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I had kids I had to take care of. I had a mom I had to take care of, I had a full-time job, you know, and a dog and a boyfriend on top of all of that. Um, and this is just American life, like you’re always juggling things.
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Watching your parents age can stir up a mix of emotions, and if you’re the caregiver who more often than not is the daughter, caregiving can be an overwhelming sea of endless checklists and mind-numbing paperwork. And what you need is a guide, a Sherpa. Well, today we have our guide, Beth Pinsker, author of My Mother’s Money. Beth, welcome.
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Nice to see you, Bob.
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Great to have you here, Beth. And uh it’s great because we go back a long way. Uh, we’re both personal finance journalists. We both have our certified financial planner designations. Uh, we both write about money. We were both in the elder planning class, uh, promoted by the Financial Planning Association. So, I feel like these are old times.
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You were, I was in the class. You were teaching the class.
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Well, all right. Well, we were in it together. All right, so let’s, let’s start as a
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real expert here.
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I’m not sure about that. You wrote the book on this. So, let’s start with the money issue. Um, the average caregiver spends thousands of dollars annually, um, out of pocket on expenses. And I’m curious, based on your experience with you and your mom, what’s the single most effective legal or financial planning document that folks need as you think about caregiving?
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Uh, it’s the power of attorney. The durable power of attorney is, is the number one thing that I found.Most useful. And I’ll say that the, the average number is like 7200 from AARP, uh, for, for right now. And I will say that I hit that in the first month, um, of caregiving for my mom because I didn’t have the power of attorney set up. I had to write a really huge check for her as an emergency thing because she had let her long-term care insurance premium.Lapse because she hadn’t filled out the paperwork in so long that her claim lapsed and they wanted a premium from her and it was $6800. So between having to write a check for $6800 and FedExit to long term care insurance and, you know, probably two flights in a month to Florida for her surgery and for, you know, helping her out further than that, I hit that $7200 in the first month.
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Yeah. So oftentimes people who get a durable power of attorney for financial matters, the document, uh, is different, maybe for different financial institutions. Did you happen to, uh, uh, face that when you went to show people that you had the durable power, but they wouldn’t accept it?
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Yes. Uh, this was probably, I, I had started to write about my mom’s surgery, um, and, and the caregiving aspect, um, just a little bit like right when it happened because I had a column due and this was the only thing I could think about, like, you know, I’m sitting in her hospital room thinking like, what the heck am I gonna write today? And the subject matter was right there in front of me cause it was all I could focus on.When I got to writing the column about having such trouble using the power of attorney form, I realized how many people face the same dilemma. It’s like an epidemic out there of people who cannot be power of attorney because the banks won’t let them. You walk in with these documents that you think are going to save you in an emergency, and the bank just shakes its head at you and says, no, these aren’t. We need other documents and we need the person.To come with you. Well, if the person could come with you, you wouldn’t need the documents, um, you know, so I said, look, my mom’s in the hospital, she just had surgery, she can’t walk, she can’t sign papers, you know, she can barely talk. So, you know, I can get a notary to the hospital, she can use an online notary. They’re like, no, she has to come in person. I’m like, well, that’s just not going to work. You have to accept my documents. That’s what the documents are for.And it took 2 appointments. So I went the first time. I was there for about 1.5 or 2 hours, uh, just arguing with them, just going back and forth. These are documents that are valid. No, they’re not. Yes, they are. No, they aren’t. And then they made me come back for an appointment, another 2 hour appointment, and then a 3rd 2 hour appointment. And finally I got the paperwork through that, that one financial institution.And then I had to do it with all the other ones. So it was just an enormously time-consuming and frustrating process. But I talked to one lawyer for my book who you probably know, Jenny Roselle.Um, and she had to sue a bank to accept the power of attorney that she had drawn up for her clients because they wouldn’t accept it, and she knew the state law was that in, you know, that if they’re valid documents that the bank has to accept them, and people need to know their rights. People need to know what they’re entitled to.
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Yeah. It, it seems like if you know in advance where all the financial institutions are that your mom or dad have their money, and you go to them in advance to say, will you accept this health, this uh proxy, this financial power of attorney. Uh, and if not, what do I need, right? So that you’re planning in advance of a crisis, so that you’re not going through what you went through, might, might seem like good advice.
