Legal Resilience In Case of Emergency (I.C.E.) with Alessandra Long Esq.

When someone is either very, very ill in the hospital or passes away, that is a traumatic time for everybody. That's not when you want to be making decisions. You want things to be as easy as possible for everybody. Trust me, I like when they give thought into what they really want because it will help their family.

This is RxChill Pill. Now is the time to stay well. Each episode teaches your brain how to become resilient with amazing stories, knowledge from experts, and short meditations you can do anywhere, anytime to elicit your relaxation response. I'm your host, Dr. Juna Bobby MD, resilience and stress management physician and mother of two amazing kids. Knowledge is resilience. And today we're going to talk to Alessandra, who's a lawyer, about the things that we don't normally want to talk about. Unless you're a Buddhist that meditates on impermanence and inevitability of death, it's not the usual cheerful dinner conversation because normally we don't really want to talk about our own death or physical demise. We don't really often want to think about the worst-case scenario either. These are things that we usually try to avoid and pretend doesn't exist. Especially when we're younger, we tend to think that we're invincible and that nothing can ever happen to us. But again, it's part of resilience is being prepared for the unknown as much as you can. So we take advantage of whatever is actually in our control by getting as much knowledge as possible and taking action. And being legally prepared means that you can be present for your loved ones when it counts. That's why this episode, In Case of Emergency, or ICE for short, is something that will definitely promote the health of you and your family and your loved ones. So I'm excited to have Alessandra here to talk about the basics of legal resilience.

So today I have here with me Alessandra Massino Long. I'm so excited to have her here. She's the principal at her own firm, Law Offices of Alessandra Massino Long, LLC, and she represents corporations, nonprofit organizations, small businesses, entrepreneurs, consultants, as well as individuals, wills, trusts, estates, and sexual abuse matters. She's been named a Lawyer of Distinction in 2019 as well as 2020. I love Alessandra because she is a fellow mom, she's a superwoman, she, uh, is an entrepreneur, and, uh, she really cares about people. And I think that's going to come through for you here. And I think for me, that's one of the most important things that I look for when I'm dealing with a law professional, because it's really important that you pick someone that you trust, that you can lean on in ways that you might not think you would ask a lawyer to be there for you. And for me, Alessandra is one of those people. So welcome.

Thank you. Thank you for having me.

How are you doing in this quarantine? I know you're home with all of your family.

I'm doing fine, as well as can be. I can't say— it's juggling a lot and having a family of 5 under one roof 24/7 is never easy. Um, but I have to say everyone's been pitching in and helping each other out. Everyone has their own obligations, so it's not like we're all together. We're all in a separate room, you know, at most all day long, really all working, working and schooling. It's nice that we get to have dinner together every night.

So are you, are you able to get that together? Because some days I found that I couldn't even get everybody together for dinner. Everybody was in different parts of the and we kind of disappeared sometimes. And I was like, wait, we have to tell each other our schedules so we could at least have a meal together.

Yeah, we've been, we've been pretty successful with that. We kind of have to check some of the school schedules and some of the Zoom calls, you know. It's generally been working pretty well, although I have to say, maybe we all don't want to have dinner together every single night. It's a lot of togetherness.

Yeah, it is. It is. And it's, it's It's interesting because you and I both, we had kids that left home for a while now to schools, right? And now they're back.

Yeah.

Which we didn't expect.

Exactly. And now they're back 24/7, you know, and they don't generally want to be back. They love home, but they don't want to be home all the time and without their friends and without their school and without their ballet and their hockey and all their extracurriculars.

So you're, you're taking it pretty seriously. You're definitely distancing right? Because I know you have a lot of older relatives and—

Yep. Yeah, we have taken it very seriously since the beginning.

Mm-hmm.

My mother is, you know, 74. I've only met with one client and from basically 12 feet apart with gloves on and masks on. But I've been doing everything remotely for my clients and for my family. And, you know, the most I've done is a trip to CVS and maybe one trip to the grocery store, but I've been having everything delivered as best as I can. Just trying not to put anybody at risk in the household and then potentially make anybody else sick.

So, so lucky that you can do it all from home, right?

Yes. They've allowed us to witness and notarize remotely. And that is huge because otherwise I would not be able to— I could draft everybody's documents, but I wouldn't be able to have them actually executed. And until they're executed and finalized and signed and witnessed properly and notarized properly, they're not effective.

