With towering gums and the scenic Back Creek reserve attracting bird life, Jenny loves sitting on her balcony and looking out into the tree tops.
She’s only recently moved and especially loves the architecture of her brand new home, which is a second-floor apartment. As she enjoys her leafy views, it’s allowed her to reflect on the question all people face as they grow older: How am I going to be looked after?
“You’ve got to be realistic,” she says, which is why when she downsized she moved to Morgan Glen Iris.
Developed by BASScare, a not-for-profit organisation with over six decades’ experience with seniors’ living, Morgan Glen Iris offers residents a premium, assisted-living retirement community.
This means it provides a little more than a standard retirement village but is not residential aged care. Residents are supported to maintain their independence through a tiered range of tailored services, matched to individual needs, which can be adjusted over time.
For Jenny, aside from the aesthetic appeal of the site, she loved that “at this place you can get increasing levels of support”.
“It’s nice to know that if I want to decrease the amount of cooking I do for myself and increase the assistance I can move to that,” she says. At Morgan there is a restaurant on site which can provide meals to residents, who also have the option of cooking in their private, contemporary apartment kitchens.
“I have my apartment cleaned once a week, which is lovely,” Jenny says of the services she is currently enjoying. Although she still drives, Jenny says she knows that “one of the big wrenches will come” when she must relinquish her license, but she knows that blow will be softened by living at Morgan.
“You can ask if you can be driven to an eye appointment or any medical appointment and back,” she explains, adding that there are also plenty of social opportunities provided as well. ‘‘You can go on an excursion in the bus.