Informed Aging

Episode 80: Life's Last Gift

• Robin Rountree and Edith Gendron • Season 1 • Episode 80

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Robin: [00:00:00] Welcome to Informed Aging, a podcast about health, help, and fun. and hard decisions for older adults.
I'm Robin Rountree, a former family caregiver. I've worked in the home care industry and now work for the Alzheimer's and Dementia Resource Center. 
Edith: Hi, I'm Edith Gendron. Thank you for joining us today. I'm the executive director here at Alzheimer's and Dementia Resource Center. And for the past 40 years, I've worked with adults, primarily seniors in elder services and aging services.
Robin: The thoughts and opinions expressed belong to Edith and I, not our wonderful employers and sponsors. This podcast is a service of the Alzheimer's and Dementia Resource Center. We are not affiliated with the Alzheimer's Association. Before making any significant changes in your life or your person's life, please consult your own experts.
Today, our guest is Tee Rogers. She's with Dignity [00:01:00] Memorial. She's going to talk about funeral and cremation and that last part of it. party that is thrown in our honor. Stick around. It's not going to be painful. . I promise. [00:02:00] We are back with Tee. Rogers, a Funeral Cremation Cemetery Pre Planning Advisor with Dignity Memorial. Can you put that in simpler terms for me? 
Tee: I help people get their final arrangements in place in advance, so they're not left doing that during a time of crisis.
All 
Robin: right. Because when you have learned that your loved one has passed away, either expectedly or unexpectedly. That is not the time to be planning a funeral. 
Edith: Correct. Take it from me. 
Robin: Oh, you've been in those shoes. 
Edith: Oh, yes. Okay. You get that call, and you go, right? And you [00:03:00] look at the rest of the family, and you say, Who's going to pay for this?
Tee: I'm so sorry you had that experience. So am I. 
Edith: So everybody listen and pay attention and do what Tee says. 
Robin: Right, right. So let's talk about that financial component first, because Edith, that was your shock. You're like, Oh, all of a sudden, in addition to all my normal bills, I have a funeral bill to pay.
That's not fun. . So the average. Funeral these days, how much does that cost? 
Tee: Well, that's really going to be different for every person, right? So, , we can say the same about weddings. What is the average wedding cost? 25, 000, but that's not the same for everyone.
So, it depends on what you choose. I think the average funeral cost right now is 10, 000 to 15, 000. Hmm. 
Edith: And I always say, unlike weddings, you only get to do this once. 
Robin: You only get to do this once. Hopefully the wedding is only once if you pick the right person the first time. But hey, I've 
Edith: been on the beach [00:04:00] twice.
Robin: Right. No judgment here at all. So 10 to 15, 000, that's not something you just want to throw on your kids or your heirs. That's a lot of money. If that's how you want to go out. But that's a choice that you can make now and make sure it happens. Just the way you want. 
Tee: Right, it's your story, you tell it your way.
And no matter what your plan is and what your choices are, it's never going to be less expensive than it is today, right? Because prices continue to go up. 
Robin: It's not like gasoline, it goes up and down and up and 
Tee: down. 
Edith: No, good point though. 
Tee: Yeah. 
Edith: Wow. 
Tee: And when you pre plan, you lock in those prices. You also, uh, help avoid the emotional spending that can occur at the time of a loss.
Robin: Let's talk about that, the emotional spending. It's, um, having to write an obituary, and , I notice a lot of them [00:05:00] read the same because it's kind of like a, a Mad Libs, right? This person was born here and worked here. These are the children they had, and this is where they lived in the church they attended.
That's kind of And they're 
Edith: expensive. 
Robin: Well, they are expensive, yeah. 
Edith: They are expensive to print and put in the paper. 
Robin: Right, but if you want that for yourself. Right, you 
Edith: better plan 
Robin: for it. Plan for it and leave the money there, right? Yeah, 
Tee: well, for something like an obituary, that would be, not a cost that the funeral home can control.
Right. You could put a cash advance forward to cover that if you wanted it printed in a paper. , with us, you get a free obituary on the website and many people go that way. , But when you plan in advance, you lock in a lot of the prices, right? Some things are not locked in. And that's one of the questions that you need to ask when you meet with a pre planning advisor, what items might not be covered in the plan that we've talked about today and what items are.
you know, not locked in in the prices. 