You're licensed to practice in New York, California, and D.C., Washington, D.C., and Connecticut.

And Connecticut, yeah.

So 4 places. So you took the bar in 4 states?

No, I took the bar in 3 states. I waved in. If your scores are at the time that I graduated, which, you know, is a long time ago now, you could waive into only 2 states. States if your scores were high enough to do that.

But you did have to take the bar in 3 states.

I did. I did.

Wow. Congratulations. So I used to teach, um, a pre-bar how to get resilient and manage your stress so you can focus workshop at Columbia Law School.

I could have used you.

I mean, it was such a stressful time for them, and I've seen videos of how the bar exam goes.

I'll never forget it. I could see it so clearly in my head. I, I took it at the Javits Center.

Yes.

And Remember? Yes. Yeah. And we got hotel rooms in Manhattan because I lived in Queens at the time, but they were like, you should get a hotel room so that if God forbid anything happens, you could be able to walk there. You know, like, this is your shot, you know?

Wow.

So you can't be late. You can't, you know, God forbid there's an accident, you know, anything. So, you know.

And it's days, multiple days, right?

Yeah, it's 2 days. When it got to the end of the 2 days and you were going to, you know, travel to go take that third exam, you know, that third day of exams, you're thinking, you're pretty much thinking to yourself, why am I doing this?

Okay, well, fantastic. So we're getting advice from someone who not only passed the bar but passed it in 3 states and has his license to practice in 4. So, um, I thought it would be a great idea to have you on today because, as you know, my podcast is about resilience. And resilience really, to me, also means having the most knowledge that you can about a topic that is troubling. Sure. Yeah. And sadly enough, a lot of my physician friends, and also I belong to some groups on Facebook, and there's been questions about young doctors in their 30s starting to wonder, hey, did I take care of all of my legal issues? It's something that they have to think about. And I guess some of them didn't have their will set up or they hadn't really thought about wills and trusts. So we're going to try to go through some of it and see if people can walk away from this podcast thinking, you know what, I really need to get this, this, this, and this together, seek legal counsel, you know, and to do these things if they haven't done so already. And for someone like my husband and I, we have to make sure that everything is up to date.

Yeah, it's very important to make sure your documents are in place, or if you've had them, you know, if you haven't looked at them in a long time, to dig them out of wherever they are and to re-look at them and make sure that they say what you want them to say and that you have all the documents in place that you wish to have and that are necessary to have in place. And I think you're right, to your point, there's, you know, a lot of young people out there which, you know, never thought about having to do this. I mean, usually this you know, doing wills, doing trusts, doing healthcare proxy, power of attorney, people don't think about until they probably get married and have a child, right? That's the normal time that they think about that. But I mean, I have been stressing for a couple of years now, children who leave, you know, who turn 18, young adults I should say, when they're no longer children and no longer minors, that they get these documents in place because the law law doesn't see their parents as being able to make those decisions for them automatically. They're adults. They are freestanding adults making their own decisions, and they should enter into these documents and execute these documents. And that way they give the power to their parents, which most likely— and in some cases, maybe there is a situation while be an abusive situation or something like that, that they don't want the parents. So then they can designate a friend or an aunt or an uncle or a trusted advisor to make these decisions for them. So it's very important. And a lot of people say to me, "Oh, well, my spouse, my husband, my wife, they'll just make these decisions for me." Well, it doesn't always work that way. And legally, they really, just because you're married, that doesn't give them the right to make those decisions for you. So it's really important when you're well to enter into these agreements, like whether it's a will, whether it's a trust, whether it's a healthcare proxy, durable power of attorney, someone authorized to get your medical records, All these things are so important and everything has its place and what it dictates.

So are you going to recommend to your 18-year-old, like, you should really have a will right now? Is that something you would recommend?

Well, I have to say, in the past I did not. I, I recommend because most of them don't have any assets, right?

And by assets, you mean like financial or like real estate? Okay.

