Lifestyle choices, circumstances lead to different paths for residents

When asked if she might be available to have her photo taken for this story, Diana Chang, 88, texted back: “I’m doing restorative yoga class at 4 tomorrow afternoon and getting a massage at 10:30 a.m. on Saturday. Life is good.”

As one of the 37,839 Hawaii residents age 85 or older at the time of the 2020 census, Chang has made it a priority to keep an active lifestyle after retiring at age 62 as deputy state auditor. She walks a mile three times a week, does yoga via Zoom four times a week and enjoys crafting, travel and lunching with friends.

“Life is all about maintenance, and the most important thing you can maintain is your body, because you really don’t want to have to rely on anybody else to take care of you or be responsible for you,” she said. “So it’s a way of being kind to others as well as to yourself.”

When her late husband, Philip Chang, suffered a heart attack in his 40s, the couple quit smoking and began running for exercise, even tackling marathons. She also participated in Department of Parks and Recreation classes and worked out on her lunch breaks.

Chang credits yoga for her recovery after a stroke five years ago while traveling in Italy.

“If you don’t use it, you lose it,” she said. “Today I can still do most stuff. I don’t have aches and pains and can still move relatively effortlessly.”

The Changs were married for 61 years before Philip, an engineer in private practice, died in 2017. Diana now lives with her daughter in East Honolulu and has two other children and seven grandchildren.

Once their kids were out of college and living on their own, the Changs were able to start putting money away for retirement. Between their savings, Social Security and state retirement benefits, Chang said she’s financially secure.

“I’ve always been frugal,” she said. “I spend money on travel and on things I enjoy, but I don’t buy a lot of stuff. I don’t buy a lot clothes, I don’t buy fancy cars, but that doesn’t mean I don’t give myself a treat,” including regular massages to benefit her mind and body.

“I have a very good life. I have nothing to complain about.”

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Mirroring a trend confirmed by the latest census data, Chang said her children married late, and she has a grandson in his 30s who has a girlfriend but is in no rush to get married or have kids.

“He just adopted a dog,” she said.

Jennifer Stierli, 43, of Kahala, lives in a household that includes her 87-year-old father and a miniature schnauzer named Max. The Hanahau‘oli School teacher said that when she got married 11 years ago, “having children was always on the table but we weren’t thinking about having kids right away, if we were going to have kids.”

“It evolved, especially for me. I had thought I wanted children for quite some time, but I was also very happy being a married couple without children,” said Stierli, whose parents were educators as well. “And also being a teacher, I often tell people I use my ‘kid energy’ during the day and, truly, I can’t imagine coming home to children after that.”

As with many other Hawaii couples without children, financial considerations played a role in their decision, Stierli said, as they share the mortgage with her father and have other obligations.

“Should we suddenly decide that we want to have children, we would adopt. But we’re very happy having a dog, and hopefully another.”