Robin: All right. So [00:06:00] I, I say to myself, today's the day. I'm going to look into pre planning my cremation, which would be my choice. , Once upon a time, you'd go to the yellow pages, but those aren't around anymore. So how do you find someone to help you through this? 
Tee: Well, you're going to, You know, choose a funeral home that you trust to serve your family in the time of grief and to take care of you after your death.
Um, and then you're going to reach out to them and ask for a pre planning advisor, or as I like to call us, time travel agents. 
Robin: Ooh, I like it. Ooh, explain, explain. 
Tee: So if you could imagine, Um, hopefully very far in the future, your loved one sitting with a funeral director, having to make heavy emotional and financial decisions in a time of grief, trying to guess what you want.
Um, we can take that moment and we pull it back in time to today so that we can take care of all of those [00:07:00] decisions and financial burden so that they are not left doing that at the time of your loss. 
Robin: What a gift to give your people. 
Edith: I'm thinking of the comment emotional decisions and we might chuckle about it now, but my siblings and I actually had a very heated discussion with the funeral director, funeral home owner, over the casket for my father.
It was, we ended up with a Coleman because my dad had been a camper and he had Coleman. camping gear. And some of us were like, No, he has to be in a Coleman. And so, you know, that when you said emotional decision making, that popped into my head. It's like, and how much more was that versus something else? I don't recall it, it just wasn't a factor.
It's like, we are going to have that Coleman. And that was pure emotion. And I'm not sure it was the best financial decision, right? It's what we it's one of the things that happened. 
Robin: But plan it in advance and you can make that. If you decide, I want top [00:08:00] of the line, casket, then if you're paying for it, then you get it.
Edith: , as an aside, did you know that Costco sells caskets? 
Robin: I'm not surprised. Did you know that? Did 
Edith: you know that? Yeah, you would know that. I was horrified to find out. I don't know why. 
Robin: Just don't get them in bulk, because that would be really weird. Look pretty 
Edith: weird for the neighbors. 
Robin: So, what are some mistakes that people make in, in this end of life planning?
Uh, obviously number one would be not doing it at all, , what else, what other problems pop up? 
Tee: Well, I would say not doing it young enough. So, you know, over the years, I have seen the difference every day in families that come in when there is a plan in place and when there is not a plan in place. And you know, we are always honored to walk with families through that process whenever they come to us, but, , if I could just get everyone to plan in their twenties, no one would ever have to walk through our [00:09:00] doors and, you know, very rarely have to walk through our doors not knowing what to do.
Or, , what the plan is. Okay. 
Edith: We say that in so many things, don't we? Yeah. If you would start in your 20s, planning for retirement. Right. Putting away for it. If you'd start in your 20s, eating a plant based diet and exercising more, you're protecting your brain. So, 20 year olds, plan for retirement. Pay attention.
Robin: Right. 20 year olds don't pay attention. 
Edith: I know. My grandson's 21. Good luck with that. 
Robin: But we're good at really, we're really good at telling them what they should be doing in that decade. Oh, I'm 
Edith: excellent at that. It's my superpower. 
Tee: So. But did we do it? 
Edith: Oh, I don't, ask me if I have one now. 
Tee: That's okay, we'll make an appointment when we're finished here.
Edith: there you go, there you go. I know what I want, I just haven't done anything about it. 
Robin: There we go. So how specific can you be in what you want? What can you solidify now? 
Tee: Well, you can, you can, solidify pretty much everything, right? [00:10:00] Um, there's, I always tell families there's two buckets to this, right? One is the logistical, um, the contract in place with a funeral home where you pick out your casket.
So your family isn't ordering the Coleman if that's not what you would have wanted. , and you, you can pay for the facilities and the decor and the catering and flowers and stationary, you know, the registry book and funeral cards and all of that. You can. do all of that in advance. That other bucket is the details, right?
So what would you be wearing in the casket and what kind of flowers would you want? Those types of things you're going to write down for your family. Every funeral home is going to have a planning guide, you know, to give you. I think ours is the best. Um, but they will, if you write that down in pencil, as those things change over time, you can edit them.
Edith: Thinking of the, you know, the sudden death of my nephew, you recall when that [00:11:00] happened and that was one of the ones where we all sat there looking at each other going, how much can you contribute, right, to trying to, , and it's incredibly emotional to try to plan something for a young person that was totally unexpected.
