Staying socially connected: 3 seniors on staying healthy with meaningful work

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Meet three seniors who show what it means to care of your health, contribute through meaningful work and connect with others to ward off loneliness. It’s at the heart of Singapore’s new action plan for successful ageing.

 

SINGAPORE - Every Friday morning, Ms Mary Chow heads to an HDB estate in the western part of Singapore to lead a group of elderly people in doing stretching exercises, dancing the cha-cha or singing.

 

“We just while away our time being happy. It’s not like your steps must be correct… We laugh and we have fun,” said the self-professed entertainer of the weekly exercise sessions that she started about a decade ago. “I talk to them, sometimes in Teochew, sometimes in Cantonese, sometimes in Malay. It’s spontaneous.”

 

The participants – they are in their late 60s to early 90s and some live alone – include people she had met through her volunteer work as a community befriender at her church. Now that her church has set up an eldercare corner at the void deck of a block in the same area, her group has expanded, with some new participants joining them after chancing upon the session.

 

Ms Chow is a sprightly senior who turns 84 in March. She still works one day a week as a pre-school teacher and has been a befriender for 23 years now.

 

“I give but I gain… I want to bring these old people out – I don’t want to see them ageing at home, doing nothing,” said Ms Chow.

 

Health Minister Ong Ye Kung recently called ageing “the most significant social development in Singapore”, and the Government is taking steps to ensure that the rising tide of elderly people can remain healthy as they age, stay connected with the community, and do not suffer from loneliness. Those like Ms Chow are carrying out their own initiatives to ensure that the elderly can lead fulfilling lives.

 

She holds the sessions after sending her 89-year-old husband, who was diagnosed with dementia six years ago, to one of his twice-weekly daycare centre sessions. Otherwise, the meet-ups may be disrupted, if she takes him along and he decides that he wants to leave early.

 

Ms Chow is his main caregiver. Her son and daughter are working parents.

 

“There are good days and bad days, and there are fun days,” she said. “I can joke, I bring my friends home and we have tea, and I take him to lunch with my friends, and he enjoys that.”

 

But when he’s feeling low, he sometimes says that he wants to see his long-departed father and mother in Indonesia, where he came from, said Ms Chow.

 

As her husband’s dementia gradually progresses, Ms Chow has made plans to downsize from their rented house to a community care apartment, an assisted living public housing option for seniors.

 

She will be among the first to move into these 344 sq ft flats in Bukit Batok that come with grab bars, a built-in wardrobe and other fittings, when they are ready – possibly in about two years’ time.

 

But it is the services, more than anything else, that drew her to the flats. They include 24-hour emergency response assistance and activities at the communal spaces on every floor.

 

“It’s to have a 24/7 presence of somebody who can help me in case something happens to my husband,” said Ms Chow.

 

Furthermore, she and her husband can just step out to join in the activities held on the same level as their flat. This means that she would not have to hail a cab to take him to the daycare centre and back.

 

Ms Chow is looking forward to the change. “As I get older, it’s good to let go of all my baggage, and live simply,” she said. “I will be helping out there if I can, cooking, dancing and exercising.”

 

These are her favourite activities, which she has continued to do all these years.

 

“When you want to catch Mary, you have to walk very fast,” said Ms Chow. “I only felt it (the perils of getting old) after I had a fall last October… and recently, I did something stupid. I climbed up the escalator stairs, and felt some lower backache, and had to skip one exercise session.”

 

But she is not going to let that affect her. “My heart is young. I always feel young,” she said.

 

Senior cuts medication dosage after staying active

 

He did not bother about eating healthy or working out. And despite being diagnosed with diabetes, hypertension and high cholesterol as far back as 2009, Mr Abdul Rahman Kadir, now 66, did not keep to his medication regime in the past. 

 

“When my medication was finished, I did not go to the polyclinic to top it up because the queues were very long,” said Mr Kadir, who added that he also had a sweet tooth. 

 

Then one day in 2018, his lifestyle choices caught up with him. He fainted and was admitted to hospital. It was then that he discovered that he had kidney failure and was required to go for dialysis three times a week. 

 

The doctor told Mr Kadir to get more active, as his health was worsening. Determined to take better care of himself, he started attending exercise programmes at the active ageing centre run by Care Corner near his one-room rental flat in Woodlands.  

 

Mr Kadir initially found the programmes – which included exercises like leg raises and standing on one leg – too intense, as he had never worked out before. But he persevered, and his resolve bore fruit after a few months. 

