by Patricia Schallert

There are many seniors among us who have lived and continue to live lives that can be considered “successful” stories…. Let’s meet Amursana Khiyod and see how he sees it.

Amur is a 68 years young retired man, born and raised in Taiwan where he grew up with his parents and three older sisters. His parents and grandparents are Mongolian and have settled in Thousand Oaks, California after leaving Taiwan in 1981.

Amur reflected on his retirement. As an educated engineer, he knew when it was time to retire. His work was intense and he was instrumental in setting up the 911 system that all of us use in emergencies. As his company was reorganizing and implementing new and faster systems, Amur felt it was time for the younger generation of engineers to take the reins. Upon the advice of his financial planner, he was happy to let go of the day to day work, that was actually 7am to 10pm almost every day, and finally, after years, retire.

So, Amur has been retired since August 2017 and is now able to practice, he says “NIKSEN” which is a life style of purposely “doing nothing”. He believes it is great for those who are “burned out from their work”. There is less stress but one has to be financially okay to be able to practice “NIKSEN”.

Like many people, Amur wasn’t sure what to expect when his wife retired and they decided to move to California from Chicago. He figured he could still work remotely and believed that “happy wife, means happy life”. So off they went and discovered the peace and quiet of Ventura life.

Originally Amur thought he would be working till he dropped. He developed a good financial plan, which changed that for him. His new mantra was “You don’t plan to fail… you fail if you don’t plan”…This thinking was very helpful , so he made the leap to retired and is grateful to be now living in a good place that offers friendly neighbors and cultural opportunities along with great weather.

Amur keeps himself busy and has enjoyed cooking with his wife, taking care of his dog and focusing on the recovery from “work burn out”. He believes in self care, reading books when he gets to them and he studies the Mongolian language. There is always something to do besides dead lines and work projects which were difficult to let go of in the beginning of his retirement.

Like many retirees, Amur had life changing turning points that affected him as he grew up in Taiwan. School wasn’t easy but logic was and so engineering became a focus.

He values principles and does not judge others. His father told him when he was a young boy of 12 “that if he is an honest man, he will always be provided for and to never avoid his responsibilities”.

Amur said that stuck with him and he continues to take responsibilities for his work, and own his mistakes and his values, gifts he learned from his father.

Amur enjoys riding his bike, walking his dog and has learned his own self care. He believes he is happy because he is healthy, independent and believes in staying positive. His mantra is “My very existence is being sustained. I surrender myself to the flow of nature. Yielding to Divine Will. Letting be all that is around me”

Editor: If you are a senior or know of one who would like to share their retirement or job with us let us know at [email protected].

As people age, they often find themselves spending more time alone. Being alone may leave older adults more vulnerable to loneliness and social isolation, which can affect their health and well-being. Studies show that loneliness and social isolation are associated with higher risks for health problems such as heart disease, depression, and cognitive decline.

If you are in poor health, you may be more likely to be socially isolated or lonely. If you are socially isolated or feeling lonely, it can put your physical and mental health at risk. Adults who are lonely or socially isolated are less healthy, have longer hospital stays, are readmitted to the hospital more often, and are more likely to die earlier than those with meaningful and supportive social connections.

The number of older adults age 65 and older is growing, and many are socially isolated and regularly feel lonely. The coronavirus outbreak in 2020 brought even more challenges due to health considerations and the need to practice physical distancing.

Loneliness and social isolation are different, but related. Loneliness is the distressing feeling of being alone or separated. Social isolation is the lack of social contacts and having few people to interact with regularly. You can live alone and not feel lonely or socially isolated, and you can feel lonely while being with other people.

Older adults are at higher risk for social isolation and loneliness due to changes in health and social connections that can come with growing older, hearing, vision, and memory loss, disability, trouble getting around, and/or the loss of family and friends.

