Talk to Your Elderly Parents about the Future | How To Start?

As Oakland County Estate Planning lawyers, our clients often ask us how to approach their parents to make sure their aging parents are properly planned for.  Especially in terms of nursing homes, long term care, and estate planning.

Having a conversation with your elderly parents about their future is not an easy topic to approach.  It often times makes adult children nervous because they fear resistance, conflict and silence.  However, according to www.talk-early-talk-often.com, you should fear the crisis that could occur if you don’t start this conversation.

They recommend that you start beginning the talks with your aging parents by starting out small.  However, topics that need to be covered include long term care options and estate planning goals.

To avoid crisis, www.talk-early-talk-often.com recomend focusing on TEMPO as an acronym for the talks

• T-iming: It is important to approach the subject at the right time.
• E-xperiences: It is often best to tie the conversation to direct experciances, such as if you just completed your estate plan with your  estate planning lawyer.
• M-otivation: Make sure to be clear about your motivation for the discussion.  Your motivation should be for the benefits of your parents.
• P-lace:  Make sure that you have created a “safe space” to have these discussions.  Privacy is important, so having this discussion in a public place may not be the best idea.
• O-utcome: Your outcome should be to establish a safe, honest, open dialogue on the future long term care and estate planning needs of your parents.

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