Grand Plans: October 26, 2023

A semi-monthly newsletter from Grand Plans designed to normalize and celebrate our glorious geri-destiny through information, stories, real talk conversation, smart planning and shared experience.

Geri-news you can use

Give up your seat, for Pete’s sake! Sitting all day increases dementia risks (WaPo PAYWALL)

Wish you knew more about what Five Wishes is all about and why you should have it? Your wish is my command with this sample link. I wish you would get off your wallet and spend the $5 it costs to ensure your end-of-life experience aligns with your expectations.

Getting older is all about lessening our sense of self and increasing our intentions to share, give, teach, love and impart. This young lady is wiser beyond her years and is making a big difference in the lives of others — we can all find inspiration in her simple, most loving example, I think!

Another important “getting older” mindset is to stay relevant so you can connect with all those helpful young people in your life. So don’t be a Padawan, zhuzh up your word skills for crying out loud! Here are a few words to help up your word fluency game.

Catch this freaking word: centimillionaires. And apparently, they are slinging major lettuce at superaging. But do we really WANT to live forever? I’m not sure who that’s really good for, all I see are dollar signs and a sh** ton of pills. No thank you.

Then again, maybe all that pill-popping and uber exercising makes for long-lasting geri-hawtness that would make centimillionaires of any age perfect candidates for this popular new show.

Speaking of shows, you may be old if you just stopped getting yours this way LOL. RIP Netflix DVDs.

Geris-prudence

Getting legally prepared — whether it’s for yourself or your parents or someone who tapped you as “their person” — is not a quick and easy process. And there’s certainly a lot more to it than drawing up a will. What do you know about probate and non-probate assets, for example? If you haven’t experienced the legal aftermath of a loved one’s death, you probably don’t know much. Find out all about this juicy legal estate planning detail from San Antonio, TX-based estate lawyer Seth Bell in this short video.

Fit as a fiddle

Movement is your best friend — and it can extend your life, so get to it! According to Jacksonville, FL-based wellness researcher Heather Hausenblas PhD, “The science is clear: every system of our body benefits when we move.” Read more about the hows and whys in this easy-to-digest piece. If you aren’t subscribed to Heather’s Substack newsletter, Wellness Discovery, I highly recommend doing so. Each newsletter she publishes is short and informative and shares helpful tips on how to enhance your health and wellness — at any age! We were fortunate to have Heather on the Grand Plans podcast several weeks ago, and invite you to listen to her informative interview here.

The grand sum

Learn about “lifestyle creep” and the 10 most underestimated living expenses in retirement in this informative piece from AARP, a club we’ll all join one day if we haven’t already!

“You may think that your big expenses in retirement will be for greens fees at golf clubs, spa charges at that resort in Crete, and taking the kids out for avocado toast on weekends. And that may well be true. But some of your biggest expenses may surprise you — because you pay them already. The combination of everyday expenses and extraordinary expenses are what people find difficult to balance in retirement.”

In other news, if you’re turning over all stones like a mad person trying to stretch every dollar for your aging loved one, knowledge of this type of mortgage may be helpful. I learned about reverse mortgages during my crazy caregiving adventures, but this one was new to me. (My smarty pants banker hubs, however, tells me it’s long been a financial strategy just known by a different name.)

Podcast News: Grand Plans Season 2

Next up in the Season 2 lineup is an interview with Amy Gunther, M Ed, an ACE-certified personal trainer and group fitness instructor. She has been working with active adults on their health and fitness for decades and has developed a seven-point plan to maintain good physical function as we age. This interview is in two parts! It’s a must-listen for sure. Hear Grand Plans Season 2 Episode 5 and 6 here, or wherever you score your podcast downloads.

Things I’m prattling on about today

It’s been almost three years since we cleared out my father’s Holly Springs MS estate to market it for sale. What a learning process!

Thankfully, much of the large period furniture was sold with the home and it had been voided of most personal items that would have held meaning for my brother and me. Also thankfully, my brother and I — and our spouses — were a good team and on the same page for the purging process.

