The Benefits Of A Naturally Occurring Support System
Sometimes when we think about retirement communities like John Knox Village East we tend to think about the benefits that are provided by the people that work at the retirement community – housekeeping, meal service, health care, therapy, maintenance service, transportation and more. However, some of the less often mentioned benefits of living in a retirement community like John Knox Village East are the benefits that happen by living in close proximity to your friends.
We never like to think about it, but at some point in a 60 year marriage, one of the partners will be left alone….one of the spouses will depart this earth before the other. Several people who live at John Knox Village East have told me that they don’t know how they would have made it through this loss if they hadn’t been here. Their neighbors wouldn’t let them give up. In some cases, they almost dragged them out of their apartments to participate in activities and socialize with their fellow villagers. They never get over the loss, but having somewhere to go, something to do and others to share the experience with made it easier. It also helped because many of their friends and neighbors had gone through the same loss themselves.
Having “nosy” neighbors sometimes heads off a health scare. It’s not uncommon that a neighbor will ask us to go check on one of their fellow residents who is at coffee every morning, but didn’t show up today. 99.9% of the time, it’s nothing – the absent attendee just had a conflicting appointment. But, sometimes, they aren’t feeling well and we’re able to get them the help they need before their condition worsens.
Great neighbors are what makes John Knox Village East a great place to live. They provide an additional layer of support when one of their fellow neighbors are down. Just the other week, a resident had a medical episode that precipitated a hospital visit. Fortunately, the issue wasn’t serious, but they weren’t their normal perky selves for a while. Another resident was going to the store and brought them back some groceries because they weren’t feeling well.
Neighbors in close proximity make for some built-in competition. Sometimes, we make wake up and think we’re not feeling too well, but we don’t want one of our fellow neighbors to think they’re doing better than us and we don’t want to miss out on the local chatter around the coffee table so we get dressed and go down and have our morning coffee and catch up on the local gossip. Next thing we know we’re not feeling as bad as we thought we were and the built in social network has got us up and going.
If you’d like to find out more about what we offer, call us at 660 584 4416 or email us at info@johnknoxvillageeast.com.
