A Loving Final Gift

From the editor: I recently saw a post about “death binders.” Intrigued, I contacted Betty, who’d written it, for permission to share it with you. Here is her post:

I wanted to share something with you that my husband and I have been working on. Having both been widowed before, we realized how unprepared we were afterwards. We each purchased a large three-ring binder and 100 plastic sheets to plan our estates. The first page has names and phone numbers of those we want to be contacted after our death. Next is our wishes such as cremation, burial, obituary, etc. and what funeral home to use. We even put down details about a service such as songs and pallbearers. My husband has a pre-planned and prepaid funeral, so all of those papers are in his binder.

We copied both sides of our cards for social security, health insurance, banks and credit, and included all bank accounts and passwords (including for our computers). Then we have our wills, living will and POA and other legal papers, including military papers, the house deed, and auto titles. We also included our birth certificates, marriage license, death certificates for our previous spouses, and insurance policies, stocks, retirement papers etc.

We verified that both of our names are on everything including the house and vehicles, and that they are transferrable upon death. We listed all utilities and their phone numbers. Be sure both names are on all utilities or they may be canceled, requiring the survivor to pay a new deposit and start over. Anything important is in the binder.

We each keep our binders in our own locked safe and pull them out when we think of something to add. It sounds like work but in the end It will be appreciated. I was a mess after my first husband died, and scrambled. I wish that we had done this. Our respective children know about this too. I hope that you find this helpful.

By phone Betty shared that 12 years ago, her husband Jim was killed in a car wreck in which he’d been a passenger. She said, “We’d been married 42 years, and he took care of everything.”

Betty’s current husband of nine years, Dale, is now dealing with cancer. She said, “We decided we wanted to get everything together, documenting every possible detail to help the surviving partner, or loved ones should we pass simultaneously.”

Our thanks to Betty for sharing. While difficult to talk or even think about, leaving instructions is one of the most loving gifts you can leave loved ones. Grieving will be painful enough without the added stress of tending to your effects without a clue to where to begin.

If you have a tip to help make life easier, please email publisher@50plusmagazine.net. Your wisdom can truly be a blessing.