Many of the residents at the Hughenden Gardens Retirement Village -the eldest being 95 – thought there was a hard limit to what they could do.
But then a ground-breaking experiment with actress Rose Ayling-Ellis at the helm has changed everything for them.
Not only have the OAPs’ opinions of themselves rapidly shifted, but their recent experience has the potential to smash the general public’s stereotypes about what the elderly are capable of doing with ease.
This has all been achieved by doing one thing – learning British Sign Language (BSL).
The retirees were willing guinea pigs for an ambitious new scheme thought up by Rose, who has long believed that BSL has the power to positively improve the quality of life of the older population.
To test her theory, she started with Hughenden Gardens, with the plan to eventually make BSL lessons accessible for the ageing population. (Rose also wants other generations to pick it up, but that’s a whole other story).
Although it sounds like it could be a B plot in Richard Osman’s Thursday Murder Club series, the rationale behind it has merit. Currently, an estimated 75% of older people experience hearing loss, which is expected to increase to 80% by 2032.
However, hearing loss can be easily dismissed and go undiagnosed leading to further problems and barriers later in life, as when communicating becomes difficult it can lead to feelings of isolation.
According to Age UK, approximately one in five older adults (aged 65 and over) report feeling lonely, and isolation is one of the biggest killers in the UK — so it’s an issue that needs to be addressed.
One of the retirement village’s longest-standing residents Karen, 77, was an enthusiastic student during the process, which was documented by BBC in the playfully titled Rose Ayling-Ellis: Old Hands, New Tricks, but initially, she had her reservations. ‘How am I going to do this?’ was her first question.
‘It was daunting. Some of us might not look that old, but we are old,’ Karen tells Metro. ‘I’ve lost a lot of my knowledge and I didn’t think I was able to learn at all.’
She was quickly surprised though, by her brain’s ability to pick up a new skill under the guidance of BSL teacher Marios Costi and Rose. Not only did she enjoy learning the new langauage, but it also increased Karen’s confidence.
‘Learning sign language has given me another dimension. My son says it’s given me a new lease of life. I’m like a big kid at the moment,’ she says.
Widower Karen admits to previously putting on a positive ‘mask’ that hid what was truly going on behind the scenes. When her husband David died in 2015, a month before their 50th wedding anniversary, she understandably struggled to adapt without the love of her life. ‘I couldn’t get used to the fact that I hadn’t got anybody living with me anymore. When I was on my own, I cried a lot of tears. I felt very lonely,’ she explains.
So in 2018, aged 70, she made the move to Hughenden Gardens and tried to be ‘strong’.
There, Karen discovered that having things to do would make her feel better, so she took on the role as a bingo caller and helps write the village magazine. Learning sign language has also become another positive and welcome addition to her schedule.
‘I still have my moments, everybody in my position does, but you have to live life to the full, and I’m doing that now,’ she explains. ‘I talk to everyone because it makes me feel better and also I don’t want them to feel how I’ve felt. Now I can speak to people with hearing issues too.
‘If you don’t talk to people, you’ll never find anything out about them. I discovered things about the lives of people I’d known for a while – both good and bad – by learning sign. I’ve had a couple of residents who have told me something funny about their life, which has gone into the magazine.’
Rose, 30, became the first regular deaf character on EastEnders and was the first deaf contestant on Strictly Come Dancing, famously going on to lift the glitterball trophy in 2021. She won the TV Moment of the Year Bafta after briefly dancing to silence. The powerful choreography choice gave an insight into what she experienced every day.
Rose then used her fame to throw all her support behind MP Rosie Cooper’s bill asking for BSL to be legally recognised as a language, which was passed in 2022 and her passion for challenging labels and BSL has continued to be unwavering.
The activist’s efforts haven’t gone unnoticed by Karen. ‘The whole project was Rose’s baby. She made us all feel special and became a friend,’ she says. ‘Hearing Rose’s story about some of the barriers she’s faced being deaf made me sad and gave us all the credence then to carry on with this because we felt it had to be done.’
After seeing the benefits firsthand, Karen knows that Rose is correct in encouraging a wider usage of BSL.
‘I do believe that if other retirement villages and more elderly people could learn it there would be less loneliness,’ she adds.
Hearing loss is a major public health issue – in the UK, 11 million people are hard of hearing, while 1.2 million adults are unable to hear most conversational speech – and the hope is the documentary will demonstrate the value BSL can have in all our lives, the joy of communicating and the power of community.
Whether the messaging hits home and inspires real change is yet to be seen, but for Karen and her friends at Hughenden Gardens, the journey is continuing. They still have weekly lessons and regularly use BSL to communicate with each other.
‘I know plenty of deaf people but before this, it never actually occurred to me that if I learned to sign, I could talk to them,’ she admits. ‘Now I am on my way to being able to talk to anybody. You don’t need to be lonely in this village.’
Rose Ayling-Ellis: Old Hands, New Tricks is available to watch on BBC iPlayer
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