your chips, taking a dirt nap, pushing up daisies, shuffling off this mortal coil, croaking, sleeping with the fishes, giving up the ghost, biting the dust, pegging out, kicking the bucket, going gentle into that good night, heading off to the last round up… i.e. dying.
This is definitely one thing that applies to all retirees. The Grim Reaper will come looking for all of us at some point. And it is my thought that it is not a bad idea to try and give this a little thought in advance and to do a little planning in advance.
I am not going to spend any time here talking about how I think you should prepare mentally or list off all the tasks that should be attended to long before your number comes up. I will leave that for you to sort through.
What I would like to do however is maybe give some suggestions about WHAT NOT TO DO – and this is all based on personal experience.
I have come to understand that my father probably had a fear of death. And as such, he made no plans and only left my mother with a few simple directives. Those directives were – no friends or family outside of the immediate family were to be notified of his death until after he was buried. There was to be no funeral and he wished to be buried in the cheapest casket possible, and that we could bury him wherever we chose. Not good. Yet, my mother and I and my sister did what he asked.
The net result was that I was in charge and had to take my elderly mother out and find plots for my father, and ultimately my mother, to be buried in. This was about as little fun for her as you can possibly imagine.
I had to tell the United Church minister who presided over his internment with us that, no we didn’t have anything in particular that he would have liked said about him and she could say whatever she wanted. She said some things and then we all went on our way. It was a fast and furious non-event.
I did balk ever so slightly on one of his wishes. I ultimately decided that a particleboard casket held together with drywall screws and carried with rope handles perhaps wasn’t what my father had in mind, and we purchased something a little better.
And then came the truly fun part. My father was the youngest of eight children and had adult sisters when he was born. As such, he was much adored by his older sibs. When I phoned his remaining living sister, my Aunt Grace, the phone call went like this… Hi Aunt Grace, it’s Greg… I am fine thank you… Dad, oh that’s why I called… Not well, in fact he’s dead… No, Aunt Grace there will be no funeral … no gathering for the internment either, he’s already buried … you will have to mourn on your own like the rest of us are doing… yes, you are absolutely correct Aunt Grace I never should have listened to him… yes, I am a bad person. As I recall most of the other calls were similar in nature.
I will never make the same mistake of honouring someone’s insensitive last wishes again. Sheeeeesh!
So, my only advice to you is, DON’T EVER DO ANYTHING LIKE THAT TO YOUR LOVED ONES LEFT BEHIND, or insist on any other silly plans for how other people should handle your passing. When you die, it ceases to be about you. Everything that happens afterwards should help those who you have left behind deal with their loss. It’s really not all about you at that point.
For the record, my most important wishes are that I be cremated, that the Love-goddess should spend upwards of $5000 on an old-fashioned Irish wake style of funeral… I am thinking that if I pick up the bar tab eventually people will start saying nice things about me at my funeral. :-)… and the toughest one is that I would like my ashes spread in Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris. Technically, you either must live in Paris, or die in Paris, for that to happen, so I’m not really counting on it.
Feel free to come and visit me there when you are in town. 🙂
