The Road to Grandma's House: The Daily Experiences of Economically Disadvantaged Elderly Women in Rural and Urban Ottawa

Elders are the fastest growing segment of the Canadian population; yet, little is written about their lives. Using an intersectional analysis, I conducted qualitative interviews with economically disadvantaged elderly women in the Ottawa area to try and uncover the daily experiences of being a woman who is both elderly and living in poverty. My research argues that elderly women are invisible in Canada and that the consequence of this erasure is that we fail to recognize the ways in which economically disadvantaged elderly women are incredibly resilient and resourceful. However, I caution against simply praising their resiliency. Instead, I advise a critical examination of the systemic barriers that force elderly women to work so hard to survive. Keywords: intersectionality, feminist gerontology, poverty, elderly, rural, urban