An End of Life Planning Project

It started with admitting that at some point we were indeed going to die. This is a biggie in our death-denying culture. Even my husband wasn’t sure it really applied to him.

We started the “getting it together” project so that our family wouldn’t be left holding the bag. A young family member had struggled through loss and loose ends following the death of her mother and begged us to do some planning so she wouldn’t have to face the situation again with us.  

Here are the steps we followed:

1. We tackled the hardest part first: funeral arrangements. I made an appointment with a recommended pre-arrangement specialist at a local mortuary. As part of this step, we decided on cremation or burial, prepaid final expenses and decided on the type of memorial service we would each like to have.

4. We then decided what to do with our “stuff.” In other words, made a will. I was able to “fill in a form” with the help of a certified legal document preparer, having done homework ahead of time with documents at www.nolo.com . There’s no dearth of will formats for do-it-yourselfers.

5. Now we were ready to move to the second category of things to do: documents needed in case of an illness or an accident that left one of us incapacitated. Each state has different paperwork required for the documents below. You can download free copies of appropriate forms by state from AARP.

·       A living will or advanced care directive that will spell out what kind of medical treatment we wanted to receive: resuscitation or not, etc. While on this step, take a look at the “Five Wishes” template found on the Aging with Dignity website.

·       A medical power of attorney to go further in making sure our wishes concerning medical treatment would be honored. 

·       A power of attorney to handle financial or legal matters if one of us was unable to.

6. The final step is organizing everything together in one place. We used what we began calling the “Big Blue Notebook,” the Get It Together Planner found at Melanie Cullen’s Website. Her book, Get It Together: Organize Your Records So Your Family Won’t Have To was a helpful source all through the project. Information on both the planner and the book are available on her website.

Caveats

·       This checklist is based on our experience doing just this few months ago in Arizona. Each state has different requirements so be aware of yours.

·       Our situation was a simple one. If your situation is more complex, i.e. you have large and varied assets and several beneficiaries, see professionals: an attorney and a financial planner.

Conclusion

Back to the beginning: why do so few people do end of life planning, even though research shows it leads to a higher quality of life at the end and loved ones experience less stress, anxiety, even depression? Because it’s hard admitting that we are indeed mortal, all of us. We had to be pushed…

But now that we’ve done it, it is a gift to each other and those who love us. It’s also brought peace of mind, this shaking hands with mortality. Most of all, it’s a gift to ourselves.

And I wish the same for you…please consider the benefits to you and your family of having a personal end of life plan of your own. 

Disrupt Aging

Here’s the current view of aging in America: “a process of deterioration, dependency, reduced potential, family dispersal and digital incompetence.” This is our dominant cultural view of aging, according to a 2015 report.*

If that scenario doesn’t work for you (and it certainly doesn’t for me), you will enjoy reading the new book by AARP CEO Jo Ann Jenkins, Disrupt Aging: a Bold New Path to Living Your Best Life at Every Age. It’s a book about changing the mindset about aging in our society, creating a new landscape for living as an older adult.

One of the reasons I have started my online store Savvy Senior Products is to be a part of a movement I felt was just starting - to redefine how we view aging in our society. I’m certainly not ready to retire and wait through my “golden years’ to die. And I didn’t find that my peers wanted to either.

We could agree we were in a transitional period of our lives, with children grown or a particular career coming to a close, but our expectations was very different from that of our parents or grandparents. Our expectations weren’t even in sync with the approach encouraged in our 30’s or 40’s – when, as financial planners, we counseled clients to focus on that ultimate goal – retirement.  

So, where was I – and my peers? Why did we want to start businesses or work part time or try an altogether new career instead of retire? Why were our expectations incongruent with current cultural norms for how to act and what to do with the rest of our lives, which for some of us could be 25 more years?

Simply put, says CEO Jo Ann Jenkins, because we older adults with years of living ahead of us find ourselves in the 21^st century with social institutions, policies and practices designed for 20^th century lifestyles when life spans were much shorter. And this longer life span is not just from adding on years of poor health and decline. Thanks to lifestyle changes, preventive medicine and better treatment of chronic disease, these can be healthy and productive years.  

Jenkins does a good job of mapping out changes that could make a difference, including changes in our health care system to now start focusing on overall well-being as we age, not just treatment.  

And it’s not just the social institution of health care that needs to change to better meet the needs of modern seniors. Changes in the workplace to accommodate older workers, “universal design” in housing to make our homes safer and more accessible, even replacing the outdated model for “retirement savings” that better accommodates our long term financial resiliency.

Here’s hoping this important book furthers the discussion about a topic critical to me, my peers and the older generations to come.  

*E.  Lindland, M. Fond, A. Haydon and N. Kendall-Taylor, Gauging Aging: Mapping the Gaps between Expert and Public Understandings of Aging in America (Washington,
DC: FrameWorks Institute, 2015). 

Empowered Aging

Our mission is to empower older adults to proactively embrace and use assistive devices and products that support an active and independent lifestyle. And we cannot embrace the kind of products offered by Savvy Senior Products unless we first embrace our bodies.

Till now and still now we’ve focused mainly on the “outside” of our bodies, our appearance. This is why we dress the way we do and fuss over that extra 5 pounds. However, if we’ve only lately acknowledged that we do get older and, in our youth-obsessed culture, lose the “looks” we once had, it’s easy to look negatively at this body that not only looks different but is beginning to show signs of mortality.

We are mortal, something our culture frequently doesn’t face, but we are forced to as we age. As miraculous as our bodies are, they do begin to change. We may have more difficulty climbing stairs, driving, enjoying recreational activities, even bathing and dressing. These changes are inevitable and will eventually happen to us all.   

A Strategy for Aging Well

Well, this is certainly depressing, you might say. Why do I need to read this? I’m hoping it’s because if we “get real,” that is, come face to face with this reality of our changing bodies, we can begin to forge a strategy for living this part of our lives that is honest and freeing, even empowering. We can:

• Approach our bodies with knowledge, gratitude and compassion.
• Take responsibility for the aspects of our health we can control. Stay functionally fit.
• Proactively use assistive devices and products that keep us “in the game.” No more denial: “I don’t need to use…” We are living longer and need to stay active and independent through these extra years we have been given.

Walking Tall in Our 70s

And to end on a less serious note: we can also correct our posture. When I was an adolescent, my parents constantly nagged me to “stand up straight.” Tall, with an adolescent’s insecurities, I shrugged off their correction and slunk around, pretending to be invisible.

Now I finally “get” it! Poor posture is even more common with older adults. Our heads may droop and our shoulders round. Over time this poor posture causes our muscles to weaken or tighten, negatively affecting our gait and our balance. A quick look at a physical therapy text showed me how to assess my current posture and how to then improve it. I can’t believe it…but here I am, in my early 70s, finally standing up straight. 

It’s part of my new sense of empowerment. I am here. And I’m glad to be here.  Please join me.