Calendar Input UI Doesn't execute until SAVE is clicked

Hello everyone, please feel free to relocate this if needed (or tell me where to post if this is not optimal). When using a calendar type field to select a date, it defaults to the current date. This is fine. But in order to efficiently navigate to a date in the past (15yrs for example) you have to either continue to click back through the months (12 * 15) or you can attempt to key in a date directly in the field. The challenge my clients are having is that the calendar selector UI doesn’t sync to the date within the field unless they click the SAVE button for the entry, and then that performs as a triggered event to update the calendar to the date within the field (the text).

Is there a way to scroll back through the years quicker?

If not, is there a way to update that triggered event so they can select a temporary date in the calendar UI, manually change the numeric year value in the text field, and then on blur or keyup, the calendar UI’s selected date can perform the same update as when clicking the SAVE button (so that the calendar UI reflects the same year as keyed into the text field)? It does currently perform this function but we have to click the save button for it to work. Thanks for any help.