People who are socially isolated or lonely are more likely to be admitted to the emergency room or to a nursing home. Social isolation and loneliness also are associated with higher risks for:

People who are lonely or socially isolated may get too little exercise, drink too much alcohol, smoke, and often don’t sleep well, which can further increase the risk of serious health conditions.

People who are lonely experience emotional pain. Losing a sense of connection and community can change the way a person sees the world. Someone experiencing chronic loneliness may feel threatened and mistrustful of others.

Emotional pain can activate the same stress responses in the body as physical pain. When this goes on for a long time, it can lead to chronic inflammation (overactive or prolonged release of factors that can damage tissues) and reduced immunity (ability to fight off disease). This raises your risk of chronic diseases and can leave a person more vulnerable to some infectious diseases.

Social isolation and loneliness may also be bad for brain health. Loneliness and social isolation have been linked to poorer cognitive function and higher risk for dementia, including and especially for Alzheimer’s disease. Also, little social activity and being alone most of the time may contribute to a decline in the ability to perform everyday tasks such as driving, paying bills, taking medicine, and cooking.

The Eldercare Locator connects the public to services for older adults and their families. This resource seeks to provide assistance for a wide range of issues affecting older Americans, including social isolation and loneliness.

Call the Eldercare Locator at 800-677-1116 or visit https://eldercare.acl.gov/ to get connected today.

For additional resources on older adults and social isolation and loneliness visit, Expand Your Circles: Prevent Isolation and Loneliness As You Age (PDF, 4.75M).

Decline in sense of smell is connected to faster buildup of Alzheimer’s disease-related pathology seen in brain scans, according to new research focused on older adults who live outside of nursing homes. The findings provide additional evidence that loss of smell (known as anosmia) is a key early sign of Alzheimer’s-related cognitive impairment and the accumulation of associated harmful proteins, such as amyloid-beta and tau. The research, led by NIA scientists, was published in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease.

Decline in sense of smell had previously been confirmed as an early warning sign for Alzheimer’s in both human and animal studies, but its connection to the uptick of dementia-related brain imaging biomarkers over time had not been as closely studied in larger populations of older adults. For this study, the team tracked 364 participants from the Baltimore Longitudinal Study of Aging (BLSA) over an average period of about 2.5 years. The NIA-led BLSA is the longest running study of healthy aging in America.

The participants were initially cognitively normal and given baseline cognitive and odor identification tests and PET scans, a type of brain imaging that can detect amyloid-beta and tau deposits associated with Alzheimer’s and related dementias. Over the study period, 17 participants, or 5% of the total tracked, were diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment (MCI), of which 11 cases were associated with Alzheimer’s, three with vascular dementia, and one with frontotemporal dementia. Two were unspecified based on clinical characteristics.

The research team found that each point of lower odor identification test performance was associated with a 22% higher chance of developing MCI. This relation remained similar even after the investigators adjusted for age, sex, race, education, olfactory test version, apolipoprotein E gene (APOE ε4) carrier status, smoking, elevated depressive symptoms, and vascular disease. The PET brain scans of this subset of participants showed that lower olfactory scores were associated with higher levels of Alzheimer’s pathology in the brain, particularly in regions associated with the sense of smell, including parts of the orbital frontal cortex, and regions important to memory and learning, such as the temporal lobe. Further, participants with greater olfactory decline over time had higher levels of amyloid and tau in some regions related to both smell and memory function.

These results indicate that loss of olfactory function is closely tied to both the level and progression of neuropathological damage seen in Alzheimer’s. The study provides new evidence that may explain why poorer sense of smell is an early warning sign for Alzheimer’s-related MCI. The researchers hope to follow up on this work to look deeper into whether olfaction can predict other types of dementia-related neurodegenerative changes.

This research was supported by the Intramural Research Program grant Z01-AG000015-57 and NIA grant P30AG066507.

These activities relate to NIA’s AD+ADRD Research Implementation Milestone 9.M, “Develop diagnostics/biomarkers in asymptomatic individuals.”