When it comes to senior health at assisted living facilities, the road to vitality often begins long before the first stretch, balance exercise or lap around the building.
For Vi Dao Schultz, senior director of fitness at Country Meadows of Wyomissing, physical well-being has never been limited to traditional exercises. After 19 years working in senior fitness, including 11 years at Country Meadows, she has learned that improved mobility at assisted living facilities often begins by getting to know the person.
“The number one reason why I love it so much is the residents,” Vi says. “They light up my day, and I try to light up theirs, too.”
Vi helps oversee fitness programming across all nine Country Meadows campuses and their sister not-for-profit community in Harrisburg, Ecumenical Retirement Community, working with a team of experienced fitness directors to develop classes and programs for residents with widely different abilities, interests and goals.
Her challenge is simple, but also complicated: how do you make movement something people actually want to do at assisted living facilities?
Maybe “going to the gym” wasn’t part of growing up
Vi knows not every Country Meadows resident arrives with a history of fitness classes or gym memberships. For this generation, exercise was often simply part of everyday life. They worked on farms. They walked places. They raised children, worked physically demanding jobs and stayed active without ever calling it a workout.
So walking into a fitness center filled with equipment or joining a group exercise class for the first time, can feel unfamiliar or even intimidating. “We educate our residents on the importance of staying active here at Country Meadows or assisted living facilities,” Vi explains.
But education alone isn’t always enough. Vi has found people are much more likely to participate when fitness connects with something they already care about: music, friends, independence, getting outside or simply having fun.
So, she makes fun part of the plan. That can mean dancing and music during a class. It can mean walking groups, trips to local parks, outdoor exercise followed by a picnic or even goat yoga and puppy yoga. Around holidays, residents have come to expect costumes, scavenger hunts and themed activities.
“If I don’t come in with a costume on holidays, they are very disappointed,” Vi says. “And I am not afraid to make a fool of myself if that gets them to smile. If it gets them to come to fitness.”
Start with what matters to residents of assisted living facilities
Vi doesn’t approach fitness as a one-size-fits-all prescription. She and the fitness team talk with residents, learn their goals and work closely with other members of the Country Meadows team.
If nursing staff members know that someone has experienced falls, for example, Vi may encourage that resident to try a balance class. Someone else may want greater strength or endurance. Mind-body classes incorporate another dimension of wellness, while specialized programming supports people at assisted living facilities living with conditions such as Parkinson’s.
Even the schedule is intentional. Programs are offered throughout different levels of care, with various times and approaches. Vi’s goal is to give every resident an entry point that feels right for them.
“There is a fitness program for everyone,” Vi says. “It’s never too late to start. It just takes that first step.”
Sometimes the motivation isn’t fitness at all. Some residents come because they know exercise is important. Others come because their friends will be there. They talk before class, work alongside one another and stay afterward to catch up.
Vi believes these relationships with directors, caregivers and other residents matter, because the social part make fitness time more fun.
When small steps become big ones
Instructors monitor the residents carefully, provide modifications and recognize the small improvements that residents themselves may not notice.
A leg lifts a little higher. Balance improves. Flexibility increases. Those moments are celebrated.
But every so often, those incremental changes lead to a moment no one forgets. Vi remembers one participant in her Parkinson’s program who initially relied on a walker.
He kept coming. Eventually, the walker became a cane. Then one day, he walked into class without either.
He simply strolled in, ready for class. And Vi couldn’t have been happier.
Are you ready to embrace senior fitness?
Many of our residents at Country Meadows Retirement Communities come to us after months, even years of inactivity caused by declining health. Our fitness directors work with medical teams and caregivers to find mobility activities for almost any to start the conversation of how we may be able to help you or your loved one.