By Jane Malkoff MSN RN NP

Now is the time for us to own decision-making in our personal care plans be it life path planning or future needs when chronic illness and acute problems typically arise.  Currently, your care options and choices are almost entirely brought to you on behalf of whatever allows corporations to survive and thrive.  This model is responsible for the third leading cause of death in our country.

Taking control of your plan is going to require thinking beyond what you may have been conditioned to believe about home and community.  Co-housing is just one excellent example of a way to look beyond our conditioned beliefs and ideas about home and community and envision the possibilities.

Co-housing works as a money making model as witnessed all around with the multiple assisted living communities and long-term care facilities housing many of our friends, family members, and neighbors.  However, we are not required to buy-in to this concept of care delivery in these contrived communities.

What if you and your current neighbors or friends began planning a co-housing opportunity in your current actual community or even in a place you always wanted to live?  Imagine how the structure could be privately owned versus corporately owned.  What if the proceeds went to the very people living in that co-housing situation?  Perhaps care expenses could be shared in order to continue to age in that home.  Since this model is not involved in the third leading cause of death in the United States, the risks would appear fairly minimal compared to current acceptable options.

Imagine how our communities would look if there were co-housing options.  Would it be a benefit for children to grow up with this model of supporting one another right in our own neighborhoods?  What if we could look beyond and we were able to discover how to be in true community again in matters of life and care?