If you want to be more upright and have shorter reach, a change of handlebars might do that, though it may require many other changes. I have two bikes and I ride my old MTB with touring bars at least as much as the old road bike with drop bars.
I moved away from road riding in 1993 when our trail system became available. So I’m riding for fun and fitness and mostly on trails.
My touring bars don’t have shifters on them, and this would be the biggest thing to adapt. I ride single speed, so there are no shifters in the way. That leaves nine inches of bar space from front to back to adjust reach and grip as I ride, and I use all of that during a ride.
I keep the forward bend level with the saddle so it’s about like brake hoods level with the saddle. The grips come back closer and are a bit below saddle level. Of course that could all be adjusted up or down to preference.
But I always counsel against moving bars up until you’ve tried keeping them down and moving them a little bit closer. At the same trunk angle, I’d rather have hands down and close so that when my legs push down hardest, the arms are pulling up as close to in line as possible. That way it won’t tend to pull me forward off the seat.
As I said, the big challenge for a geared rider is to adapt shifters. The Nitto Albatross has this shape and can use bar end shifters. So if there are bar end shifters that work with your gearing, this could work. Otherwise, you could possibly use some type of thumb or trigger shifters, but those will occupy some of the available grip options.
If this looks useful, it may be worth finding a bike set up this way to try it out.
Otto