Rose Gattari, of Warren, Mich., could be the poster child for successful aging. “I want to say that I’m very blessed, I feel lucky,” she says. “I thank God every day for giving me the capacity to do the things I love to do.”
In a few weeks, we’ll be celebrating Rose’s 82nd birthday. Ask her how old she feels and she’ll tell you – not anywhere close to her age.
That’s the key, researchers say. All the rest of it is important; exercising, eating right, staying active, engaging socially, and not having a chronic disease or illness. Rose does all of that. But the key to her success is feeling younger than her chronological age. And believing it.
“81,” Rose says. “It’s just a number. When people ask my age, I make them guess. Many say 65. I laugh, but honestly, that’s how I feel.”
On Friday, Dr. Peter Lichtenberg of Wayne State University’s Institute of Gerontology, spoke at the Active Aging Summit in St. Clair Shores. He shared some common theories on what separates the successful from the unsuccessful when it comes to growing old.
He spoke about findings like SOC: Selectivity, Optimization with Compensation; MOVA: meaningful, organization, visualization, association; and Automatic versus Effortful Processing.
As I scribbled notes, trying to translate the scientific concepts into simple ideas that I could write about, I realized all I had to do was consider a day in the life of Rose Gattari.
She walks between two and five miles a day on her treadmill, depending on the season. In the summer, she keeps it two miles, leaving time and energy for the outdoors. Rose keeps her late husband’s garden going, but scaled it back to be manageable. She cuts the front lawn, but not the back.
In the winter, she takes out the snow blower and clears her own driveway – but only when the accumulation is under four inches.
This is what Dr. Lichtenberg means by Selectivity, Optimization with Compensation. Successful agers select what they’re good at and focus on it. No multi-tasking here. They optimize the activity by compensating for the changes in their ability. In other words, they cut back. They don’t quit.
Rose kept Papa Remo’s huge garden for several years after he died. Even though she could rely on her children to help maintain it, she knew in her heart that it was too much. This year she made the decision to sod over most of it. She went from 26 tomato plants to 12 and planted a fraction of the lettuce, swiss chard and cucumbers.
Rose is also a member of the Warren Symphony’s board of directors, responsible for filling the concert programs with advertising. She runs two committees of WARE: Warren Association of Retired Employees. And she jumps at the chance to babysit any of her young grandchildren.
She gets it all done through a combination of loving the activity and staying focused and organized. Everything has a place in Rose’s home. When she walks through the door, she hangs her keys on their hook. As she’s planning to leave for a meeting, she places everything that goes with her near the door.
She has amassed a personal library of articles, notes and memorabilia from a lifetime of community work and church volunteerism – with every piece of paper filed and easily retrieved. She’s done the same with photos and keepsakes from school years and athletic accomplishments of her six children and eight grandchildren.
This is what Dr. Lichtenberg means by MOVA: Meaningful, organized, visualization and association.
For Rose, many of these practices come naturally. It’s just the way she does things. For the rest of us, who have to work at being organized and staying focused – there’s still time.
“The brain doesn’t work as fast as you grow older,” Dr. Lichtenberg said. “The amount of information we can process decreases. And it’s harder to inhibit distractions.
“But the brain has plasticity, and we can improve and maintain memory skills through discipline, exercise and training. It’s never too late.”
-- Anne Marie Gattari, am.gattari@brightstarcare.com , 586.279.3610, BrightStar of Grosse Pointe / Macomb
No comments:
Post a Comment