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That is the absolute best advice to give anyone, and a lot of people balk at it nonetheless because they think that they’re handing over control of their finances to their, you know, adult child or whomever it is, and they think that that that that the document is, is sort of binding immediately. But these durable power of attorney is designed to be an emergency document, and the way I describe it is it’s like leaving a spare key at the neighbor’s house.Right, you’re not inviting the neighbor to come over anytime they wish at 3 o’clock in the morning and make coffee in your kitchen without letting you know. You’re, you know, the key is there for emergencies if you get locked out and are having a problem. There, you know, that’s the same thing with the power of attorney. It’s not there for somebody to take over for you while you’re well. It’s there in case something happens to you that somebody has permission to open the door to your finances.
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Yeah, it’s the break glass option. So you just mentioned something that I want to turn to, which is you spent hours upon hours upon hours trying to straighten all this out. And one of the things that we know is that for many caregivers, uh, this is the reason for career gaps, which can hinder their re-entry into the workforce should they leave their employer or if their employer doesn’t grant them some sort of leave for caregiving. What’s your thought about like how people need to sort of survive their career when they become a caregiver?
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It’s a, it’s a big juggle. Um, I was a cliche American caregiver, you know, 52 year old woman with divorced with teenage children and no help at, you know, no help at home, so I had kids I had to take care of. I had a mom I had to take care of. I had a full-time job, you know, and a dog and a boyfriend on top of all of that, um.And this is just American life, like you’re always juggling things, but you come to a point in, in with a crisis, a healthcare crisis, and an elderly person, an aging person who’s dying, um, and things are going to get serious and they’re just going to take over at some point.You know, my mom at the end just needed me to be there to be there and not try to work and not try to parent at the same time. And so I had to go to work and say, you know, the words, uh, I’m leaving and I don’t know whereI’m coming.
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So back. So it’s like career be damned then, right? Like there’s no, there’s no cost greater than, right, like who cares about my career if I’m taking care of my mom or dad.
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Well, it’s not necessarily that, it’s that, like, I don’t, I’m not advocating for people to quit their jobs, I’m advocating for jobs to be humane.My job was humane. I have a very remote, friendly job, and they are very decent human beings. And so when I said, I, my mom is sick and I don’t know how long this is all going to take, it’s just going to take what it takes, they were like, Yeah, do what you got to do, you know, we’ll be here to support you any way that we can, and we’ll be happy to have you back when you return.Not everybody’s going to get that response, but they should. That’s the thing about the American system is that if you don’t have a remote-friendly job, if you’re a cashier at a store, they’re not going to look very kindly on that kind of response. And so,The it’s the system that should be better, not people. Like if you have a sick parent and they’re dying, and you’re due at your job, you know, sitting in a cashier.You, you have to make a choice, and the parent’s only going to die once, and you only have one shot at it. So I think that the system should be more forgiving and more humane about that kind of choice that people are facing.
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Yeah. Um, you just earlier described what to me sounds like a lot of stress. Um, how did you deal with, um, you know, what coping mechanisms did you have to deal with maybe some of the, the negative emotions and stress around this?
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Uh, junk food, mostly, um, there was a Chipotle and a Jersey Mike’s right across the street from the hospital. Um, there’s a Trader Joe’s right down the road. Um, yeah, I mean,
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is
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that
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your advice, get, get sick next to it, become a caregiver next to it at Jersey Mike’s.
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Uh, you know, I had very little time, you know, I would come home from the hospital and when visiting hours were over at 8 o’clock at night, I would give myself till 9 o’clock at night to eat junk food and watch TV. And then I had to do paperwork.And that, you know, it was like I needed a break. I gave myself a break, and that was how I got through it. I have a lot of supporting, loving people in my family, and I have a lot of friends, and, you know, I have a therapist and all sorts of people to help me with my, you know, emotional life, and I leaned on all of those things. You have to, it takes a village, you know.Um, it’s a really hard thing to go through, and you just deserve every resource at your disposal to get through it.Yeah,
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and if itmeans that in your books.Yeah. So I think there’s a stat in your book that says that uh people experience health declines when they become caregivers, maybe up to 26% poorer in overall health. Um, did you experience that? And what advice do you have for folks who might be experiencing um some sort of health issues?
