I was often told growing up that people come into our lives for a reason, a season, or a lifetime. When a member of the book club I used to attend mentioned that her mother had recently transitioned from independent living to assisted living and could use visitors to cheer her up, I planned the visit to be a one-time occurrence. I was still dealing with trauma from my time working in senior living and losing some of the elders I had grown close to. I don’t remember much about the visit. I do remember introducing myself to my new friend, explaining that I was an acquaintance of her daughter through church, and that I wanted to come by to see how she was doing since she had recently moved apartments. I ended up enjoying that visit so much that the visits continued regularly.
Going to the assisted living for the first time was difficult for me. I remember seeing the medicine cart being pushed down the hallway, and it brought back memories that I would rather forget. On the first couple of visits, walking up to the door, I could feel my heart rate increase, and I had to practice taking deep breaths. I thought that anxiety spikes would be a regular occurrence. eventually they ceased. I started looking forward to the visits. We would bring snacks or drinks to share with her. I’m grateful that the experience and friendship with M, as I’m going to start referring to her, helped me view going to a senior living community in a less traumatic, more positive light. The staff was always friendly and welcoming when I visited, and I would make small talk, asking how their day was going and whether they were looking forward to the upcoming holiday.
Something I had to make peace with when I decided to continue visiting M and to invest more emotionally was that I was most likely not going to have her in my life as a friend as long as I would like. The amount of time we have with anyone in our life is never guaranteed, but when you meet someone who is in their late eighties, it’s an educated guess that you’re not going to have decades of friendship. I have often had a hard time letting go. Part of that difficulty is that there often isn’t a clear timeline for when someone or something will end. When someone passes, or something ends, there might be a warning, but sometimes there isn’t. The lack of warning has been the source of much anxiety over the years. I still carry some residual anxieties about my difficulty letting go, but one of the many gifts of this friendship was that it forced me to let go of those anxieties if I was going to be a good friend to M. In the end, I was very lucky and had years with her and many visits.
While I started out going to just visit her, I ended up meeting other friends. One day, I went to visit her and, sitting at her table, was a resident from my first job out of college. I exclaimed the name of this long-lost friend with joy and gave her a big hug. She was happy to see me and stated that I looked familiar. We now visit her as well when we visit. We’ve spent some time getting to know other residents, and I’ve become more familiar with the community’s layout. It feels a bit like an apartment complex. I’ve taken different significant others. My boyfriend and I take his son to visit some of the seniors when we go to the playground nearby. My own mother took my siblings and me to visit the elders at a senior living facility.
It was there that I learned about dementia and that sometimes people will wander, not understanding where they are in their lives. A gentleman who we visited with often had one day left the facility and then been found on the side of a road, saying he was looking for his car. He hadn’t owned a car in years. As a child, I kept thinking how scary it must have been to be walking along a road, looking for a car that didn’t exist. The sound of cars whizzing by must have been terrifying. We met a lady who had lost a leg in a sledding accident when the sled she was riding with a friend was hit by a car. By the time she got medical attention, one of her legs had to be amputated. She went on to compete in horse races and horseback riding competitions, and to become a horseback riding instructor. I found it fascinating that she had a wooden leg by her bed that she had used throughout her life. Even after we stopped visiting as a family, I went back to that assisted living to volunteer as a teenager.
One of the jobs I was given was serving coffee after lunch. I found it odd that people enjoyed drinking coffee in the middle of the day and with their lunch. My mom had always drunk coffee in the morning with breakfast or at different events with dessert. She explained to me that it was a generational difference: people often had a cup of coffee to socialize, and it was drunk at any time of day. Each person had a very strong preference for regular or decaf. Spending time around seniors always felt calmer and made more sense to me than spending time with my peers. Whether it was watching soap operas, discussing their prior hobbies, or talking about our own families, when I could only talk about my siblings, the rules I knew I had to follow were knock on their door, if allowed to visit, not be too loud, leave when asked, and not ask too many questions. Sitting quietly was acceptable. The complex rules that came with middle school and high school students seemed to melt away when I stepped through the door. I told myself I was visiting because they were lonely, but I was the lonely one.
We visited her apartment, where we discussed the life she led before moving to the state where I live. She told stories about meeting her husband, raising a family, and the different jobs she had. I’ve often felt a lot of shame because I’ve investigated different careers and jobs before settling on the career path I’m currently pursuing. Hearing about how my new friend had started out as a nurse, been a school secretary, and eventually done activities/ recreation work when she and her husband had retired helped me see that having different jobs and careers over a lifetime is normal and nothing to be ashamed of. She told me stories about her great-grandchildren and the friends she was making. She would gossip to me about the hairdresser who had cut her hair too short and how she didn’t want it to be cut that short again. I can share that complaint, but it’s never the hairdresser’s fault. I always think I want my hair shorter than I do. It’s only when I can’t pull all the hair back into a ponytail and have to use two hairbands to do it before going to the gym that I realize I cut it too short. It was a wonderful reminder that we all have much more in common than we think. Life goes on even as we get older.
When I got the text from her family member that she had passed, I was sad, and I still am. More than sadness, I feel very grateful. I got more time with M than I thought I would, and I enjoyed so many wonderful visits with her. I’ll remember her for a good sense of humor, warm laugh, and welcoming personality. I still plan to visit the other friends I made at that senior living community. I look forward to those visits and hope that my friend is at peace wherever she is.
Living on the Spectrum 
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