Peg Hall, a resident of Era Living's Aljoya Thornton Place in Seattle, Washington, joins Suzanne to provide a resident's perspective of what a typical day is like at an Era Living retirement community. Peg is from New Jersey, lived around the country and in Japan, and ended up on the west coast.
She first moved into independent living during the pandemic, and there weren't any activities because of that. "When I first moved into Aljoya, I was independent. I wasn't meeting many people, because the pandemic was going on, and I joke about how I used to go to the trash room to meet the other residents. We didn't have activities or meals together, but it was 2020. What could you do? And after I was here three months, we would go outside and get some exercise, taking a walk. And unexpectedly I got some vertigo, crashed to the ground, and had a severe break to my backbone.
"And they were able to help me here. In a couple of days, I was at the hospital, then I had surgery, and then I went to rehab for six weeks and I was kind of in shock during that time. And of course, as I improved, they said, well, now you can get to go home... compute home, well, that's Aljoya. And I was so grateful that I could go back to my apartment and not like in some senior residences where you have to move to another area. I got back to my original apartment with lots of help, and the caregivers — this was assisted living — caregivers coming in very often. Staff watched me closely. My family came frequently. So with all therapists came three kinds of therapy coming right into my apartment. I did not have to leave. Fortunately, my insurance covered that.
"During this long period of assisted living, I gradually got better, was able to get in and out of the bed by myself, et cetera. So then I got out of assisted and into independent living where I am now."
When asked what advice would she give somebody that is looking into a retirement community, Peg said, "I think you have to decide what is important to you. If you're a people person, then you want to be in a place where you have an opportunity to meet people, and you have to decide if you want a large place — some of them are like hotels to meet their high rise — or a smaller, homier place. And then the first one I looked at was about 25 miles away from the center of the city. And I thought, that's gonna be too far. I wanna enjoy the cultural and educational things that we have in Seattle, I don't want to be too far out in the boonies. So the location would be important."
Learn more about Aljoya Thornton Place, located at 450 NE 100th St. in Seattle, WA.
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