there are six documents you need to prevent chaos and protect your grief in the moment when your parent can no longer make decisions for themself:
1. financial power of attorney, for managing their accounts and paying bills
2. healthcare proxy, for making medical decisions on their behalf
3. HIPAA authorization, for being allowed to access their medical information
4. will or trust (or both!), for what happens to their assets after their death
5. advance directive, for what type of life-saving measures they do or don’t want performed
6. POLST, for informing emergency medical responders about whether to perform life-saving treatments
these BIG SIX are the best way to prevent frantic conversations under fluorescent hospital lights or screaming matches with account services representatives who won’t give you the information you desperately need.
save this post and have a conversation with your parents about how you can help them get these documents into place — it’s a gift from them to you and your future self will thank you!!
#agingparents #financialeducation #financialtips #adultchildren
our neighborhood hosts a big wheel race every easter where kids and adults alike dress up in costume and drive big wheels down the (actual) crookedest street in san francisco. it’s full of ridiculous energy and we’ve been looking forward to returning as a family since our introduction to the event last year.
we go as bystanders. as lovers of community. as both big and little kid energy. as adults marveling at the others brave enough to shatter a collar bone for the rush. or so we thought.
after a couple hours of showing our support, we all headed back to the house for an easter egg hunt. my sister brought up the rear. “where’s dad?” i no quicker asked, before she was connecting her phone to our apple tv to share a video: “you’re not going to believe this.”
a few seconds into watching trikes rush down the hill, we heard the crowd break out in uproar, and then there comes dad. no plan to join, no intention to join — just a friendly couple of race-goers had caught him and issabelle on the way out and encouraged them to participate, sparking a random surge of motivation.
it’s important to note that dad hasn’t met a hill in san francisco he hasn’t resented since we arrived here. when people ask how he feels about the move, he reliably says “family” with a smile, and then “hills” with a very different kind of look. so watching him reactivate his love for adventure and take the longest and steepest hill he’s attempted since we moved felt like something i don’t quite have the words for.
my husband went to meet (read: rescue) them at the bottom and helped them navigate back home, where the whole family chanted “poppa! poppa!” to mark dad’s return. it’s the most alive i’ve seen dad in four and a half years, and i’m proud to report that he and issabelle are already plotting their return for next year. 💛
(with a huge thank you to @kaylajoyfox and @hannalongwell and the wonders of the internet who ensured we saw this from all angles)
#strokesurvivor #strokerecovery #strokeawareness
hi, i’m becca. and this is my dad, rich, also known as, uncle rich, poppa, poppa deech, doc, and dr. d. in december 2021, my dad had a massive stroke that converted his active, energetic life into something radically different. if you ask him, he’ll tell you he misses a lot of things about his life before the stroke. but of those things he misses most, teaching tops the list. so welcome to our instagram. follow our adventures through the complicated, joyful, melancholy, and meaningful world of aging, post-stroke recovery, and caregiving. dr. d will be your guide. #caregiving #aging #stroke #aphasia
if your parent becomes incapacitated (think: sudden stroke or cardiac arrest, sudden dementia onset, complications from a routine surgery…) without a power of attorney in place, NO ONE can access their bank accounts, pay bills, manage investments, cancel memberships, sell assets on their behalf — not a spouse, not a child, no one. It doesn’t matter if you have a blood relationship, if you have a marriage certificate — nothing.
to get authority for any of these things, you will have to petition the court, a process that takes weeks to months and can cost tens of thousands of dollars — all the while bills are going unpaid, memberships unused, ongoing fees incurred, etc etc etc.
oh, and you’re dealing with this administrative nightmare while you’re just trying to focus on your grief.
have i convinced you yet? talk to your siblings and work together to help your parents get a POA in place.
