Your tolerance and temperament to step outside your comfort zone decreases as you age. You’re generally more flexible and adaptable when younger than in old age. Considering this, we can’t expect the elderly to adjust to a senior living facility easily.
No matter how well it’s maintained or how great the people there are, a senior living facility is still a place that’s not home for seniors where they can feel safe and comfortable right away. Having to live in an unfamiliar place, away from their loved ones, and out of their comfort zone is bound to make them feel sad and depressed, and if you don’t do anything about it, their mental health will only go further downhill.
You’ve got to ensure the sound mental health of seniors living at your facility. Read this blog post to know how you can do that.
Encourage Them to Read and Learn New Things
One way to ensure sound mental health in seniors is by encouraging them to read and learn new things, like a new language. Reading reduces stress, improves memory function, and help seniors sleep better. Learning a new language also has a profound positive effect on mental health. It activates the regions of the brain that have been affected by aging. It also improves socialization skills, especially with those who are familiar with the language they’re learning.
Encourage Them to Exercise Regularly
Exercise is as beneficial for mental health as it is for physical health. Exercising signals the brain to release endorphins, more commonly known as feel-good hormones. People feel more active, fresh, and happier when they exercise. They feel good about themselves. This has a direct positive impact on mental health. Not only does exercise make seniors feel good, but it also reduces the risk of depression in seniors.
Teach Them How to Use Social Media Platforms
If the seniors living at a senior living facility can interact with their loved ones regularly, they won’t feel lonely or depressed. You can teach the senior residents how to use social media platforms like Facebook and FaceTime so that they can talk to their family and friends whenever they miss this. This would keep them from feeling sad and depressed.
Engage Them in Fun Activities
If seniors living at senior living facilities are made to sit idle all day long, their mental health will deteriorate. They’ll feel like they’re alone and have got nothing to look forward to in life. You can ensure sound mental health in seniors living in senior living communities by engaging them in fun activities like painting, knitting, and other arts and crafts activities. You can also host small competitions every now and then so that seniors don’t have the time to feel sad and lonely.
Keep Pets
Spending time with pets is the best thing one can do when they’ve got nothing to do. Looking after a pet can give you a purpose that you thought you were missing in life. You can consider keeping cats or dogs at your facility with whom the senior residents of your facility can spend some time during the day.
Ensuring sound mental health in seniors might sound easy, but it’s not so in reality. Seniors are not as flexible and adaptable as youngsters, and engaging them in new things will require constant effort.
If you’re looking for a senior care facility where sound mental health is given topmost priority, you should consider visiting Inspirit Senior Living once. You can see for yourself how genuinely happy our residents look.
