open letter Wednesday

[sdlaura]

Sorry you’re dealing with that rere! My parents totally have all their ducks in a row (despite being in great health they email me another advance directive or estate planning doc like every other day) because they had to deal with it for my dad’s parents and saw how important it was. MIL has always lived in a fantasy world. They have some $ but not so much that it won’t evaporate very quickly if they need long term care, which SIL says is coming sooner vs later, so they need to plan for it. And it will all fall to local SIL if we don’t do anything, and I refuse to do that to her.

[supertrooper1]

mae0111, happy belated birthday! I'm sorry your family is so selfish. Especially your H after he dropped the news on you this week too. Definitely make it a birthday weekend and treat yourself.

[supertrooper1]

Dear ex-H,

Why did you buy DS expensive deodorant that is made by one company and can only be bought on Esty? You know he hates change and I want to be able to by him deodorant at the grocery store or Target, not make a special purchase on Etsy.

Signed,
Annoyed parallel parent

Dear coworker,
It's interesting that you haven't answered a team email in months, yet we have a new temp supervisor and all of a sudden you're answering emails, chiming in on calls, and going above and beyond.

Signed,
Curious coworker

[rere]

@sdlaura my cousin and I were at a graveside service not too long ago and he pointed out where my aunt and uncle had pre purchased their plot, head stone, and prepaid the funeral. Not in bad health, but just taking that off the children. I said that was nice because mom's probably down at the bank trying to get another 30 year loan against the house.

[mae0111]

Aging parents is hard. I was a late teen and young adult when my parents/grandparents were going through this. There was a ton of fighting among the kids over, basically, nothing.

I am very grateful that my parents have gone through the preplanning process - they have plots, I think, though they were talking about cremation. They have their services planned and paid for. The house is in a trust, and my sisters and I are trustees. I'm hoping that they literally have $0.00 left by the time they pass away. I keep telling them SPEND IT ALL!!! BUT... the house is SO FULL... so that will be a thing.

H and I own MIL's house, so that part will be easy. BILs and H cleaned out her long-term home when FIL passed away. Any clutter in her house now is actually BIL and SIL storing things in the house, so they can clean it all out when the time comes...

[mommyatty]

Ugh. I don’t look forward to when MIL passes for so many reasons. We care for her now. She’s still in good health and pretty independent, but we gave her a car and pay her car insurance, we take her for medical care when she needs it, we feed her dinner every night, we make sure someone knows she’s alive every day. BIL who is in his 60s calls her regularly for money. DH is already on the deed to her house and her bank accounts with right of survivorship. She has no will, and basically everything she has will skip probate because DH will own it by right of survivorship. Except I guess the contents of her home, which is mostly stuff that belonged to FIL so DH already owns half of that because FIL also had no will.

BIL I’m sure is expecting big money when she dies. MIL makes vague references to how she knows her sons will be fair when she dies. My view is we will give BIL what he gets under the law and not a dollar more. He’s taken his inheritance while she’s alive. We give her stuff, including care. He takes stuff and hasn’t seen her other than when he wants something every few years. And he fritters away money like mad. (He has NFL season tickets and went on a cruise last week… he’s a maintenance man for their rural school district, so not exactly a high paying gig). But then he’s also an alcoholic with advanced cirrhosis who won’t stop drinking, so maybe he will go first and we won’t have to deal with him after she’s gone.

[sdlaura]

Re:planning for elder stuff, I’m not really concerned about the post death planning. My family members will be cremated and we’ll hold a memorial service when we feel like it. I’m concerned about the potentially years/decades of pre-death care and decision making and cost that will be required.

[k3am]

sdlaura that’s the exhausting part. Especially if you’re long distance and decision makers aren’t in agreement. We’re finally on the “other side” with mom settled in memory care, the house sold, finances sorted, but I swear the years in between were some of the hardest.