Yes. Financial assets, not even necessarily necessarily real estate, but a lot of them don't have money in their own name per se, right? If they have an account, it's usually a custodial account, or their parents have named them in a trust or something like that. But, you know, even most of the 18-year-olds I know don't even have their own credit card. The parents are cosigners on the credit cards. So I usually don't generally, um, recommend a will, um, for them. But I highly recommend— I mean, and I'll qualify that with the fact that if they do have assets in their own name, then yes, they should have a will. But in general, I recommend that they do a healthcare proxy, healthcare proxy slash living will, a durable power of attorney, and an authorization of medical records. So the durable power of attorney is what I call the business document. That's my, that's my, you know, shortcut when I'm talking to people because that controls your assets basically. Like if you have any assets, if you're 18 and you don't have any assets, you just really want the healthcare proxy, the living will, and the authorization of medical records. But I also do recommend the durable power of attorney because say you're away at college, say you enter into a lease or you take out a credit card or you have you know, certain things that, you know, maybe your parent will have to take care of if, if God forbid something happens to you. So it will, you know, the durable power of attorney has like a litany of things, you know, take care of— you could take care of the person's taxes, you could take care of the person's real estate, you could take care of the person's whatever it might be, leases that they've entered into.

So, so you're almost like that person who has that durable power of attorney is acting as you.

Yes, exactly.

Okay.

In the event you cannot.

And who should you think of? I mean, it might not necessarily be your best buddy, right?

Right. Like, I mean, if they have a good relationship with their parents, then it's usually their parents. It could be one parent first as their agent, and then this other parent as a secondary substitute, or they can make both parents equal, having equal rights to take care of things. And they can make it either they have to work together or they can work individually, the two parents. And then they have like an aunt or an uncle or an older sibling serve as the substitute.

So you have to have multiple layers of like number 1, 2, 3 people?

I would think I've always done in my practice, I make it a point to do at least 2 people and sometimes 3. And given the situation that we're in at the moment with the virus and how it, how it's moving, I stress that even more. And I tend to go to 3 because God forbid something happens to both of your parents since they're quarantined together. Most likely, more often than not, right? Something happens to both of your parents, you want somebody, most likely, hopefully outside of the home, to also have that power.

And to be clear, the idea of power of attorney doesn't mean that they have a right to everything you own. It's just they have the legal right to, let's say, sign for you or take care of your business for you.

Yes, they have the legal right to take care of your business matters in your best interest, and that is what they should be doing. I can't say that it hasn't been used inappropriately at times.

Give me an example.

I mean, a child could steal from a parent. Basically, let's just say an adult child has the power of attorney of a parent. They could take that money, and even though they're supposed to be using that money to take care of their elderly parent, they could siphon that money and use it for their own self, you know, if they have nobody monitoring it or if they're, you know, not very scrupulous, you know. So it's very important to have people you trust in those positions. And, you know, sometimes specifically the Connecticut one does not have it, but the New York power of attorney is very extensive. It's almost 17 pages long. And without getting into the nitty-gritty of it, it has spot. In the event, you know, you want that person monitored, um, for checks and balances' sake, you could name someone to be a monitor. And it could be a professional, it could be another friend, it could be another family member, what— whatever the case may be. You know, more often than not, people don't put in monitors because they trust the person that they are, uh, naming, you know. And also specifically, you know, New York has a statutory gift rider that can be filled out where the person, the agent, is able to give him or herself gifts, gifts in a tax sense. You're able to gift people $15,000 a year, you know, so that's also, you know, something that is more complicated than some of the other power of attorneys in other states. Connecticut's regular general power of attorney, durable power of attorney does not have that.

And then the other 3 things that you said an 18-year-old—

the healthcare proxy slash living will, you can do them, you can do them in one document. Healthcare proxy really names the person who is going to make healthcare decisions for you if you cannot. That's clearly, obviously a very important document because, you know, if you are incapacitated in any way, whether it's temporary for a longer period of time, you know, sometimes I use the example of you could get into a car accident and break your arm and just, you know, be on morphine. And you, we know that's probably temporary, right? Because because you've only got broken leg or broken arm or whatever the case may be. But in those instances, you know, the doctor may be asking permission to the agent, you know, the healthcare proxy, can we do this operation? So that's a temporary situation. And then it gets more serious, obviously, if you're looking at the living will portion of the healthcare proxy, which, you know, where you're deemed terminal and whether you want to be on life support for nutrition or artificial, you know, life support, or whether you want to get cardiac resuscitation, um, and that type— or artificial tube feeding. So all of those things, that healthcare agent would be able to make those decisions for, for you. Um, but if you, if you write in your living will that you don't want those extraordinary measures if you're in a terminal condition, only if you're in a terminal condition, death, or you're going to be very disabled.

Uh-huh.

