Harvest Guest Home Receives Kitty Rhoades Music & Memory Grant

Harvest Guest Home has been selected as one of 15 assisted living communities, in the United States and Canada, to receive the 2016 Kitty Rhoades Music & Memory Grant. 

MUSIC & MEMORY℠, a non-profit organization based in Mineola, New York, brings personalized music into the lives of the elderly, or infirm, through digital music technology, vastly improving quality of life. Through the grant elder care professionals, and family caregivers at Harvest Guest Home, will receive training in how to create and provide personalized playlists using iPods and related digital audio systems that enable those struggling with Alzheimer’s, dementia, and other cognitive and physical challenges to reconnect with the world through music-triggered memories.

By providing access and education, and by creating a network of MUSIC & MEMORY℠ Certified organizations, the organization aims to make this form of personalized therapeutic music a standard of care throughout the health care industry in the United States and Canada.

In 2013, Wisconsin’s Department of Health Services launched the Wisconsin Music & Memory Initiative, enabling 100 nursing homes throughout the state to become MUSIC & MEMORY℠ Certified Care Organizations and bring personalized playlists to their residents. In fall 2014, an additional 150 organizations received certification training. Other states are following in Wisconsin’s footsteps, significantly broadening the impact of our program. The Music & Memory organization is also broadening its approach to serve individuals in hospice care, adult day care, assisted living, hospital and home health care. 

Please click on the video to learn more.

Qualities of Successful and Unsuccessful Aging

Excerpted from: “What are you doing with the rest of your life?”
By Paula Payne Hardin, Ed.D., MPS; Research base: Dissertation study; a large sample (N-567) national survey (Market Facts, Chicago); and other sources.

PEOPLE WHO ARE MATURING POSITIVELY HAVE THESE ATTRIBUTES:

1. They have evolved a generous view of others and of the world, which includes maintaining a forgiving stance towards faults and inadequacies in themselves and others.

2. They have a giving attitude toward themselves and others. They give more financially than do most people.

3. They form a caring and positive relationship with nature. They are concerned about the quality of the environment that will be passed on to the future generations.

4. They are reflective and seek self-understanding.

5. They have had a pivotal event(s) that led to transition or rebirth experiences. Everyone has such events, but generative people use them positively while non-generative people withdraw and blame others for their misfortunes.

6. They simplify their lives. Generative people take time to gain the insights needed to clear away clutter and confusion. They learn to set limits.

7. They have the courage to change both themselves and conditions around them.

8. They describe themselves as spiritual. They trust God or some Higher Power, and they trust the life process.

9. They are sought out by others for counsel, wisdom, perspective, and creative insight.

10. They are committed to continued learning. Generative people often spend considerable time learning on their own or attend a variety of workshops or classes.

11. They are clearly engaged in caring behaviors toward themselves and others.

12. They evolve healthy eating and exercise patterns.

13. Laughter and tears come easily and spontaneously.

14. They are hopeful people. They take their dreams seriously, and their lives demonstrate that some dreams do come true.

THOSE CAUGHT IN SELF-ABSORPTION AND STAGNATION WILL INCREASINGLY MANIFEST SUCH PERSONALITY AND CHARACTERISTICS AS:

1. A tendency to blame others for problems, and feelings of isolation.

2. A tendency to alienate other people. Those aging unsuccessfully are difficult to be with for more than a brief time.

3. Moodiness, irritability, thoughtlessness, low vitality, chronic anger, despair, meanness of spirit.

4. Clinging to rigid opinions, unable to set them aside long enough to listen to another’s views or experiences. They don’t allow certain people or topics to be mentioned and those around them are careful not to share delicate or intimate subjects.

5. An inability to enjoy and adapt to the changing world.

6. A need to hang on to money.

7. An increasing obsession with life’s inequities and their own wounds.

8. A noticeable lack of intimate friends of any age.

9. A high use of alcohol, tranquilizers, or other forms of escape, such as TV, frenetic activities, etc.

10. The inability to be a “wise elder,” who has something of lasting value to give to others.

11. A tendency to create guilty feelings in others.

12. An excessive focus on themselves, especially on their health problems and body functions.

13. Fears of the future.

On the Radio: Harvest Guest Home Celebrates 20+ Years of Service

In 1995, when Joe Flores bought Harvest Guest Home, little did he realize that two decades later he would be celebrating the vocation of his life.

Below, listen to Harvest Guest Home's exclusive 20th Anniversary Broadcasts series, hosted on WRCO-FM, where Joe Flores looks back on the past 20 years, and how a dedicated care staff helped and continues  to make the daily lives of each Harvest Guest Home resident the best possible experience.

Joe chats with special guests Julie Burnham, an advocate for the annual Alzheimer's Walk benefiting the Alzheimer's and Dementia Alliance of Wisconsin, and Mike Marshall, whose father spent many happy days at Harvest Guest Home.

In the final segment of the 20th Anniversary Broadcast series, Joe looks ahead at what's to come.