#powerofattorney #agingparents #millenialmom #financialplanning
mothers are amazing 💛 happy mother’s day to all the mamas out there who’ve never stopped encouraging their daughters to dance
#mothersday❤️ #mothersday #motherslove❤️ #aginggracefully
say it with me: supporting your aging parents doesn’t have to destroy your relationships with your siblings.
but it does — all of the time. it’s sad and it’s real and i hear stories about it every single day in caregiving.
it always starts the same way. the caregiving dynamic just happened. it became a slow slide into predictable patterns where the sibling closest became the default caregiver, and as more and more responsibility piled on, the other siblings disappeared further and further from view. and very often it’s rooted in the quiet and inaccurate operating principle that there isn’t much to do if you’re far away.
supporting your aging parents can and should be a collaboration with your siblings. remember the thrill of successfully working together to throw a house party without your parents catching you? let’s reimagine caring for our parents as one where we can actually thrive in our sibling dynamic!
but you need three things!
you need communication
you need a plan
and you need equitable participation
#agingparents #siblingslove❤️ #siblingsgoals #caregiving #siblingsforever
the brilliant @mindbodylove__ taught me that many families avoid these conversations in fear of driving disconnection — when in fact it’s the deafening silence that really does so.
make this your season of connecting with your mama. convince her that what you want the most is to give her an aging chapter she can actually dream about.
caring for our parents is not a burden. the burden is being left in the dark and left to navigate it alone when optionality has left the building.
good luck, god speed, and let me know how it goes! ✌🏼
#agingparents #aginggracefully❤️ #mothersday #motheranddaughters #motherdaughterlove
requirements & qualifications: willingness to play wildly off-tune, zero regard for rhythm or tempo. applicants must be okay with drool everywhere.
#multigenerationalliving #jamband #grandparenting
do your future self the biggest favor, and allow the tough talk. just like the sex talk, get it over with and move on.
parents who want to talk to us about end of life are offering us one of the greatest gifts we’ll ever receive. the gift of knowing that the decisions we make about treatments, care, and burial arrangements actually reflect what they wanted. the gift of focusing on grief when the time comes, rather than paperwork and logistics. the gift of not having to guess, and live with the doubt of whether we guessed right.
rejecting that conversation provides short term relief in exchange for long term uncertainty. have the talk.
#agingparents #longtermcareplanning #caregiving #longtermcare
new on breaking curfew: the day my dad became “old” overnight, the quiet expectation that our elders just hurry up and disappear, and a provocation to feel less afraid of aging (without the power of a psychedelic retreat)
link in bio
🗣️ we need to be talking about the cost of longterm care, and whether your family is preparing for it.
if your parent starts to need support to get dressed, take a shower, manage their medications, etc., you’re easily looking at a yearly bill upwards of $100,000.
if your family decides that an assisted living or nursing facility becomes necessary, you’re easily looking at $10,000+ a month.
in the absence of really good longterm care insurance, that money is coming out of your parents’, your or your siblings pockets, and we need to be planning accordingly.
#longtermcareplanning #agingparents #longtermcareinsurance #longtermcare #financialplanning
there’s an unbelievable amount of noise at end of life, and all of it prevents a dying person and their family from focusing on the most important and meaningful thing in those moments — grief.
a death doula’s singular mission is to work with a family at the end of life to help usher in the most meaningful, connected, and beautiful death possible. they help with:
(1) translating the chaotic healthcare system, being a first line of defense for decision making, filling out paperwork, and just generally protecting the family from as much of the STUFF involved at the end as possible
(2) making space for purposeful, connected, enduring conversations to unveil last wishes, forgivenesses, regrets, expressions of support and pride, love, preservation of legacy, and so much more
(3) designing death and after death, to fill it with ritual, meaning, and an environment that makes the dying person feel most at peace and the family most present
if you’re supporting a loved one through end of life right now or know someone who is, send this to them to help them consider whether a death doula is the missing puzzle piece to help facilitate the most beautiful death possible 💛
#deathdoula #nicolekidman #endoflifedoula #endoflifecare #deathcare
