By Mary Jane Happy
THE ERICKSON TRIBUNE

The face of the traditional family home is undergoing an extreme makeover. Today’s generation of parents 65 and older lead more active, healthier, and socially engaged lifestyles than ever before.

Dwindling are the traditional images of large empty homes with grandma in the kitchen baking pies and grandpa painting the white picket fence. More and more parents are trading in the family house for a home where painting and mowing the lawn are someone else’s chores. They’re choosing instead to spend their time as volunteers, students, educators, coaches, athletes, and members of a community with endless possibilities.

Although the exterior makeover may look different, the transition doesn’t have to be extreme.

Re-defining retirement
Higher levels of education are linked to improved health, increased income, and a better standard of living in retirement that will continue to increase among people 65 and older according to a report commissioned by the National Institute on Aging and released by the U.S. Census Bureau last year.

As lifestyle and health resources continue to grow, improving and extending the lives of our parents, so does the mutual desire of retired seniors and their children to relocate the family home to communities that provide opportunities for parents — and peace of mind for their kids.

Kelly Trudell, 39 and her three older sisters are all raising children of their own while working full-time jobs. They share the responsibility and concern for their parents’ well-being and happiness.

“My parents had been living in a condominium a half hour drive from all of us girls,” says Trudell. “It was getting more difficult to get out there on a regular basis.”

When her father was 76 and her mother 69, Trudell’s mother had surgery that required additional care when she returned to her house. The family decided it was time for a change.