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Yeah, I think a lot of that is um spouse caregivers who are the same age, you know, as the person that they’re caring for. Um, there are a lot of sad stories. I mean, think of Gene Hackman.Right? Gene Hackman’s wife is taking care of him with advanced dementia, and she’s an older person also, and she had a health issue. Caregiving wears you down, and she was a primary caregiver, not just a financial caregiver, and it’s just a really stressful, hard, full-time, you know, job 24/7. It’s more than one person can really do. And so care.Givers are prone to all sorts of illnesses, and this takes them out of the ability to care for the person who’s sick. This is when adult children tend to come in. Now, you know, I was a 52-year-old woman. I didn’t have, um, you know, significant health issues of my own, but, you know, like I have the same back problems my mom had, which precipitated her illness. And so sitting bedside.You know, for hours upon hours upon hours was not great for me, um, but, you know, like, self-care is important. I took, I got up and took walks. I got, took, got up and took breaks. Um, I was much better about that than the paid caregivers, at least when I was there. They were just sort of like, you know, on their best behavior and would just stay in the room constantly. I’m like, what aboutA lunch break? What about a bathroom break? What about 15 minutes to go walk around outside and get some fresh air? Being in a hospital setting is just a really difficult experience. And my mom was, from the time of her surgery in November of 2022 until she passed away in July of 2023, it was like 8 or 9 months, she was almost always in an institutional setting for that time period, andYou know, it caused delirium in her, it caused also, you know, delirium in the caregivers and and me and my brother too.
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Yeah. So, would your, uh, sort of advice be, be mindful of your needs, right? Your health needs, your sleep needs, your, you know, your exercise needs, whatever the case may be, just don’t forego your personal health for the sake of being a caregiver.
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Yeah, nobody can sit there 24/7 bedside for a long illness. I mean, think about somebody who’s got dementia and it goes on for 10+ years. I spoke to one woman from my book whose mother was in dementia care for that long.And she says she wished she knew at the beginning and could tell her beginning self that this was a marathon, not a sprint, and that, you know, every phone call wasn’t a cause for her heart to start palpitating and for her to go into, you know, flight or fight emergency mode.That this was all going to just take a really long time to play out and that every day was going to be something new and a new challenge and that she could just roll with it and be a little bit more, you know, zen with it all because it was all just going to happen whether she worried about it or not.
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Yeah. Beth, we have to take a short break and when we come back, we’ll talk more about some of the other caregiving challenges that you and others face in that role. So don’t go away. Welcome back to Decoding Retirement. I’m speaking with Beth Pinsker. She’s the author of a new book called My Mother’s Money.Beth, uh, when we, before we took a break, I mentioned that there are a whole bunch of other challenges that caregivers face. One of them, I think, is what I would describe as the burnout factor. You’re spending maybe 26 hours a week, maybe years at a time being a caregiver. II know in my case, with my mother, it was really just 6 months, but with my father, it was over a decade of caregiving and long-distance caregiving, uh, on top of that. And, uh, it was easy to be burned out through all this caregiving. Uh, what’s your advice to folks who are experiencing that?
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I think that taking whatever help is offered is, um, a really good, uh, piece of advice. Also, there are things that you can outsource and there are things that you can’t. Um, the physical caretaking is expensive to outsource, but possible. Um, and often it spares families, um,Some of the humiliation and, and, um, dignity loss that that comes with caregiving, you know, the helping with bathing and incontinence and things like that. My mom didn’t want us to do those things for her. Um, however, she was, there wasn’tSomebody that she was going to trust with her ATM card and the code. Um, you know, my name was on the forms that gave somebody legal responsibility to do financial and medical things for her. She couldn’t really give that task to anybody else and wouldn’t have trusted anybody else with that. I mean, my mom was an older lady. She didn’t even bank online, you know, like that’s how distrustworthy she was of the system. She wasn’t going to hire some third party person.To manage her money, she would think that it was just going to all get stolen, but she trusted me and she trusted my brother, and that was a task that then we had to personally fulfill. Um, if I wanted to outsource that task, there were parts of it that I could get help with, but at the end of the day, if the credit card company needed to be called, it had to be me on the phone, you know, if there’s checks to be signed, I had to sign them. I couldn’t then secondarily outsource.Those tasks. So, the, the advice is to do what you need to do yourself physically and, but, you know, try to get help with as much of it as you can otherwise.
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Yeah. Uh, you mentioned your brother, but we know that the vast majority of unpaid caregivers, uh, is performed by women and typically the oldest daughter or a daughter. Um, and this can contribute to significant lifetime financial losses, loss of contributions to a 401k, Social Security earnings, a lower benefit, uh, on and on and on. Um, what’s your advice around the gender divide and how did you deal with it with your brother?
