: Widows & Widowers

Taking someone in need under your wing

Hello everyone:

I want to pay tribute to some folks I know. They are the unsung heroes who take a new divorcee or widow or widower under their wings, to help that individual who is hurting get back on his or her feet.  May you be richly blessed for your kindness to someone who is hurting.

I know a lady who did just that with a work colleague. She invited this colleague, who she had not known before except to say “hello,” into her life when the lady suffered an unexpected loss.  This woman has been there for the other gal. She’s taken her to dinner, let her spent the night when it was too painful to face the empty bed at home, and given her advice on how to cope with the death of her husband. She is a devout Christian, as you might expect, and there is a hurting lady who now knows where she is going when she dies, thanks to the outreach of this wonderful woman.

If you know someone like this, I hope you will share his or her story with my readers. These are the behind-the-scenes folks who are treasures from heaven.

Best,

Dr. Sheri

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Being financially mindful

Hello everyone:

I met someone recently who is facing some real challenges since her hubby died without warning. She had no idea of how he handled the finances, she didn’t drive, she didn’t own any assets in her own name, and she had some in-laws that were more like outlaws. They told her they would “take care” of her, if she signed her hubby’s life insurance over to them and signed her house over to his children from his first marriage.

Apparently, she did sign over the life insurance and they are paying her a monthly amount that meets her mortgage payments and not much else. Oh, and they have offered her a one-way ticket to the country from which she immigrated (after she signs over the house).

Folks, in-laws can become out-laws really quickly when money is involved. Please make sure that, if your spouse has already passed, you get some strong financial advice from a financial consultant (as opposed to the in-laws that want to take your money from you and get rid of you).

Please be as wise as a serpent and as harmless as a dove because being the latter can get you into real hot water.

Best,

Dr. Sheri

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Cleaning your living room: “Wow!” or “Oh, my!”

Hello everyone:

Many years ago, I had the chance to visit the daughter of some friends. I went into the living room and discovered that the entire house was coated in plastic sheets, from the rug to the end tables to the sofas and chairs.

That is not a good way to live, although cleaning the place was a breeze because all she needed to do was dust off the plastic.

When my grandmother became a widow, she stopped taking the blankets off of her fine living room furniture (she kept things covered when grandkids were visiting but removed them when she and Grandpa were alone in the house). She was put in a nursing home about 20 years after her husband died; when we removed the blankets, we saw that the fabric had completely disintegrated. It was sad that no one ever got to see the beautiful fabric; all we saw was some old wool blankets over all her furniture.

I once knew a single fellow who had hardwood floors throughout the downstairs of his house. I went over to help him with some remodeling and noticed that his floors were in dire need of mopping.

Now I was raised in Florida, where we had terrazzo floors or carpeting throughout our homes, so this was my first exposure to hardwood. I suggested we get out a mop and bucket; he went nuts.

He told me that you wouldn’t use water on your furniture, which is made of wood, so you shouldn’t use it on your hardwood floors. He wanted me to use furniture polish, which I did. It took a whole can of polish to clean those floors.

Here is my older-but-much-wiser advice on this topic:  Do not try to clean your wooden floor with furniture polish!!!!!!!!  It does not lead to happiness (or cleanliness). It leads to falling down and floors that are still dirty, even though they may be shiny.

Do you have any tales of woe about cleaning? I would love to hear your story!

Best,

Dr. Sheri

 

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Thoughts on keeping food fresh

Hello everyone:

Let’s talk about bugs. You may like them personally under some circumstances (which I cannot imagine) but you don’t want them in the kitchen, eating your food.

When I grew up in Florida, I went to an un-air-conditioned high school with direct access to the outside world. The school had problems with palmetto bugs and cockroaches. When we put our lunches in our lockers, the bugs frequently got our lunch before lunchtime.

We got used to carrying our lunches with us all morning; I developed a taste for squashed peanut butter and jelly sandwiches by default because my sandwiches always looked like they were run through an old-fashioned ringer washer by lunchtime. Please note that we could also stop here and talk about the rats in the locker rooms, but I digress!

Sealed containers are great for storing cookies, pretzels, and cereal. They are not expensive and can be purchased at the grocery store. If your significant other never had them, please buy some and transfer your food into them.

If your dearly beloved had them but the food has been in there for an extended period of time, dump the food and start over. You may be growing penicillin, otherwise.

Here’s a quick bit of information: if you like soft cookies, put a piece of bread in the Tupperware-type container when you add cookies and they will remain soft longer. The bread will become hard as a rock, so you will need to toss it out and replace it occasionally, but the cookies will be delightful.

I hope this information helps you on the way to a bug-less storage of your food.

