The aging of the population in Québec as in the rest of the western world, brings to the fore people who until now were greatly marginalized. This is the case of mentally ill and mentally retarded elderly who until recently, lived their aging in the shadow of psychiatric institutions. Have these people now found with deinstitutionalization, the possibility of growing old within society ? This article analyses the conditions of integration and support networks, in sum a collective responsability of these aging people in nursing homes.