Of course, we didn\u2019t let her cancel. The Gaydi Project, as I call my mother, had fallen off a step stool while decorating and fractured her heel. We arrived to find her bedbound, and so began my education in caregiving for my parent\u2014an otherwise independent person\u2014while also parenting my then 9-year-old. As The Gaydi Project was on heavy narcotics and weed (another article entirely) and largely immobile, my husband and I took over everything she normally did as a go-getting zip-switcher (her word for weaving through sidewalk crowds). Vibrant and adventurous, she hated being infirm, hated the loss of independence, hated us all up in her kitchen. I got scolded for sorting the recycling improperly; for worrying aloud about the tall step into her dining room. Things were growing tense but holding at kind enough through gritted teeth. My mention of a shower chair blew everything to pieces.<\/p>\n
Who Doesn\u2019t Like a Good Sandwich?<\/p>\n
If you\u2019re in your 40s or 50s, you may be in the sandwich generation. More than half of Americans in their 40s have a parent 65-plus and a kid they\u2019re still financially supporting, per a 2022 Pew study<\/a>. The AARP and Huntington Bank report that nearly 30 percent of caregivers<\/a> nationwide are doing both jobs at once, and a staggering 72 percent have cut back on food or medical care\u2014or raided their retirement savings\u2014to keep both generations afloat.<\/p>\n These arrangements are as much financial as emotional. Assisted living in San Diego runs a median of $6,820 a month\u2014more than $81,000 a year\u2014before memory care, which adds another 20 to 40 percent. For most people, that\u2019s insurmountable. Modifying or redesigning a home can often be the preferable, affordable solution.<\/p>\n It\u2019s Not Aging in Place. It\u2019s Universal Design.<\/p>\n Beppie Mostert of Living Design Interiors<\/a> specializes in aging in place, sustainability, and universal design\u2014an expertise she came by personally. Her mother was diagnosed in her early 60s with an incurable disease that chipped away at her mobility. \u201cShe couldn\u2019t cope in her own home,\u201d Mostert tells me, \u201cand she was determined not to leave.\u201d Researching how people actually stay put, Mostert incorporated what she learned into her design career. \u201cWhen you address the individual\u2019s needs, that\u2019s aging in place. When you address everybody\u2019s needs, that\u2019s universal design.\u201d<\/p>\n One of Mostert\u2019s clients bought her Scripps Ranch home shortly before an accident, after which she began using a wheelchair full-time<\/a>. Over two decades, Mostert has adapted the home piece by piece\u2014most recently adding an elevator. By turning \u201cmultiple-level living into single-level living\u201d structures, a home becomes suitable to whomever is in it.<\/p>\n For another client who remodeled a bathroom, Mostert raised and expanded a window for natural light, ditched a sunken tub in favor of a zero-threshold, doorless shower, and added rollout shelving and a lazy Susan in the vanity. \u201cI didn\u2019t design for a part of their life,\u201d she says. \u201cI designed for their entire life.\u201d<\/p>\n The Decisions San Diegans Are Making<\/p>\n San Diego County is aging fast<\/a>: The 60-and-over population is projected to cross a million by 2040, with more than 100,000 residents over 85. Currently, the number of seniors experiencing stress due to housing costs<\/a> has gone up 16 percent in a year; homelessness among those 55-plus is up 5 percent.<\/p>\n Aside from having, you know, a decent life and secure housing, what most of us want as we face our later years is simple: to remain independent and in our own homes as long as possible. Getting old is a privilege and staying healthy is, too. Nearly everyone will experience some form of disability in our lifetime, whether acute (like a fractured heel) or chronic (like multiple sclerosis). Per CDC data, disability prevalence nearly doubles, from roughly 24 to 44 percent, between early adulthood and age 65-plus.<\/p>\n Karen Newell falls into this latter group. Health conscious her entire life and previously active (she met her husband, David Ciccone, through a race-walking club), she was diagnosed with Parkinson\u2019s disease about five years ago. \u201cThere\u2019s this term, \u2018temporarily abled,\u2019\u201d she says, explaining that being able-bodied is not a given. \u201cUnless something drastic happens, we\u2019re all pretty much going to be disabled at some point.\u201d<\/p>\n Because Newell\u2019s mother had Parkinson\u2019s and her brother has it, too, Newell and Ciccone started altering their home around any anticipatory future diagnosis. They\u2019ve since worked in stages with the help of Kaminskiy Design and Remodeling<\/a>.<\/p>\n Operations manager Kimberly Villa speaks of the collaborative process and what she calls value engineering: \u201cWe always [say], as this is a partnership, \u2018Let us know what you\u2019re able to invest, and we\u2019ll let you know what\u2019s possible for that investment.\u2019\u201d It\u2019s part of why clients often build in phases.<\/p>\n At one point, Newell and Ciccone considered selling. Pacific Beach homes tend to be small<\/a>, and their existing footprint didn\u2019t accommodate what Newell might eventually need. But they loved the location\u2014close to services, close to the life they\u2019d built\u2014so instead of leaving, they decided to build around staying.<\/p>\n Compelled by watching her mother\u2019s disease progression, the couple began by altering the front steps of their 1952 Pacific Beach bungalow into what is essentially a slight incline. Ciccone modeled them after the patio stairs at the Hotel del Coronado, which he measured to make sure those leading to their front door were low, long, and shallow. Parkinson\u2019s comes with \u201con\u201d and \u201coff\u201d times, and \u201coff\u201d times make even gentle steps hard to trust, so they recently added a railing. In the kitchen, the couple kept the original footprint but widened its U-shape to 5 feet instead of the standard 3 or 4\u2014room enough, she says, to get a walker or a wheelchair all the way around if it ever comes to that. And Kaminskiy is working with them on a garage conversion.<\/p>\n Building Ahead of Need<\/p>\n Jen Pinto, principal designer at Jackson Design & Remodeling<\/a>, works with clients planning for the future.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/accessible-home-bathroom-1024x683.jpg.webp\")
Courtesy of Beppie Mostert, Living Design Interiors<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Kaminskiy-Design-and-Remodel-encenitas-1024x683.jpg.webp\")
Courtesy of Kaminskiy Design and Remodeling<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/courtesy-jackson-design-remodeling-683x1024.jpg.webp\")
Courtesy of Jackson Design and Remodeling<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Kaminskiy-Design-and-Remodel-shelves-683x1024.jpg.webp\")
Courtesy of Kaminskiy Design and Remodeling<\/p>\n