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Downsizing, To Move or Not to Move? That is the Question
Aging Well | Last Active: Mar 23 9:13pm | Replies (473)Comment receiving replies
My husband & I have been dealing with this issue for the past year. We've lived in our home on 2 lovely acres for over 30 years, raised our family here. But the maintenance & upkeep has become a burden, now that we are in our 70s. A year ago we found a nice house on a small lot in a great community, closer to our daughter's family. It seemed ideal but when it was time to commit to it, my husband had panic attacks at the thought and we backed out. He had recently closed his small business, retired, and began having hearing loss, so maybe it was too many big changes to handle at once. He has had some mental health counseling and is somewhat more relaxed and accepting of life as it is. Then last spring we put an offer in on a house, just as the stock market plunged because of Coronavirus. Again we backed out, as a good chunk of our retirement money is in the stock market.
We've gotten rid of a lot of the unnecessary stuff accumulated over 30 years, but he has a lot of tools and equipment that he may or may not need in the future. I keep an eye out for another possible home purchase but I'm afraid of getting my hopes dashed again.
Replies to "My husband & I have been dealing with this issue for the past year. We've lived..."
Your house is out there just keep an open mind and the right one will come along.
Criss, I'm just in the middle of reading a book called The End of Old Age : Living a Longer More Purposeful Life by Marc Agronin. He's a geriatric psychiatrist with years of experience helping people deal with the changes of aging. He talks about the stages that we have to go through when we come to a crisis point such as making a major change, loss of a close relationship or dealing with a health crisis and how we need to find our way through and find the meaning in the new situation. It is similar to working through the stages of grief. All these changes can make us feel like we have lost control and don't know who we are anymore. It can be quite frightening and it seems to me that women deal better with such changes. I think we are used to having major changes in our roles through marriage, pregnancy, parenting, caretaking, etc. I just grabbed it off the shelf in the library and it has turned out to be such a good find. You might find it helpful too.
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Truly a tough decision! We are not there yet, but I know the day will come as we have 3 levels and a medium-sized but elaborate yard with gardens and a pond. Fortunately there are MANY options, condos, townhouses, detached single family, apartments in our immediate area, and both daughters are nearby. So, I persist in clearing out whenever & wherever possible.
My parents set a good example, moving from a big home to a smaller one, then a mobile home. Finally Mom moved to successively smaller apartments as her health became worse, and they shed possessions all along the way. By then end, Mom had given everything of value to her kids and grandkids, and left a list of who was to get the remaining (lovely) furniture & her jewelry. We held a one-evening giveaway of the rest to her grandchildren, so each could have something to remember her by. It was lovely no tension, no fighting...in contrast to cleaning out my in-law's home of 40 years with only the help of my parents. My husband's sister still asks us to send her certain long-gone things - 25 years later!
Sue