Albuquerque Senior Living Community

A Wonderful Active Lifestyle

In addition to our beautiful setting, with the Sandia Mountains creating a spectacular backdrop, the quality of care provided at The Cottages senior living community is another key reason we have become so well known in this part of Albuquerque. Our dementia care community is specially designed for people with memory disorders. For example, our wide walkways flow in a circular fashion so that residents don’t get frustrated when they come to the end of a hallway. Instead, they can continue their “journey” by wandering around the community again or by going outside into our secured courtyard area. In addition, our caregivers go above and beyond to make sure residents participate in our many activities. It’s not unusual for visitors to see caregivers entertaining residents – in fact, at a recent tour, one of our visitors told us how surprised she was to see one of our staff members dancing for our residents! Not only are our caregivers incredibly patient, compassionate and caring, but they are also extremely skilled in caring for very sick Alzheimer’s residents. In fact, with our training, we are able to provide a level of care that many memory care communities cannot.

While Alzheimer’s strikes each person differently, in some cases the disease progresses to the point where residents are unable to do anything for themselves. Even in these instances, we can keep the majority of our residents here. We have around-the-clock nursing to provide assisted living services as necessary, and we can bring in Hospice to provide end-of-life care, including pain management. We also make sure our families are supported and will make therapists and chaplains available to counsel them as necessary. Our families get tremendous peace of mind knowing that their loved one can remain in the comfort of their own home at The Cottages for the remainder of their lives.

At The Cottages, our activity program is also tailored towards our residents’ unique needs. We offer a variety of activities, including daily exercise designed to help residents build strength, flexibility and mobility; live entertainment; pet therapy; bingo; ball toss; cooking classes; and movie nights. We also have a men's sports group, which our ladies love to be involved with – and our “Red Hat” society's monthly tea party, to which our gentlemen often attend! We also have a special activity called Take 10, when a caregiver takes 10 minutes to interact on a one-on-one basis with a resident, whether that’s just chatting, reading, giving them a back rub or doing their hair. We also do arts and crafts, typically geared to the time of year. Memory games are a big part of our activities program. For example, we may play a memory game that asks residents to recall something from their past or a trivia game that focuses on an old movie like The Wizard of Oz. During our Family Nights, we typically bring in an outside speaker or our own in-house experts to talk about Alzheimer’s and the disease process. These are just a few of our many activities designed to help residents maintain their memory and give them ample opportunities to socialize with each other, which can help prevent depression.

Partnering with the Local Neighborhood Community

We host a small Alzheimer's support group called Café Mananero on a monthly basis for the families of our residents. We meet on the second Wednesday of the month at a local restaurant, usually for brunch. Café Mananero is the best kind of support group – our family members who have had loved ones at The Cottages for a long time are here to support our newer family members. They can share their feelings about our community and the quality of care we provide better than we can; after all they have all been dealing with a loved one who has Alzheimer’s. They can also provide an invaluable perspective to help our newer family members understand what to expect as the disease progresses. We are grateful to our families for supporting others this way, and in fact, one of our family members plans to continue volunteering, even though her mom recently died. Our community, including staff and family members, also participate in the Alzheimer’s Association’s annual Walk to End Alzheimer’s to raise money for Alzheimer’s research.

We also host a variety of events on a monthly basis, most of which are open to anyone in the local community, including seniors and their families. For example, at Christmastime, we organize a Jingle Mix and Mingle social, during which we offer food, entertainment and door prizes. In September, we have our own State Fair Days, basically bringing the state fair to our residents and anyone else in the area who wishes to join in the festivities. We serve popular fair food, such as turkey legs, Indian tacos, cotton candy, snow cones, hamburgers and hot dogs, as well as have several games and entertainers. In October, we host a Harvest Fest. Every month there’s something fun and different going on at The Cottages!

Fine Dining

Our dementia care community offers a total of three dining rooms, one of which is dedicated to our higher functioning residents. We serve three meals a day. Our food tends to be more comfort food – Yankee pot roast, meatloaf and spaghetti. Plus our chef is Mexican and prepares all kinds of traditional Mexican cuisine, which the residents love. We can accommodate all special dietary needs, including mechanical soft and pureed. Snacks, which might include ice cream, chicken nuggets, egg rolls, cookies, fruit and veggie trays, are also brought out to residents three times a day. Our refrigerator is also fully stocked should a resident feel like a midnight snack! In addition, we use bright Fiesta ware which, studies have shown, helps residents with memory impairments focus better on their food.