Exactly. Then you have the right to say that in this document. And then your healthcare agent should be, you know, giving that document to the doctors and being like, no, this is not what this individual wanted.

And so how often should you look at that for yourself? Because people change their minds, right?

Sure. I mean, I, I generally tell my clients that they should be looking at their documents every 3 years.

I know most people do not, but yeah, it's something like I don't really want to think about, right? It's, it's one of those things, just like nobody wants to think about if there was a pandemic, and yet here we are.

And yet here we are, and no one would ever think that, you know, possibly a household could be taken out, or, you know, something as dire as that, or two parents passing away, or a grandparent and a parent who live in the same house. And no one wants to think of that scenario, right?

So the healthcare proxy and living will is so that somebody can convey or tell the doctors what— that you don't want any extraordinary measures, or whatever wish you have.

That's the living will part. The healthcare proxy, just healthcare agent part, is just making, making those, you know, regular decisions for you when you're in a hospital incapacitated. You, you don't necessarily have to be terminal, you know, it could be which hospital to send you to and you can't be— you're not make— you can't make that decision on your own. It could be, it could be what type of medications that the doctor is giving you. It could be what procedures that you're getting to save your life. And I always say the most important thing for people to remember is to have discussions. And we're all so busy, you know. I have these discussions because I'm an attorney, but, um, you know, have the talk. You should talk, talk within your family, talk to each other. Make sure that the person who's making these decisions for you knows what your wishes are and what you want. Like, that's so important, even more important than actually doing the documents. I mean, obviously you need to do the documents in order to make it all work right, but they should know what you want. Your spouse, your kids, your kids, the parents, the elderly parents, you know, or whether it's an aunt or an uncle that doesn't have any children and you are, you know, the niece or the nephew and you're their person. You know, or it's a dear friend who is single and is, you know, combining.

But like you said, it's just such a topic that most people want to avoid because it's just a downer. It's not, right? You know, let's talk about what's going to happen if I'm in a coma. No, it's not like dinner conversation.

Exactly. No, not uplifting. No, it's not. It could be a dinner conversation and it could be a conversation to have over wine. You know, I mean, a little bit of wine, you know, just to to kind of relax you enough to be able to speak freely. And, and, you know, the question— nobody wants to talk about whether I want to be buried or whether I want to be cremated.

And it's, it's hard to even think about, like, for myself, do I want to be cremated or buried?

I would say that is the one thing that maybe 75% of my clients can't answer, and they don't want to answer. And some of them, it prompts them to go get a plot or to decide whether they want to be cremated or buried and whether they want a party or whether they want this, they want that. And we put whatever they want in the document.

So you can write like, I want a party for my funeral.

Yeah, I want a party. Cool. I want a party.

Yeah.

And I want you to use my money to throw a party for me. I want it to be a celebration of life. And, you know, and, and people do that. I like when they give thought into what they really want because it will help their family.

It helps their family emotionally.

Yeah. And it takes the burden off of the family as to what would they have wanted after, you know, because you know it's right there in black and white.

Yeah.

What they want, you know. And I think having, you know, when someone is either very, very ill in the hospital or passes away, that is a traumatic time for everybody. That's not when you want to be making decisions. You want things to be as easy as possible for everybody.

Of course, you're like in a fog of grief, right?

You're in a fog. You're trying to make a million different decisions, right? And, you know, if there are some decisions that are already preordained for you, and then, then that's, that's a better way to go. It's a gift to your family. In my mind, it is a gift to your family to know what you want and what your wishes are. Sure. Even for any age, you want healthcare proxy and living will, a durable power of attorney, and then I do a document called an authorization of medical records, which is just an easy document that allows your agent to get medical records for you. And it's, you know, it's sometimes very convenient.

So yeah, I mean, that, that's a big pain. Like, yeah, when patients would have to go in and sign their records out, like, let's say their whole file. And if you can't do that, you have that person that you trust who can do it for you. That's what you're saying.

Exactly.

And what would you say to somebody who says, you know, I don't have— I'm not I don't have any estate. I don't have that much.

Right, right. I get that.

Yeah, because people see the word estate and they're like, I live in an apartment or whatever, you know, it's not an estate.

