End-of-life planning documents are important to have in case something happens to you. When my mom was dying of Early-Onset Alzheimer’s disease, I realized that though she had the required documentation, I wished she had left more specific directions on her final wishes. That’s why I’m writing this, to help you and your kids/next of kin through your passing. I’ll be focusing on Healthcare Directives for this blog post, which can help give your family members peace of mind during your final days.
Disclaimer: I’m not a lawyer or financial planner; I’m just a mom who lost her mom and realized what I wish she had spelled out in her end-of-life documents, especially her healthcare directive.
The Basics
The most common documents you’ll want for end-of-life care planning are:
- Advance Healthcare Directive: designates a health care agent and leaves health care instructions
- Durable Power of Attorney: designates who will make decisions for you if you’re unable to do so
- Dispositive Documents: Will, Trust, Beneficiary Desinations, etc.
For most of the basics above, it’s best to contact a lawyer, financial planner, or other estate planning professional, as these are legal documents.
However, the Advance Healthcare Directive (or simply referred to as a Healthcare Directive) is something you can complete on your own, so, I’ll be focusing on that document for this blog post.
Advance Healthcare Directive
An Advance Healthcare Directive, or simply referred to as a Healthcare Directive, can often be prepared for free. You can find forms online, often at your local hospital’s website. If you live in Minnesota, here is one you can complete (might be valid in other states, too): Health Care Directive
The healthcare directive does need to be notarized to be official, or at least have two adult witnesses to sign that they witnessed you sign. Often, hospitals may provide notary services free of charge before you file, as you having a healthcare directive helps them when you come to them in your time of need.
The healthcare directive asks specific questions regarding end-of-life care, instructions for loved ones and healthcare providers, and who will make tough decisions if you’re unable to. Having this documentation helps reduce the chance of a family dispute regarding your end of life wishes.
Why Details Matter
Fill out your healthcare directive as fully as you possibly can. This will help your loved ones/family members the most so they aren’t left wondering what you would have wanted. My mom filled hers out the year she was diagnosed with Early-Onset Alzheimer’s Disease, though it’s not as specific is as I wished it was. She only filled out two parts of the 8 pages, other than signing over her rights to my father, and then to me if he’s not around. Even the sections she did fill out, are left to broad interpretation, which some family members are seeing differently.
Don’t let this happen to you and your family members; it’s not fun and causes family rifts at the worst possible time.
Having specific instructions as to when/how you want to be fed, treatments to prolong life, what you want to happen for specific medical conditions, and whether you want to be resuscitated if you have a terminal illness. Let me be clear, I’m not upset with my mom about her not being specific; she already had a diminished capacity, and she did what she was able to.
I suggest starting these documents in your 30s or 40s, hopefully long before you’ll need them. It’s also good to update them at least every decade as things may change over the years.
Details to Include
Basically, anything that you can fill out within the document, fill it out completely.
Think of different situations that could arise, such as:
- If you’re in an accident
- If you are diagnosed with a terminal illness
- If you’re diagnosed with Alzheimer’s Disease and are unable to make decisions for yourself
It also helps to include:
- Quality of life vs quantity of life decisions
- Organ donation, including brain, full body, or just basic organs
- Medical treatments, including pain management
- Palliative care and hospice care services that are most important to you
- Medical Care decisions such as whether you want to be on life support
Within the Advance Healthcare Directive, you can detail different scenarios and what you’d like to happen for each of them. This may seem overzealous, but it can be very helpful for family when it comes to needing to make important medical decisions for you.
Planning for your Funeral or Memorial Service
All of this is morbid, I completely understand it’s hard to think of, but this will all help your family later. It really helps to have your funeral arrangements planned, if at all possible, ahead of time.
You can document your personal preferences within your healthcare directive, or you can go one step further and contact the funeral home and/or church, and cemetery where you’d like things to take place, and have everything set up and paid for ahead of time.
I’m all for planning ahead, but I haven’t even done that yet. For now, I’m working on planning my mother’s funeral, and then I will write, in detail, what I’d like for my funeral.
Things to include in funeral planning:
- Which funeral home you’d like to use
- Which type of church you’d like to have your service at, or even better, a specific church
- Songs, including the opening hymn, sermon hymn, closing hymn, and other music preferences
- Who you’d like to deliver your eulogy: often a family member or someone you trust who you think will be able to stand up at your funeral to address the congregation.
- Choice of psalm readings during your funeral service
- Scripture readings during service
- Pallbearers
- Burial arrangements, including whether you like to be buried or cremated
- Where would you like to be buried or have your ashes kept or scattered?
- Any other family, religious, or military details you want to have included
Who to Give Your Healthcare Directive To
Writing the document is the first step, but ensuring that the people who will need it if something were to happen to you have it, is the next step.
Ensure that your spouse, or whoever you designate as your primary health care agent, has a copy of this document in a safe space, such as a safe, or somewhere they’ll remember where it is.
Share it with your medical team, including your primary care physician and your local hospital so they have it on file for you. This is especially helpful in case your primary health care agent isn’t immediately available.
You can also share it with your adult children and other important people you’d like to know your final wishes.
Ongoing Considerations and Updates
As I mentioned earlier, this is great to have, but also important to update from time to time. This is especially true if you need to update beneficiaries, have more children, if the people you designate as your health care directives pass away, or are no longer part of your life, etc.
I suggest keeping a copy of this on your computer so you can easily update it and refile it once a decade or so.
Keep in mind that sometimes these forms get updated. I noticed this when I was working on updating mine from a few years ago, and wanted to find an example form to share with you above. They updated the form, which doesn’t necessarily mean I have to update mine, but it might be worth updating to if I want to in the future.
When thinking about the other end-of-life documents that I mentioned above but didn’t go into, keep in mind you may want to update those if you switch or open bank accounts, acquire more important documents, gain more financial assets, life insurance policies, or if your end-of-life wishes change.
It’s important to complete all of these documents when you have the mental capacity to do so, which is not only important for the case of Alzheimer’s, but an accident or other illness that comes up as well. We can’t predict when these things will happen, so it’s important to do what you can now to prepare.
As a mom of identical twins and a son two years older, I have gained invaluable experience in the realm, and chaos, of parenting. With a Master's Degree and Education Specialist Degree in School Psychology, I spent years as a school psychologist, helping children navigate through their educational and emotional challenges. Now as a stay at home mom and professional blogger, I combine my areas of expertise to help you in your parenting journey.