Best,

Dr. Sheri

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Long term care can cost you and arm and a leg, so beware

Hello everyone:

I was talking to my financial consultant recently. Our topic of conversation was long term care. Here’s what I took away from our chat:

Do you have long-term care insurance? It is extremely expensive to get long-term care; yet you really can’t afford to be without it. Long-term care insurance (LTC), an insurance policy, helps provide for the cost of long-term care beyond a predetermined period. LTC covers care not generally covered by health insurance, Medicare, or Medicaid.

To get into one quality long-term skilled care facility in my area, you are expected to give a one-time “facility gift” of $50,000. The care then runs between $10,000 and $11,000 per month, depending on the level of need. That is a substantial chunk of change, so I hope you can see the need here.

Where would you get the money to pay this kind of bill? The pool of insurance for long-term care usually plans on the costs running about $125,000 per year. However, keep in mind that a joint plan provides this for you and your spouse; if one of you has used it up, there is nothing left for the other spouse to draw on. Folks usually last about four years in one of these facilities. If they stay home and get care, the lifespan is usually 15 years.

Do you qualify for long-term care? If you have pre-existing medical problems, the answer may be “nope.” You have to plan on using long-term care insurance or you could end up in a Medicaid facility.

The interesting thing about these places is that, if the treatment you need is not available locally, they can ship you off to the nearest place where it is available.

I heard a horror story lately where an elderly woman who was not insured needed specialized care. One day when her daughters came to visit her, the daughters found out that their mother had been shipped some other place three weeks before their visit that day (they really needed to visit their mother more often!).

It took a while before they could even learn where their mother was, since folks had forgotten by then and they had to look it up. As it happened, the mother was shipped from Maryland to Pennsylvania. The daughters, who apparently had not seen fit to visit their mom very often when she was local, now had to drive a distance to check on their mom. that’s not a scenario you want to experience, so be prepared!

Best,

Dr. Sheri

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Cleaning out the closet- make sure the widowed or divorced person is ready

Hello everyone:

If you are familiar with the movie Diary of a Mad Black Woman, there was a scene where the betrayed wife Helen (Kimberly Elise) was taken by Medea (Tyler Perry in drag) to her former home and her old closet.

Medea encouraged Helen to tear up the clothing of Brenda, the other woman (Lisa Marcos). As they utterly destroyed the closet’s contents, clothes flew all over the place. This was a great source of relief to Helen and Medea as they took revenge on the adulterous husband Charles (Steve Harris) but it, along with the wholesale chain-sawed destruction of the living room, led to their being taken to jail. It is not a good way to get a closet organized, although it did relieve some tension.

My sister-in-law knew a gal whose hubby died unexpectedly. A relative of the lady came into her house and removed all of the dead man’s clothing; she thought she was helping out, but the lady had wanted to do it herself, as part of the grieving process.

She had planned on making a comfort pillow out of one of her hubby’s dress shirts, but that plan was nixed by her relative’s over-eager approach to cleaning out the closet. Make sure the person is ready; let things happen in their own time.

Best,

Dr. Sheri

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Why I wrote Suddenly Single and maintain this website

Hello everyone:

There are several sets of ideal readers for Suddenly Single. They include widows and widowers, new fathers whose wives die during childbirth, divorcees, long-term caregivers, the terminally ill, and relatives of widows and widowers. With the exception of new fathers, the bulk of these readers are Baby Boomers in their 60s and 70s.

Many of them are retired, having planned on spending the rest of their lives with their spouses. They are unexpectedly alone and may be feeling overwhelmed by the amount of work that they will now be required to do. If they are a long-term caregiver, statistics show that they did not chose to take over this role, but felt obligated to do so.

Widows and widowers may have had a brief period of time during their spouse’s illness where they became aware that they might end up alone, but the illness may have been brief and left them little or no time to prepare. If they planned their finances carefully, they may be financially secure, or they may be like a divorcee who suddenly realizes that her husband wants to jettison her for a younger model.

The new father who suddenly loses his wife will most likely not be prepared for this situation at all, thinking that he would have many years with his young wife before they had to consider death and dying.

Likewise, divorcees may find themselves suddenly ousted from their seemingly-secure marriages, finding themselves in need of information on how to maintain their homes.

The serious illness of a parent or loved one can add stress as individuals try to juggle the demands of managing more than one household and family. Terminally ill individuals may wish to plan ahead by practically preparing their families for their eventual demise. The relatives of widows and widowers may wish to provide their loved ones with the guidelines for effective household management.

