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“I’ve been sleeping in my attic flat for the last 20 years,” says Liva Tresch (90) from Zurich. After the former photographer had to give up his self-taught profession due to eye disease, he began to gradually isolate himself from his surroundings.
His small apartment was his retreat, where he lived with the support of Pro Senectute until it was no longer possible due to his health. “I should have moved into a nursing home ten years ago. “Then I would enjoy it more and be more involved and help others,” he says during Blick’s visit. The Central Switzerland native had long been registered at another nursing home planned for Zurich. He had to look for another solution, as expensive rental apartments were suddenly planned instead of retirement apartments.
After visiting the restaurant, he went to the nursing home resident.
It was only about a year ago that Tresch moved into a nursing home in a historic building in the city of Zurich. He lives in a one-room apartment with a magnificent view on the top floor of the “Klus Park Old Age Health Center”. «At first I only went to the restaurant once to eat. “But I thought everything was so great that I signed up right away,” Tresch says. He raves about the beautiful park, the staff and the food: “I live here as if I were in a hotel!”
His spacious apartment has his own toilet and sink. There are kitchens and showers available to residents on each floor. «It works great. “Everything I need is here,” he says. The room also has its own espresso machine and refrigerator. Cleaning and laundry are done by staff.
Tresch eats lunch in the dining room, where he shares a table with three other residents with whom he gets along well. He raves about the food; he just sometimes wants “bite-sized pieces and better blades” because his left hand no longer works as well as he would like after surgery.
The 90-year-old remains mentally healthy and enjoys solving Sudoku and crossword puzzles, writing and philosophizing. “It’s just that the packaging is old and I’m slow,” he says, laughing. What bothers him the most is his back, his knees, and his painful fibromyalgia, which sometimes makes it difficult for him to sleep. “Then I doze off in my TV chair. “It’s better than lying in bed,” he says. He prepares his own breakfast and dinner and eats them in his room. “We have a wonderful breakfast buffet in the dining room, but I prefer to be alone in the morning.”
A hard life with material for a book
Tresch always has something to do. Never gets bored. He is currently preparing an exhibition of his own carefully archived photographs at the nursing home. He says that most of the time he is just “brösmele”, lost in thought and writing down his philosophical thoughts. “I am dyslexic, I cannot read or write, I have no vocational training; I am a real ‘buuretoch’ from the countryside.”
Tresch, an illegitimate child living temporarily in a foreign place, looks back on a difficult childhood filled with abuse. For a long time he was ashamed of loving women and feeling worthless. His eventful life story could fill a book with his work as a photographer and his unhappy love story with his long-term partner.
A chapter about Liva Tresch and her love can be read in a published book found in her library, which also contains antique cameras and other “treasures”. Tresch doesn’t struggle with his past. «I can forgive and despite everything I found a level in life and finally respected myself. “I respect everyone and everything.”
Meetings, activities and recreations
He said Blick was a little dizzy from physiotherapy during his visit, but recovered for lunch. For once, he eats at the public restaurant in the garden; here masters and others spend their lunch breaks at neighboring tables. Tresch loves encounters and exchanges, and also participates in activities such as crafts or communal cooking in the afternoons when her daily routine allows. “We also have a chapel and theater in the house.” If you want fun and friendship, the retiree says, you always have options here.
“Our park here is amazing. There are often children and teenagers here in the evenings,” he says during a short walk after dinner. He could get help at any time thanks to the emergency button he always carried with him. “I’ve never needed it until now, but it gives me security.” There are comfortable chairs everywhere that he likes to use.
Tresch knows almost all the plants in the park, enjoys the duck pond with fish, and enjoys watching the birds in the park. A stone enthusiast, he would always take and collect stones with him on his previous trips. He left some of them in his room and some under the trees in the park. “Many were taken away. “It would be nice if someone liked it and my pieces moved on,” he says as he walks back into the room.
All kinds of freedom and support when necessary
Today he says he feels a little proud that he was able to survive this long. He wants to spend the rest of the day in peace and quiet in his room before eating a light dinner and then munching carrots in front of the television. “I have complete freedom here, but there is always someone there when needed,” he says.
So far, Liva Tresch doesn’t need any help with her personal hygiene, other than one of the staff giving her eye drops and rubbing her back in the evening. She is just happy and grateful and hopes she still has some time left to enjoy her life. “I’ve never been this beautiful in my entire life.”
Source : Blick
I am Dawid Malan, a news reporter for 24 Instant News. I specialize in celebrity and entertainment news, writing stories that capture the attention of readers from all walks of life. My work has been featured in some of the world’s leading publications and I am passionate about delivering quality content to my readers.