 

“My health is better and I feel my legs are stronger. Last time, I had to rely on a wheelchair to move around, but now I can move around with just a walking stick. If I didn’t exercise and just sat on my wheelchair, my legs would have been even weaker,” said Mr Kadir. 

 

He started attending the classes five times a week, and began avoiding oily food and excessive salt when he cooked. During a routine follow-up consultation with his doctor last April, he was told that his health had improved to the extent that he could reduce the dosage for his diabetes, hypertension and high cholesterol medication. 

 

“The medication I took would give me side effects like giddiness. But with a lower dosage, I don’t feel anything (wrong) now,” he said. The exercise classes at the active ageing centre that he once struggled with are now the highlight of his day. 

 

The centres are key nodes in the community for the elderly to connect, attend active ageing programmes and get care referral services. As part of a renewed push to help seniors age gracefully under the 2023 action plan for successful ageing, Singapore is set to almost double the number of such centres to 220 from the current 119 by 2025. 

 

Mr Kadir says that his regular visits to the active ageing centre have also improved his emotional and mental health. The divorcee, who lives alone, said he used to keep to himself in the past and spend his days watching television and reading newspapers at home.  

 

“When I was alone, I would think about sad things of the past, like my financial problems and family quarrels,” he said.

 

But he started to make friends at the exercise classes and his mood lifted. He no longer dwells on the dark days gone by.   

 

“The centre changed my life. If not for it, I’d just be staying all day at home. I didn’t know how to approach people when I first moved here, but at the centre, I can now make friends easily.”

 

And he feels far fitter, too.

 

Finding purpose in meaningful work

 

When Mr Alfred Chia left his job caring for intellectually challenged adults at the Christian Outreach to the Handicapped in 2014, it was because it had become too physically taxing. The former police officer, who had then spent about 14 years in the social service sector after a mid-career switch, felt he was getting on in years.

 

Mr Chia was part of a team running programmes at the daycare centre for people with conditions such as autism, Down Syndrome and cerebral palsy, or those with multiple disabilities. The physical demands of the job were getting too intense for the then 60-year-old, who had to help clients brush their teeth, shower, and use the toilet. 

 

“Some of them would soil themselves in the minibus on their way in, and we’d have to help to sanitise the vehicle as well. Some of them would have fits because of epilepsy, so we’d also have to calm them down,” said Mr Chia.

 

“I left because some clients were young adults who were very strong, and as I aged, I had limited strength (to handle challenging behaviours),” he added.  

 

But a few months after leaving the job, Mr Chia found himself caring for another disadvantaged group – this time, as a volunteer at a dementia daycare centre run by eldercare non-profit Yong-en Care Centre. A friend had introduced him to the organisation on account of his caregiving skills. Mr Chia found that the role suited him more.

 

“The clients here are very different”, said Mr Chia. “For those with mild dementia, I just lend a listening ear when they talk about their lives. For those who have moderate to severe dementia, their mood can change quickly and they sometimes get angry. They may scold me, but it’s okay – I just have to get used to it.”

 

Mr Chia started working with the organisation on an ad-hoc basis to cover staff who were on leave. He became a part-time employee in 2017, covering about two eight-hour shifts a week. As part of his job, he now conducts activities such as group exercise classes and arts and crafts sessions. 

 

“I’m healthy and still able to contribute, so why not work? I get to hear from the older residents and sometimes they also advise me about my diet. The work is also meaningful and has purpose,” said Mr Chia, who added that the flexibility of the part-time work means he gets to spend time with his family and friends as well. 

 

In hiring Mr Chia, the company also tapped the part-time re-employment grant which encourages employers to offer part-time re-employment to seniors. 

 

Under this grant, which was introduced in 2020, employers can get funding support of up to $125,000, or $2,500 for each eligible resident senior worker, when they commit to re-employing older people part-time. The initiative is being extended from 2023 to 2025 with revised criteria. 

 

Mr Nicholas Lai, executive director of Yong-en Care Centre, said nine out of its 32 staff are above the age of 60. Many of them are hired for dementia-related caregiving roles.

 

“We didn’t deliberately look for senior aged employees. It just happened that quite a number of the suitable candidates are seniors,” Mr Lai said. “They do bring certain traits that are very obvious – they find meaning in what they do, and they understand why they are doing it.”

 

 

Source: The Straits Times © Singapore Press Holdings Limited. Reproduced with permission.

 

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