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Well, my brother and I had a good division of labor. He’s a very, very private person, so, um, I left him out of the story, um, largely on purpose because, you know, he didn’t really want to be figure into it. He did quite a bit. Um, I did the billing because that’s my forte.Uh, he was really much better at dealing with the doctors, and I hated dealing with the doctors. So, you know, we had a, a, a division and we sort of leapfrogged each other on trips. So there was no reason for both of us to be there at the same time. We’re both busy people. We both haveKids, you know, his job was less remote friendly than mine. So I would go for a week, and then as soon as I would leave, he would go for a week, and then I would go back for another week. And we, we kind of, you know, somebody was usually, one of us was usually always there, but, um,You know, the, the financial burden of managing all of that was, was largely on me, mostly cause that was in my skill set, and I think that what you’ll find is like, I have a financial, particular financial skill set, but it really is just, you know, the, the oldest daughter, um, doer philosophy, you know, like, I’m just the one in the family who gets stuff done, so,That isn’t always a gender issue anymore, um, but think about in your family, just think about the person who, um, assigns everybody a dish to bring for Thanksgiving, right? That’s the person that’s gonna end up with all the caregiving tasks, right? That, that’s the person that gets everybody organized, who, you know, orders the matching t-shirts for family trips, um, who, you know, is always the one who sends out the birthday cards and neverForgets, you know, anything, um, any special event that anybody’s having, that’s the person that ends up with the caregiving tasks because they’re the ones who do stuff. That could be male or female, it doesn’t matter. They’re only children out there. There are blended families, you know, families look, family and people look all different these days, but there’s always somebody there who’s the doer.
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Yeah.Um, you and I know that planning to become a caregiver should not be done in the middle of a crisis, um.What’s your advice around avoiding planning for this during a crisis? Like there’s a lot of, you mentioned mind-numbing checklists and paperwork. We have, you mentioned earlier, um, the durable power of attorney for financial matters, but we need a healthcare proxy. We need a HIPPAA. We might need a, uh, advanced directive. We might need, uh, a, a living will, etc. right? We need, we need lots of stuff in preparation for the possibility of a crisis.
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Most of all, you need to listen. Um, our mutual friend Annaly Krueger would tell you, would tell everybody, um, if she were here, that you, you need to listen, you need to be paying attention. You, if, if you guys are, if like a family, it’s together for the holidays, and you’re gathering up everybody, you need to notice stuff. You need to notice, um, is the car.Parked halfway in the driveway and halfway on the grass. Um, are there stacks of mail? Is the house in any sort of disarray? Um, you know, I would notice things like, um, whenever I would come to visit my mom, the first thing she would do is hand me her keys and ask me to go to the mailbox to get her mail.Because she was having so much problems with mobility that she couldn’t get down the elevator and through the lobby to her mailbox. Like that was a problem, like that was something I should have noticed as a red flag, like, oh, she’s not doing so well here on her own.Um, another red flag is when I would call her, um, she was always there to listen to me, no matter what. Like, I thought I was calling her, uh, to help her to keep in touch, and she was really just listening to me endlessly blather about my life, um, so patiently like a mom should do, um, but sometimes she would shoo me off the phone, and I would think, OK, something’s wrong.You know, like, what is she not telling me? She doesn’t want me to be on the phone to hear something in her voice that she doesn’t want to give a clue to, and that would be a red flag for me. Um, when I finally went down there and um started to poke into her bills to start paying them.I realized she was giving a lot of money away to politicians of her political stripe. Um, nothing nefarious in that, but more than was responsible for her finances. Like it’s like she was giving compulsively um or just giving to anybody who asked without any thought about how much she had already given, was she giving effectively, um.And this is a red flag, you know, like, but you have to be paying attention. You have to, to be looking for warning signs, you know, instead of just saying, oh, mom seems fine, everything’s OK, I don’t have to worry about or step in or do anything right now. Like they’re gonna be little things that you can see if you’re paying attention.And if you don’t see those things, then something big is gonna happen. Mom’s gonna fall, or crash the car, or, you know, any one of those things. When I was talking to Annalee Krueger for my book, um, she’s um a financial caregiving, um, specialist, and, uh, you know, she, uh, our call was late in the afternoon when I did the interview with her, and her dad had crashed the car in the morning.Um, her, I forget how old her father was now, but, um, he’s in his 80s, and, you know, she, she had to cancel her whole day, you know, her whole morning, and deal with, with her dad, and you don’t wanna wait, wait for that sort of thing to happen. Um, she had a plan, of course, I just want you to know that like she knew that day was coming when he was gonna have some sort of minor, it’s a very minor thing, but, you know, that.When somebody stops driving, that’s like a family crisis.
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Yeah, uh, Beth, we’ve run out of time, unfortunately, but we’d love to have you come back on and talk about things we didn’t get to in your book if, uh, if that’s OK with you.Yeah, absolutely. All right, so that wraps up this episode of Decoding Retirement. We hope we provided you with some actionable advice to help you plan for or live better in retirement. And don’t forget, you can listen to and subscribe to Decoding Retirement on any of your favorite podcast platforms.
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This content was not intended to be financial advice and should not be used as a substitute for professional financial services.