And you find yourself trying to find things that were meaningful to that person. Right? So when I think of pre planning, I think, what a gift to give your family. It's like, you don't have to wonder, did I pick the right song? They know. Right. What a great gift. 
Tee: Yeah, you can't ever take away the grief that they're going to be going through, but by pre planning, you're taking a huge rock out of that backpack that they're going to have to carry.
Robin: That's a great way to put it. Yeah. So, If I decide to pre plan, which would be a very good thing for me to do. When you decide to pre plan. When, when, when. 
Edith: We're going to get two for one. Two for 
Robin: one. Two for one. We're working on the 
Edith: deal. Two for one planning session. Maybe they can cremate us together. 
Robin: Oh, [00:12:00] wow.
Eternity with you, Edith? 
Edith: Eternity, eternity, Robin. Eternity. I'll even have them hold me until it's time. 
Robin: Tee I'll pay you extra to make sure that doesn't happen. Oh my gosh.
Tee: I'm not sure we have that plan 
Robin: so, but you aren't expecting me to write a check or hand over a credit card for 15, 000 today, are you? 
Tee: So unlike at the time of a loss, when you plan in advance, there are going to be payment plan options available to you. 
Robin: Nice. Yeah. All right. So my morbid brain goes to, , I've made this arrangement and I paid for three months and then I get hit by the proverbial bus.
 What happens then? 
Tee: So, that is something you definitely want to address with the funeral home you're making a plan with, right? Make sure you know what happens if you pass away before you finish making payments. A funeral home is always going to hold your money [00:13:00] separately from their funds. , we do that by holding it with an insurance company.
So if you were to pass away while you're still making payments, then all or a part of that would be paid off by the insurance, depending on some answers to health questions. 
Robin: Okay. Okay. So what happens if If I pass away when I have checked off the last item on my bucket list, I'm sitting in Italy. I've just had the most amazing meal, had my limoncello, and I'm, I'm out.
What? How do we get my body to Florida? 
Tee: So um, that is another great question. You want to make sure you know the answer to when you're pre planning is what happens if I pass away when I'm traveling. . What happens if I move? What happens if I change my mind? How do I make changes?
All those. So our plans, we have a travel protection plan and that covers all of the costs of transportation, as well as coordination with foreign [00:14:00] mortuaries, repatriation, all of the, the logistics that need to happen. 
Robin: I mean, planning a funeral is one thing, but I, repatriation of a body, I would have no idea how to handle that. 
Edith: They do that within the countries of the UK.
Oh. My friend Don's son, he was in Wales and they had to go through that to bring him back into England. 
Robin: But wouldn't it be nice if, you know, Somebody else was in charge of handling that. 
Edith: Yeah, that would have been really nice. The only nice thing about that. 
Robin: Right, right. Okay, so, do people dream big? I'm nosy.
Do they, do they like put down Disco Ball and, and uh, I don't know, a Jimmy Buffet soundtrack? 
Edith: I was just thinking The Temptations, Life. 
Robin: Oh my gosh. 
Tee: Yeah. Okay. We'll put that in your plan. 
Edith: Cindy Lauper, Cindy Lauper live. There you go. 
Tee: Okay. Yeah. So it's a, it is a broad range.
It's whatever is first of all, going to honor you [00:15:00] best, but we have to remember, it's not just about us, right? Right. Whatever is there to support our family in their time of grief, you know, what is going to support them best? What, you know, religious, secular, or spiritual traditions need to be honored? What family traditions need to be honored?
You know, what is going to give them the most comfort in coming together and supporting one another in their grief when you're no longer there with them? 
Robin: Okay. All right. Maybe no disco ball. 
Edith: Well, Or 
Tee: maybe a disco ball. 
Edith: Yeah, maybe. I'm gonna say this too. Insist on answers. You know, my poor mother in law that I bring up all too often.
We asked her what, you know, she's, she's Getting up there. Any idea? What would you like? What songs? And she said, I don't care. And I said, Oh, okay. I have a friend who is an imam. So I'll have him come then and he can say a few words. Well, you wouldn't do that, would you? So you do care on some level. We all care.
We may not [00:16:00] want a lot, but we do care. 
Robin: Right. 
Edith: We do care. 
Robin: And so after that final party, as I like to put it, because I want mine to be a party. 
Edith: Okay. 
Robin: Then you got to figure out where you're going to be. Okay. Right? Or you'll end up in a box, in a closet, so be very clear about where you want to be. Can you give a backup option too?