We use the word estate very, very broadly because you need to have a word to address what you have. Okay. Whether it's little or it's a lot. Okay. Everybody has personal items. A lot of people have a car. You have furniture, you have jewelry, you have antiques, you know, you might have a residence or two. You might have some stocks, some bonds, okay, some cash, a regular savings account. I mean, most people generally one checking account, one savings account, and one credit card, right, in order to function. Some people have pensions and life insurance. And individual retirement accounts and business interests. So these are all things that you have to take into consideration. So I think that if you sat down and you made a list of things that you have, which is what I generally do in this checklist to my clients, I say, and I, I've made mine, you know, relatively short in comparison to some that I've seen. I mean, mine is 4 pages long. I've seen some that are 10 pages long, but they also ask for who do you want your executor to be? Who do you want your trustee to be? Who do you want your, you know, your burial instructions, all that kind of stuff.

What's the difference between an executor and a trustee?

The executor, how I explain it to my clients, it is the person who ensures that your estate, however big or small, is distributed disposed of according to your wishes when you die. So that is who the executor is, and they're basically the person to take care of all of your matters once you pass away. You know, they're the person that is going into the house and having to sell things or give things away or give them to whatever beneficiaries are to get them, you know, dictated by your will if you have one. Trustee is the person that you've named in a trust, in a separate trust, or under a trustee provision in your will that will take care of items that are in your trust that you've already drafted. Or if it's a— and I'm getting a little bit into nitty-gritty, but if there's a testamentary trust in your will, they would be the trustee of that trust. There are lots of different trusts, and with, you know, without getting into too much detail, there's, there's a lot of different trusts that can be for taking care of your minor children and giving them different funds at different ages. Whether you are very wealthy or you're not, you may need a special needs trust because you have a special needs child. You may have need a trust because you want to save on taxes. So there's a lot of different things that a trust can accomplish for a person, and that depending upon what your goals are will depend upon what type of trust is drafted for you. You know, they can be rather simple or they can be very, very, very complicated. So, I mean, it really matters, and that's why it I feel that it's so important to have legal counsel. These are not the types of things that you can get from downloading a document from the many websites that are out there. You know, it's just having that guidance of having somebody who looks at the whole picture of your life. And even if the picture of your life is small or you're just starting out, it's important to have the proper counsel just Just like going to the doctor and having the proper doctor. Like, I mean, you know, WebMD can only do so much, you know.

How would you recommend picking an attorney then? Is it as personal as picking a doctor, for example?

I think so. I mean, I mean, I think so, but that's maybe because I am an attorney. I usually get my clients by word of mouth, and I think that that is the best recommendations by other people and people that you trust. Is the best way to go. I mean, that doesn't mean— I have a whole plethora of resources, and I always, to my clients and my friends and my neighbors and my family, say, if you ever need a recommendation for anything or anyone, you know, try me, because, you know, I talk to a lot of people. I'm involved in the community a great deal, and, and with my law practice and my 3 kids, you know, I come across a lot of different people. I just think that you need to click with the person too. You know, so, you know, that's why it's like a lot of attorneys, not all of them, but they'll say, I'll, you know, talk to you on the phone or meet with you for a half an hour to give you some guidance and some consultation, whether it's free or it's paid for, you know, maybe at a reduced fee or something like that. We can discuss it, and, and that way you've got that face-to-face, or at least over the phone. Or in these days over the Zoom, and you see, like, is this person— can I work with this person? Sometimes people look at it as, okay, well, I just want somebody to do my will, or I just want somebody to do my power of attorney, or, you know, to write, you know, draft up my LLC, you know. And then sometimes people are looking for somebody, the go-to person that they can go to for legal advice on anything. And, and that's It's fine because, you know, sometimes people have their lawyer that they go to and then they seek that lawyer's counsel for, okay, well, now I need a real estate attorney, so can you refer someone to me? You know, like, if you don't do real estate, it's like, you know, it's like a doctor. You don't go to the pediatrician for everything, right? Then you have different doctors.

Yeah. And so I, you know, I've had lawyers in the past, I've had worked with great lawyers And, uh, sometimes it's hard to know when they're going to start the clock. I know these are questions that people would love to ask lawyers and they don't get to, so that's why I'm asking you here.

