With a Little Help From My Friends

The only difference in our senior years is that we may have to open ourselves to a little help once in a while. And from that level of honesty and transparency, we enter into a truer human experience, one in which we can receive—and give—love. It becomes quite a lovely exchange of mutual blessing.

In our Assisted Living neighborhoods, MorningStar offers various levels of support with the activities of daily living, each type of assistance determined after an assessment with our Wellness Director, working in agreement with the senior and extended family. In all cases, around-the-clock Care Managers, on site and at the ready, ensure your safety as they meet your expressed (and even unexpressed) needs.

For you, the senior, it is our team’s responsibility to remember you prefer coffee with cream, or that you hail from Youngstown, Ohio. It’s our pleasure to help you choose an outfit for dinner on the town. It’s our gift to respond to you with thoughtfulness, and encourage independence wherever it can be found, and to instill self-confidence in all that you are and all that you are contributing.

For you, the family member, perhaps all this talk about assisted living is attended with feelings of guilt. You wish you could open your own home to a beloved senior, but other commitments and constraints prevent you. Perhaps you are now the caregiver, and feel apprehensive about turning that role over to someone else, even though your selflessness is taking its toll on your own health and well being.

A Candid Word to the Spouse or Adult Child

Perhaps all this talk about assisted living communities is attended with feelings of guilt in you as the spouse or adult child of a senior in need. You wish you could open your own home to a beloved senior, but other commitments and constraints prevent you. Perhaps you are now the caregiver, and feel apprehensive about turning that role over to someone else, even though your selflessness is taking its toll on your own health and well being.

Please know we are here not to replace you, but to walk beside you and your spouse or parent—all in the hope of being an additional loving presence in all of your lives. And if you allow MorningStar to assume the full-time role of Care Manager, the two of you are free to reestablish a more balanced relationship. Finally relax. Share a laugh. Enjoy each other.

Many of us on the MorningStar team have walked this same road with our own aging moms and dads. We too have marked the passage of time, and seen the need for a lifestyle adjustment. We too have sought advice from others, and wended our way through plenty of heart-to-heart talks. We have helped to redistribute possessions piled high after years of accumulation, to sell the family home of half a century, and to make the tender decisions.

Yes, we’ve been there ourselves. Which is partly why we’re so inspired to serve you with excellence and empathy. For more evidence that we understand, ask for our Conversation Guide.

This is the only place to be. I don’t want for a thing. (102-year-old resident)

MorningStar communities are private pay.