Tee: Yeah. So, I mean, I always tell families it's important when you're choosing cremation that you have some kind of final resting place plan, right? It can be cemetery or legacy cemetery where multiple family members are together. Or you can do scattering or planting, but I have walked into family's homes where there is a mantle full of urns because they keep getting passed down.
And the oldest kids are looking at us going, You know, what do we, what do we, what do we do now? And when they get passed down, that person, or even the first generation of receiving them 
[00:17:00] might 
not know, you know, well, would they want to be scattered or is that against their religious tradition? If they would want cemetery, what would they want?
Would they want above ground or below ground? So. It is important that we have that conversation, you know, it's, it's never an easy conversation to talk about final wishes, but it's so much easier today than it is in the future. 
Edith: Yeah. 
Robin: Okay. Heavy stuff, heavy stuff. It is. But again, such a gift to give to those who are left behind.
Yes. um, to make their lives a little bit easier, which is good. 
Edith: Here's a tiny little quirck because you know it's me. My grandmother did do all of the pre planning. Um, casket choice, clothing, everything. So you've seen both sides, the planned and the unplanned. I have seen both sides and here's Now, here's the thing.
thing that I took away from my grandmother's, and it is nowhere near as soul crushingly painful [00:18:00] as not having any answers, as we didn't have further family members. So we're there, and the flowers are there, and her colors, and there was nothing for us to do. to buy or to contribute because I'd said to my dad, well, you know, I want to buy some flowers for me.
He said, no, no, no, no, no, that's all taken care of. And I get it, but I didn't appreciate how hard it would be not to be able to like have the flowers up there with the ribbon that says grandma on it. Now, technically, I guess I could have. It was my dad's mother. He said, no, and I'm not going to contribute to his distress either.
So, When you are pre planning, remember that people do want to somehow acknowledge. Right? , what you meant to them. Right. Maybe it isn't through flowers, but then work into the ceremony maybe that they could say something or whatever. I don't know. I don't have all the answers, but I just remember coming away from that thinking I couldn't really do [00:19:00] anything for my grandmother.
Robin: Okay, you 
Edith: know the traditional marking of the loss. 
Robin: Right. And, you know, I learned by my mother's passing, in lieu of flowers, please donate to this. Well, some people just wanted to still send flowers. Yes. And I accept that. Like, you're grieving, I'm grieving. Whatever you need to do, I'm not going to judge. So I think that's a a good way to go into it as well.
Edith: Tee said it beautifully when she said it's not just for the deceased person. It really is for those that you leave behind. It really, really, really is. Because you're not gonna know Whether they do it or not. 
Robin: Allegedly. Yeah. 
Edith: I have a high authority that I don't know what I'm talking about in that regard.
But generally thought, right, that um, you really aren't going to know, so, yeah. 
Robin: So, , memorial jewelry. This is something that I'm seeing more and more of. Interesting. Or like the planting. Um, do you guys help facilitate any [00:20:00] of those things? 
Tee: There are so many options out there, Robin. There really are. And certainly, you know, If you pre plan with us, we have cremation jewelry and we have the fingerprint jewelry for people who are not either being cremated or comfortable with having cremation jewelry.
There's cremation glass. There are, uh, keepsake urns. So just so many different things that, that you can do. 
Robin: Can you actually, I've heard this and I don't know that it's true. It didn't come from the internet, but can you have the cremation ashes made into jewelry? Have you heard of that? 
Tee: Yes, we have a program where you can turn them into diamonds.
Robin: Hello. I always thought I had a sparkle to me. I can keep that going. All right. How do people get a hold of you. If they want to, they want to sit down like I am going to and figure all of this out. 
Tee: So you can certainly [00:21:00] contact me directly. My cell phone number is 407 608 9242. , or you can contact a Dignity Memorial Funeral Home and ask for a pre planning advisor or whichever funeral home you choose.
Robin: . Thank you so much for joining us. I really do appreciate it. 
Tee: Thank you. 
Robin: Please make sure to subscribe to our podcast, Informed Aging. Tell your family and friends about us.
If you'd like to support the work that we do at the Alzheimer's and Dementia Resource Center, go to ADRC cares dot org slash donate... You can find us at Facebook. com slash Informed Aging. Today's episode was recorded at ADRC's podcast studio. That's it for now. We're looking forward to our next visit.