Yeah, no, that's fine. I'll be, I'll be honest, but I can only speak from my opinion. I do know there are lawyers that, you know, every single minute and every single second is billable. I mean, I make it clear in my engagement engagement agreement, what's covered and what, you know, what I'm charging for. But like sometimes if a client calls me up and says, 'Alfondra, I need a recommendation for blah blah blah,' or emails me, I'm not charging them for that, you know. Or if, you know, we spend an extra half an hour talking about, or 15 minutes or 10 minutes talking about how, how is the family, how are they doing, you know, how are you doing, or we get different topic, like at the end of our legal discussion, let's say, I don't charge them for that. Or I try to, like, if we're just kind of chit-chatting in the midst of our legal conversation, I try to compensate for that. But that's me. I might say, okay, well, that's point two that shouldn't be in there because we're just chatting. And it should be in your engagement agreement. Like, that's why we have engagement agreements, so that it is set forth. And any lawyer will learn the hard way if they don't go, you know, have their clients, um, enter into an engagement agreement, because, you know, your clients need to know what they're being charged for, and you need to have the right to charge them for these certain things. So, I mean, it is your time. I mean, our time Time is, is money, as it is in many businesses, and that time adds up. And anything that they're not billing, they're not making money on, and they're not getting a salary for.

There's no hard and fast rules, and you should make it clear ahead of time with whoever you hire as your lawyer. And you wrote this awesome article here in the local Greenwich Press, and you Basically talked about wills and trusts, guardianship designations for your children if they're minors, and power of attorney, which we spoke about, and the healthcare proxy and living will, which we also spoke about. Anything else you would want to add?

One important topic that I didn't cover that I'm going to be following up with another article that I'm writing is the probate and estate administration, which is something that happens after somebody dies. And that is definitely a topic that most people do not want to talk about.

And so the probate is basically if you have a will, you have to prove that the will is valid.

Right, exactly. So that's probably enough for an entire podcast all in and of itself. But I'm just going to give, give you guys just a, just a small taste of it. Whether your loved one has all their documents in place or not, it is likely that you will have to go through the probate court whether they own property or not, or whether there are certain accounts that they didn't have a beneficiary for, or you, you know, you need what's called letters testamentary in order to get to certain accounts and get certain assets for certain beneficiaries via the will. And if there is no will, then you absolutely have to go to probate court because that means you are passing away with no will. That's called passing away intestate, when someone dies without leaving a will, because you've got no guidance there as to what that person wanted. So the state— there are statutes that dictate who gets what in that case, and you have to go through the probate court in order to get the distribution to the people that it needs to go to via those statutes. You know, it could be a very, very easy probate and the will is valid and everything's left to certain beneficiaries and everything's in, you know, or in a trust, and the probate would be like very, very short. Just notifying the probate court. In some cases, you don't even have to go through the probate court at all if you've done everything the right way. In the event there is no will, then you have to go through a full probate process. And file a petition on behalf of the heirs and the beneficiaries of the individual. And so in order to get legal title to any property they have and, and, and be able to, you know, dispense of all of their debts and all of their assets.

Okay, great.

I guess in order to even be prepared to make a will, as you suggested, have some conversations with your family. Make it fun, make it light.

Yeah, and you can, you can do it on a walk, take a walk, or make a game out of it. Where do you want to go when you're dead? Great.

Okay, so have that discussion. Then you should get all your papers in order, right? You should get a list of all of your assets, exactly, all your bank accounts, all all your retirement accounts. Um, yeah, you know, taxes, all your contacts, insurance. Yeah, life insurance. Get all of that in one place, right? And all the contacts in one place. Do you recommend paper or like online? Is there anything to help people online? Is this, um, detailed list something that's available to them that we can have them download, or what, what is available online to help people organize themselves before they even meet with a lawyer?

I'm sure there are tools online. I don't off the top of my head have a particular website that I can send them to, although, you know, Juna Bobby MD, of course, you could, you could download my checklist.

So I'll have that available for people then. Awesome.

Be able to find different materials on, like, the different state bar associations websites. Like, you know, every state has their own bar association, so a lot of times you can find, like, checklists and shortcuts that way, um, just to kind of organize themselves. And then each county— here in Connecticut, we have the Fairfield Bar Association. You can find it under family law, and sometimes they'll have a section that's That's wills or trusts and estates. Believe it or not, very helpful during this COVID-19 situation. If you're in New York, Nonprofit Westchester has a great website and they just are chock-full of just information in general. npwestchester.org. I mean, obviously it caters to nonprofits and not really individuals, but they've been having excessive amounts of information come out even for individuals during this Time I signed up as a subscriber, it's free and just got on their, you know, their mailing list. So I've been getting an email from them a day.