According to the American Community Survey Report, their statistics state that “the majority of widowed males and females were 65 years and over (70 percent and 66 percent, respectively)” (7). Widow’s Hope states that “800,000 people are widowed each year in the United States. Nearly 700,000 women lose their husbands every year and will be widows for an average of 14 years” (para. 1). Widow’s Hope further states that “there are 13.6 million widows in the United States” (para. 2); over half of the women in America who are over 65 years old are widowed (Widow’s Hope, para. 19).

The problem will only increase over time, since the U.S. Census Bureau estimates that there will be 88.5 million people over the age of 65 in 2050 (Profile America Facts for Features, para. 3).

Now you know!

Best,

Dr. Sheri

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Long term care: Love it, don’t lose it

Hello everyone:

Do you have long-term care insurance? It is extremely expensive to get long-term care; yet you really can’t afford to be without it. Long-term care insurance (LTC), an insurance policy, helps provide for the cost of long-term care beyond a predetermined period. LTC covers care not generally covered by health insurance, Medicare, or Medicaid.

To get into one quality long-term skilled care facility in my area, you are expected to give a one-time “facility gift” of $50,000. The care then runs between $10,000 and $11,000 per month, depending on the level of need. That is a substantial chunk of change, so I hope you can see the need here. Where would you get the money to pay this kind of bill?

The pool of insurance for long-term care usually plans on the costs running about $125,000 per year. However, keep in mind that a joint plan provides this for you and your spouse; if one of you has used it up, there is nothing left for the other spouse to draw on. Folks usually last about four years in one of these facilities. If they stay home and get care, the lifespan is usually 15 years.

Do you qualify for long-term care? If you have pre-existing medical problems, the answer may be “nope.” You have to plan on using long-term care insurance or you could end up in a Medicaid facility. The interesting thing about these places is that, if the treatment you need is not available locally, they can ship you off to the nearest place where it is available.

I heard a horror story lately where an elderly woman who was not insured needed specialized care. One day when her daughters came to visit her, the daughters found out that their mother had been shipped some other place three weeks before their visit that day (they really needed to visit their mother more often!). It took a while before they could even learn where their mother was, since folks had forgotten by then and they had to look it up. As it happened, the mother was shipped from Maryland to Pennsylvania. The daughters, who apparently had not seen fit to visit their mom very often when she was local, now had to drive a distance to check on their mom.

I hope you find this information helpful. It is not meant to provide legal information, but simply to provide a guide towards preparing you for long term need ahead of time.

Best,

Dr. Sheri

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Being penny wise and not pound foolish

Hello everyone:

I met up with a former high school teacher a few years ago, running into him at the mall. After asking what he was doing now, he told me that he was back at the same high school after a five-year break.

He immediately (and voluntarily) launched into an explanation, telling me that he had met a wealthy, older widow a few years before and that she had taken him into her home (and her pocketbook).

Over a period of a couple of months, she began giving him lavish gifts; her financial advisor cautioned her repeatedly that she was running through her estate very quickly, but she told him to mind his own business. One day, she asked her counselor if she should marry her much-younger boyfriend and she was told, “You might as well. You’re spending all of your money on him.”

They got married a short time later and their spending increased. He told me that they thought nothing of taking friends to Paris for the weekend or going to New York City for lunch.

He said that they had spent money like drunken sailors on shore leave, until one day when they found out they were broke. They were forced to sell her gorgeous house and their numerous expensive cars.

When I ran into him, they were living in a very modest home with economical cars. He said, “I spent all of her money and now we are back to where I was before I met her.”

To his credit, he did not divorce her and move on, he was actually taking care of her, albeit at a considerably lesser lifestyle than they had become accustomed to. His hard-earned advice: Be careful with your money and spend carefully!

Best,

Dr. Sheri

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It’s good to have a stash of cash

Hello everyone:

Yesterday I had the opportunity to chat with a recent widow who opened my eyes about things financial and widowhood, so I wanted to pass her comments along to you. Her hubby died six months ago and his finances still aren’t completely worked out. Translation: She hasn’t gotten any money from the estate yet.

The good news is that she owns her own home. More good news is that she had a small “stash of cash” to tide her over. Her husband was sick for two years and she managed to put some funds aside during that time. It’s a good thing she did, because she would be really strapped by now if she hadn’t.

So far, she has had to prove they were married by bringing in their original wedding license.Do you know where yours is?

She said every where she turns, they ask for an original death certificate ($20 each, in Maryland). She also told me that they will send the original death certificates back, if you ask, but that you still need numerous copies.

Because she did not have a financial consultant working for her, her finances have gone to probate court, including some land that he owned but she didn’t. Folks, if you do not have a plan, make one. If you didn’t have a plan and it’s too late for your spouse now, at least you have some company.

What is your sad story to tell?

Best,

Dr. Sheri

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