J U LY 2 02 6
FEATURE: THE CONVERSATION WE
NEVER HAD: ASKING YOUR AGING PARENTS ABOUT MONEY BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE A client called me two days after her mother had a stroke. Her mother was alive but not speaking. The hospital needed to know about insurance and her mother’s advance directives. Within days, she would also need to know who held financial power of attorney to pay her mother’s bills. My client, who was 58 and had spent her career running a small business, did not know the answer to any of those questions. She assumed her mother was financially fine, but did not know where the will was, who the attorney was, or what her mother wanted if this moment came. She spent the next four months piecing it together. The accounts came out of a manila folder at the back of a closet. The will was out of date, and the law firm that created it had merged and changed its name since her mother had used it.
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