But the thing I learned was that I will never EVER accumulate so much “throw away” BS in my older age. My dad had one entire closet dedicated to paper party products and funny cocktail napkins. His cabinets were stocked with multiple full sets of Pier 1 and Pottery Barn tableware, glasses, plates, and utensils — and cloth napkins, in case he ran out of paper cocktail napkins, I guess. There were hoarder-worthy collections of tortilla chips and salsa, bless his party-loving heart!

My dad loved to entertain at his beautiful home, but I’m not sure he was accounting for need and overstock. So all that extra stuff, all that rando cheap decor and semi-unused serving pieces were extracted, piled on the porch, and donated to the first person who said he would take it all away. We didn’t have months or the bandwidth to make sure all this extra stuff found just the right home. We thoughtlessly gave it away. Over and over again.

I want to remember what a wasteful hassle all the extra can be to my loved ones. I want my Grand Plan to include thoughts around reducing, reusing, and rethinking every purchase. #GrandPlans

Shelf Life

I’ve just started reading this newly released hit, and I’m ready to recommend it. The Big 100: The New World of Super-Aging by William J. Kole drives home the fact we all need to remember now: we are living a hella LOT longer these days, which directly affects our Grand Plan and the financial, legal, and medical preparations we’re making for it.

“By 2050, the world’s centenarian population—those aged 100 or more—will increase eightfold. Half of today’s 5-year-olds can expect to reach the same heights. It’s going to upend everything we thought we knew about health care, personal finance, retirement, politics, and more. Whether we’re 18 or 81, this tectonic demographic shift will affect us all. The Big 100 confronts readers with both the brightness and potential bleakness of a fate few of us thought possible. Journalist William Kole guides us on this journey into our future, an optimistic but sometimes fraught exploration of super-aging as the grandson of a centenarian.” 

And now for some exciting, grand book news…stay tuned for details!

Shared experience

We can all learn from each other’s geri-scary moments. What are some of your takeaway lessons? What have you promised yourself you’ll never do to your loved ones? What worked for you? What didn’t? More conversation and story-sharing helps elevate the geri-experience for all of us. If you are willing to share your grand tales, email susannabarton@me.com and I’ll put them in an upcoming newsletter. Here’s today’s Shared Experience:

“What have we learned that we won’t repeat? We will be certain that our health care powers of attorney, durable powers of attorney, living wills and do-not-resuscitate orders are all up-to-date and are printed on the right color paper. Yes, really. Florida, where my parents and you both live, requires the DNR be on yellow paper. EMTs, emergency rooms and other health care facilities will disregard it if it’s on white paper. Also, my father’s POAs and living will, which were done and executed in 2002, had to be updated before anyone would accept them. We were lucky that he was lucid enough the day my parents’ lawyer went to his bedside to update them. Had he not been “of right mind,” we would have had to go through a long and costly guardianship process before we could, say, engage his long-term care policy.”

— Anonymous

O-Bitchin

I think the beginning of this obituary is really beautiful.

William B. Pence — “Living an earthly life so completely that, when illness comes, you pray to transition quickly to your heavenly home is testimony to a deep faith, gratitude for what has been and longing for all things yet to come. And so it was that on October 8, 2023, William B. Pence, Jr., age 98, slipped into the arms of Jesus from the McGraw Palliative and Hospice Care Center. (Read the rest of the obituary here.)

Some golden gedunk and goods

Like most normal aging adults, my hair has started thinning a bit since its stiff-claw-bangs 80s heyday. My doctor suggested taking these supplements but I’m not sure how well it works. (They taste yummy!) I’m totally NOT a product person, but I have seen some good hair-did results from spritzing a little of this in my hair (though, this one smells better TBH) before giving myself a home-job blowout with this handy tool, which a friend suggested I get on the stick and buy stat. I now cannot imagine how I did my stringy, thinning hair without it.

Speaking of good smells, if you’re going to splurge somewhere with your retirement savings buy this detergent. YES — it’s redunk expensive — but I swear, one little splash goes a long way and you will be amazed by how many people sniff you out and compliment you on your sweet scent.

Check out our Grand Plans merch in our new Etsy storefront.