Specifically for Seniors - The Next Generation Specifically for Seniors

One of the best parts of doing this podcast is that it gives me the opportunity to meet and talk with some remarkable people who've done exceptional things after retirement. Chad Richardson was a Detroit police officer who gave himself the gift of filmmaking when he retired from law enforcement. On today's episode of Specifically for Seniors takes us on his journey to fulfill his dream after retirement.


Chad and I talk about his movie Bad Senator and the more than 200 seniors who volunteered in the film as well as the retirement community where it was filmed. Be sure to check out the film trailer for Bad Senator in the podcast.

Maggie Scarf is a former visiting fellow at the Whitney Humanities Center, Yale University, and a fellow of Jonathan Edwards College, Yale University. She was for many years a Contributing Editor to The New Republic and a member of the advisory board of the American Psychiatric Press.

Maggie is the author of seven books for adults and two books for children. She s the recipient of numerous awards and fellowships, including a Ford Foundation Fellowship and a Nieman Fellowship in Journalism at Harvard. She has received several National Media Awards from the American Psychological Foundation. Her articles have appeared in the New York Times, The New Republic and Psychology Today

She has appeared on many television programs, including Oprah, Today Show, Good Morning America, CBS News, and CNN, and has been interviewed extensively on radio and for magazines and newspapers across the nation.

Maggie's books include the acclaimed New York Times bestsellers Unfinished Business: Pressure Points in the Lives of Women and Intimate Partners: Patterns in Love and Marriage. Body, Mind, Behavior (a collection of essays, most of them first published in The New York Times Magazine); Intimate Worlds: How Families Thrive and Why They Fail; Secrets, Lies, Betrayal: How the Body Holds the Secrets of a Life, and How to Unlock Them; and, most recently, September Songs: The Bonus Years of Marriage.

Maggie and I talk about her life and career, her books, and the Supreme Court.

There is an organization in Massachusetts that is focused on caring for an aging population, that develops services that meet older adults’ needs and preferences and advocates for us. I had not heard of this organization before so we invited Elissa Sherman, the President of LeadingAge Massachusetts. to explain it to us.

Dr. Sherman has worked in aging policy for more than 30 years, beginning her career in state government as an analyst for the Massachusetts state legislature’s Joint Committee on Human Services and Elderly Affairs and later working at the Commonwealth’s Executive Office of Elder Affairs where she was involved in the development and implementation of regulations governing assisted living. She joined LeadingAge Massachusetts (then called MassAging) in 1998 as Director of Public Policy and has overseen the Association’s public policy and government relations work since that time.

During her tenure at LeadingAge Massachusetts, Dr. Sherman has brought the voice of not-for-profit aging service providers to the development of state policy through her work leading the Association’s advocacy activities, and through her involvement on numerous state advisory boards.

Dr. Sherman completed her PhD in Social Policy at the Heller School at Brandeis University and received her Bachelor’s degree from the University of Vermont.

Elissa. and I discuss Leading Age Massachusetts and the services it provides both for not-for-profit organizations and consumers alike.

Rick Mater is a longtime runner and Emmy-nominated TV executive living in Los Angeles. He was born in Pinner, England, and grew up in California, New Jersey, and Munich, Germany.

A miler in high school, he lettered in cross-country in college and has run the Grand Canyon twice as a cardiac patient. A heart attack survivor, he has four stents in his left anterior descending artery and a defibrillator implanted in the side of his chest. He is the author of Six Hours: Running for My Life in the Grand Canyon.Rick and I talk about overcoming medical problems and facing the challenge of a 17 mile run in the Grand Canyon - twice.

Rick's books:

Beat - https://www.amazon.com/Beat-Richard-Lewis-Mater/dp/1736823019

Six Hours: Running for My Life in the Grand Canyon - https://www.amazon.com/Six-Hours-Running-Grand-Canyon-ebook/dp/B0BGQNPWMK/ref=sr_1_1?crid=39ETR5NAJTFZ3&keywords=beat+by+rick+mater&qid=1707662706&sprefix=beat+by+rick+mater%2Caps%2C84&sr=8-1

As many of us age we develop physical problems, we have difficulty seeing, hearing and mobility. We require a walker, wheelchair or motorized device to get around. And we feel that our physicians don’t understand our problems. So we asked Dr. Lisa Iezzoni to be a guest on the podcast to help us work through the challenges we face.

Lisa I. Iezzoni, MD, MSc is Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School, and based at the Health Policy Research Center, Mongan Institute, Massachusetts General Hospital. Her research for the past 25 years has focused on improving the life experience of people with mobility disability.

Dr. Iezzoni has conducted numerous studies examining the health care experiences of persons with disability. She has also explored home-based supportive services; her book Making Their Days Happen: Paid Personal Assistance Services Supporting People with Disability Living in Their Homes and Communities was published in 2022. During the 2022-2023 academic year, she was the Sally Starling Seaver Fellow at the Harvard Radcliffe Institute. Dr. Iezzoni is a member of the National Academy of Medicine in the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

Dr. Iezzoni and I discuss her disability and use of a wheelchair for the past 47 years, we talk about her career and research, the problems of independent living with a disability, health disparities, and the fact that many physicians are reluctant to trreat patients with a disability. We also discuss the problems of getting good dental care. We talk about the contents of her book - Making Their Days Happen: Paid Personal Assistance Services Supporting People with Disability Living in Their Homes and Communities.

We close with a discussion of a phrase she used in a previous podcast - "OK, what can I do to make that person's life better?

Book Available at:

https://www.amazon.com/Making-Their-Days-Happen-Communities-ebook/dp/B09KQ5LVML/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1GHX8CLXARWQA&keywords=making+their+days+happen&qid=1707093399&sprefix=makingg+their+days+happen%2Caps%2C90&sr=8-1

On today's podcast, it is my distinct honor to introduce MT Connolly to those of you who have never had the privilege of meeting her. M.T. Connolly is a leading national expert on elder justice and a MacArthur “genius” grant awardee.

In issuing the award, the foundation said Connolly has “ devoted her career to laying bare the many forms of elder abuse: physical and psychological, as well as financial exploitation and wrongful deprivation of rights.”

MT is the author of the 2023 book, The Measure of Our Age: Navigating Care, Safety, Money, and Meaning Later in Life. She was the architect of the federal Elder Justice Act, founder of the Department of Justice’s Elder Justice Initiative, and lead author of the Elder Justice Roadmap, shaping federal, state, and local research, policy, and practice. She is also co-designer of the community-based “RISE” model intended to introduce holistic, hopeful, and effective ways to empower older adults, reduce harms, and promote elder justice.

MT Connolly talks wth me about what we do with the 30 additional years of life we've gained since the 1900's, geriatric medicine, the challenges older adults face, the federal elder justice act and her book The Measure of Our Age.