RETIREMENT
Planning Ahead
Preplanning can help your family during challenging times
Photo: iStockphoto.com/kate_sept2004.
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BY THERESA SULLIVAN BARGER
few weeks after my sister’s death, I searched her home looking for a white binder containing our mom’s legal documents. The closing on our childhood home was less than a week away. Our elderly mom had dementia and was living in assisted living, so we were selling her house. My sister had our mom’s power of attorney but upon her death, the role fell to me. I needed the original legal documents to sign the closing papers. My brother-in-law had no idea where my sister kept important papers. A math whiz, she handled the family finances. Even in my grief, I resented her for not giving me at least basic instructions regarding her wishes and our mom’s care. Of course, I felt guilty for feeling that way. I had tried broaching the subject two and a half years earlier when she got her terminal breast cancer diagnosis. “You’re going to beat the odds; I know it. But just in case you aren’t feeling well temporarily, please just tell me where things are,” I said.
“That’s unnecessary,” she said. “You’re being negative.” Her family had to plan her funeral during the pandemic with no idea of her wishes other than having a closed casket. If our family had talked openly and regularly about dying, we could have avoided months of stress, second guessing and headaches. “We don’t know what the future will hold and whether we will get sick. It’s much better to have people in place who you trust who can step into these roles,” says Theresa Marangas, an estate planning lawyer with Meier Law Firm in Latham. “COVID was a great catalyst for learning about how to do things smarter, how to be more practical and not in denial.” It’s not just about planning your funeral and who gets a family heirloom. The pandemic has taught us that even young, healthy people can get sick and die. “Without a will, if somebody passes away, New York state law dictates who receives your estate,” Marangas says. At the point someone is old enough to make their own WINTER 2022 | 55PLUSLIFEMAG.COM 59
