{"id":2776,"date":"2024-02-29T01:00:26","date_gmt":"2024-02-29T01:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.villages.com.au\/?p=2776"},"modified":"2024-02-29T01:04:24","modified_gmt":"2024-02-29T01:04:24","slug":"why-a-retirement-village-after-he-died-i-felt-very-cut-off-from-like-minded-people","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.villages.com.au\/retirement\/why-a-retirement-village-after-he-died-i-felt-very-cut-off-from-like-minded-people\/","title":{"rendered":"Why a retirement village? \u201cAfter he died, I felt very cut off from like-minded people\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t<div data-elementor-type=\"wp-post\" data-elementor-id=\"2776\" class=\"elementor elementor-2776\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<section class=\"elementor-section elementor-top-section elementor-element elementor-element-fc24d10 elementor-section-boxed elementor-section-height-default elementor-section-height-default\" data-id=\"fc24d10\" data-element_type=\"section\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-container elementor-column-gap-default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-column elementor-col-100 elementor-top-column elementor-element elementor-element-7fe7512\" data-id=\"7fe7512\" data-element_type=\"column\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-widget-wrap elementor-element-populated\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-725bc20 elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"725bc20\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-widget-container\">\n\t\t\t<style>\/*! elementor - v3.15.0 - 20-08-2023 *\/\n.elementor-widget-text-editor.elementor-drop-cap-view-stacked .elementor-drop-cap{background-color:#69727d;color:#fff}.elementor-widget-text-editor.elementor-drop-cap-view-framed .elementor-drop-cap{color:#69727d;border:3px solid;background-color:transparent}.elementor-widget-text-editor:not(.elementor-drop-cap-view-default) .elementor-drop-cap{margin-top:8px}.elementor-widget-text-editor:not(.elementor-drop-cap-view-default) .elementor-drop-cap-letter{width:1em;height:1em}.elementor-widget-text-editor .elementor-drop-cap{float:left;text-align:center;line-height:1;font-size:50px}.elementor-widget-text-editor .elementor-drop-cap-letter{display:inline-block}<\/style>\t\t\t\t<p>Like many married people, Ann Symes (pictured right) had never thought about living on her own.<\/p><p>\u201cWe lived in Pooraka [12km north of Adelaide CBD] until my husband got very ill,\u201d said Ann.<\/p><p>&#8220;He was diagnosed with cancer. My daughter had a massive house with a huge garage, which she turned into a granny flat. At my husband\u2019s request, not mine!<\/p><p>\u201cI didn\u2019t want to leave my home, but he felt that I wouldn\u2019t manage on my own. He was always very protective. So, we moved to the granny flat and a year-and-a-half later my husband passed away.<\/p><p>\u201cAfter he died, I felt very cut off from like-minded people, so I decided to look at [retirement] villages because I felt it was the right thing for me.\u201d<\/p><p>Ann and her daughter looked at many villages until they toured <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theweeklysource.com.au\/topic-aged-care\/retireaustralia-is-leading-the-ageing-in-place-movement\">RetireAustralia<\/a>\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.villages.com.au\/sa\/magill\/magill-retirement-village-4353\">Magill Retirement Village<\/a> in Magill, 7km east of the State&#8217;s capital city. and finally found home.<\/p><p>\u201cI saw some beautiful retirement villages, very upmarket, but very cold. Magill was the last one I came to and when I came into the unit, I said to my daughter \u2018I\u2019m buying here\u2019 and my daughter said: \u2018Are you sure? Think about it.\u2019 And I said \u2018No, I have a nice feeling\u2019.\u201d<\/p><p><strong>Life in a retirement village<\/strong><\/p><p>RetireAustralia say Ann is known in the village as fun, friendly, generous, and always helping to other residents and with her warm laugh that\u2019s easy to believe.<\/p><p>\u201cI try to make friends and be helpful,\u201d Ann said. \u201cI think most of the people who come here are happy to be friends. We check on each other, all the residents interact in some way or another. I like people, I\u2019m a people person.\u201d<\/p><p>For Ann, life in the village is the perfect arrangement. She can live on her own and on her own terms, but she still has the comfort and security of living in a caring community.<\/p><p>\u201cI\u2019m not brave enough to live on my own now, so I like the security here,\u201d she said. \u201cI have the best of both worlds \u2013 I live on my own, but I have the community around me so I\u2019m not alone. I\u2019ve got my independence, I can close the door and I\u2019m on my own, but outside I have everyone around. We all look out for each other.\u201d<\/p><p><strong>A maintenance-free lifestyle<\/strong><\/p><p>One of the major reasons people decide to move into a retirement village is when the continual need for maintaining their family home becomes a hassle.<\/p><p>\u201cI like the help, the handyman is very helpful,\u201d said Ann. \u201cThe staff listen to you and try to do as much as they can. We\u2019re very fortunate to have our Village Manager Kelly Reading (pictured above with Ann), she\u2019s wonderful.\u201d<\/p><p><strong>\u201cI\u2019m very happy here\u201d<\/strong><\/p><p>As well as taking part in the many social events in the village and playing Rummikub with friends on the weekend, cricket-mad Ann loves watching it on Foxtel.<\/p><p>\u201cWhen we first came, my daughters and I would go to the cricket matches here at the Adelaide Oval. It was good fun! My daughters are just as mad about cricket as I am,\u201d she said.<\/p><p>She said quite a lot of her friends have asked her about living in a retirement village.<\/p><p><strong>&#8220;I always tell people that I\u2019m very happy here and I encourage them to move in. \u2018Why don\u2019t you try it? Because I\u2019m happy here.\u2019 I tell everybody!\u201d<\/strong><\/p><p>\u00a0<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Like many married people, Ann Symes (pictured right) had never thought about living on her own. \u201cWe lived in Pooraka [12km north of Adelaide CBD] until my husband got very ill,\u201d said Ann. &#8220;He was diagnosed with cancer. My daughter had a massive house with&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2777,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[70],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2776","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-retirement"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.villages.com.au/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2776","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.villages.com.au/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.villages.com.au/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.villages.com.au/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.villages.com.au/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2776"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.villages.com.au/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2776\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2781,"href":"https:\/\/www.villages.com.au/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2776\/revisions\/2781"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.villages.com.au/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2777"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.villages.com.au/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2776"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.villages.com.au/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2776"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.villages.com.au/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2776"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}