My Father Wants to Age in Place. AI Will Be Watching
It was January of 2026 in North Seattle, and my 86-year-old father was struggling to move around his house. “I’m stumbling around here,” my 86-year-old
It was January of 2026 in North Seattle, and my 86-year-old father was struggling to move around his house. “I’m stumbling around here,” my 86-year-old father told a guest in his home this past January. “Oooh, ooh, careful,” the guest replied. “Yeah, I almost fell down.” Meanwhile, I’m 5,000 miles away in Austria, unaware of any trouble until months later, when I read a transcript of the entire incident via Sensi.ai: an always-on, AI-enabled microphone that’s been monitoring my father’s life for nearly a year. His coughs, toilet flushes, and even snippets of private conversations—Sensi records it all. Sensi was first recommended as a free add-on to my dad’s care because, like most older adults, he would like to spend the remainder of his life in his own home.
Once a modest, single-story clapboard, it was yassified in the ’90s by a couple from Vegas, who added a second-story steam room and bidet, a feature that entertained our family cat. While these amenities never appealed to my father, he has embraced the carpeted staircase as his preferred exercise equipment—climbing them up and down on loop—even as his worsened gait has become an ongoing concern for his loved ones and caregivers over the past few years. When my family first began fretting that he’d fall in 2024, I defended his choice to stay at home, which doubles as a well-kept shrine to my late mom, who died in 2019. “He should live however he wants,” I told a friend. “When I’m old, I’d like the right to fall down,” she replied.
To reaffirm my stance, I also found studies confirming that older adults who move into nursing homes experience steeper cognitive decline; plus, I was still haunted by the flickering, fluorescent institution that once housed my mom for a month. Sensi’s promise was tantalizing: A little white box would sit under a table or chair and silently monitor for danger. It seemed like an easy way to help my dad preserve his independence and give me peace of mind from Europe. But safety wasn’t the only consideration. My father has always been a private guy who’s kept his feelings squirreled away (unless the topic is fractals or philosophy). When I came out, it was hard to figure out how he really felt, and I eventually gave up trying to break down his walls, relying on surface conversations about the weather to connect.
Usually, it was only a brief chat before he said “Here’s Mom” and passed the phone. My dad was initially resistant to Sensi because of his own privacy concerns—who can blame him?—but after a little cajoling from my sister and me, he finally agreed to have the device installed. At some point, Sensi flagged my father as someone with a “possible high risk of falls” and began listening for words indicating he was unsteady on his feet. When Sensi’s microphone overheard him saying the word “fall,” it automatically sent the private exchange to his caregivers.
The BriefWire