As we gather around our tables this Thanksgiving, surrounded by loved ones and the warmth of togetherness, I find myself reflecting on what it means to be grateful despite challenges.
In recent months, the Alliance has been hyper-focused on what often feels like an endless uphill battle. Budget cuts to important research funding, threats to lifesaving clinical trials, slashed departments and programs that provide nutrition and activities for older adults, worries about access to medical breakthroughs, and increasingly high medication costs are all things that keep Alliance staff up at night.
Despite this, I am fueled by my thankfulness at working alongside an incredible team of smart individuals who are dedicated to championing healthy, dignified aging, and working to make the world a better place for older adults even in the wake of challenges.
While our world is ever-changing and unpredictable, the familiarity of holiday traditions reminds us of the passage of time. We at the Alliance hope that you take a moment over your holiday meal to reflect on aging as we do—not as something to fear, but as a journey filled with potential, connection, and meaning.
If you ask older loved ones about their experiences, you’ll likely hear both the happy and the hard. The Thanksgiving when a loved one was overseas. The first time hosting Thanksgiving. The year someone took the Turkey Trot or neighborhood football game a little too seriously. The Thanksgiving that the whole family volunteered at a shelter.
My advice this Thanksgiving is to listen to the older adults around the table and find ways to honor the wisdom they carry. Age brings a perspective that we all need to empower ourselves to get across the next hurdle.
I’m thankful this season that organizations like the Alliance exist to work hard to create a world in which we all age with as much grace as possible.
Wishing you all a warm, peaceful, and deeply grateful Thanksgiving.
Katie Riley serves as Vice President of Communications at the Alliance.