And then I will leave links to these sites that you spoke about as well. And what would you tell parents? Like, what age should you start to tell your children? What— at what age would you start to introduce wills and things like that to kids? That, that it's an important thing. It's a— it's something that they should know where it is. Without making them overly anxious?

I would say in their teenage years, you know, maybe 13 and above, depending upon how mature they are, at least educating them on what it is.

Okay.

And what these things are and how it works. I mean, obviously we really only have these discussions pretty much with our 16-year-old and our, our 17-year-old. You know, our 12-year-old really doesn't want to hear about this.

This is 17-year-old know where to get all the documents, what you guys want, or do you have somebody else outside of the family taking care of things like that?

I have my sister, to be honest with you. Yeah, because I've, I've felt that it's a little too heavy for the younger, you know, for the children, for the teenagers. My sister, outside of my husband and I, pretty much knows where everything is. And I have a what's called an in case of emergency sheet that I have I can't say, and even given what I do for a living, that it is completely 100% up to date, but I try to update it every year. And in case of emergency document where I put all the accounts, where my legal documents are physically or on the web, who my accountant is, who my, who my doctors are, who, you know, who the contact is for the mortgage, who the contact is for, you know, the church, who the contact is for the insurance, who the children's doctors are, who the husband's doctors are, who, you know, where the car's been leased from, all that kind of stuff. Who, what is the, you know, number for AT&T or the garbage men or the, you know, all that kind of stuff, you know. And depending upon what you think. And this is your book right there.

Did you make that yourself or did you use a pre-made book?

Yes, I literally made it myself.

Nice.

This includes everything. And, and mind you, it's going to have so much important information that it shouldn't be left around, whether it's in a safe, um, or, you know, in your safety deposit. Well, your safety deposit box. That's a whole nother thing, um, because, because somebody has to have the right to get into your safety deposit box. So you have to have a secondary signer. So it should be, it should be somewhere safe, um, and maybe potentially with a key. And a couple of people should know where that key is that you trust.

Locked away. Great advice. Awesome. Thank you so much, Alessandra. This was amazing. And thank your daughter for lending you her laptop and earphones.

Thank you.

If, uh, callers call in or email me questions, if you'd be willing to answer them, I will let them just keep sending me stuff.

Absolutely. I'm, I'm happy to answer any questions. If I am able to answer them, I am happy to answer them.

And thank you for, in this time, this topsy-turvy crazy time, for helping us with this. And, you know, my job will be to— how to make talking about wills fun.

Honestly, the best time to talk about it and to laugh about it or to discuss it is when you are well.

Yeah.

Or, you know, or like the rest of us, we're stuck in, you know, in the house at the moment and we are a little scared. I mean, this is a perfect time for a Zoom call with your mother, with your father, with your siblings. To just let you know, my brother and sister are single, both single, but they're both very successful. I have had their, their documents drafted for I can't even tell you how long, and neither of them have taken it seriously. And last week I sent them their documents again, and I said, you better look at these because I don't want to be the one holding the bag. So it is You know, definitely something that even being apart, you guys can all take care of remotely. And thank you to the governors of New York and the governor of Connecticut to have allowed us to, to do that, to protect ourselves and protect our families. I am grateful for that.

Yeah, I'm hoping that, you know, people have something special for all the healthcare workers out there who are putting their lives on the line. So hopefully, um, they're getting some legal help as well if they need it.

Yeah, I think, um, well, first of all, I do have to say, I mean, I'm giving a discount to healthcare workers and, and depending upon what they need will depend upon what kind of a discount, you know, that they get. And also, um, for healthcare workers and also for EMS and EMTs And it doesn't have to cost an arm and a leg, right?

I mean, you can do it for a reasonable fee, these basic things that we're talking about.

Yes, absolutely. And it's a heck of a lot less expensive to do it now than if you pass away without it. It's like literally like maybe an eighth of the cost.

Wow.

Then if, you know, if you didn't have these things in place and you passed away and then your, your family had to deal with it all.

So again, this is all about prevention and staying resilient.

All of that.

Legally resilient.

Legally resilient and legal wellness.

Yes. Yes. Okay. Thank you. Stay well.

Stay healthy. Thank you, Juna Bobby MD. Thank you for having me. Thank you for everything that you do to support our community and to give us guidance. And you stay well. And my love to the family.

You too, and can't wait to see you in person again.

I know, me too. Take care.

Check the show notes below to download your free ICE booklet. ICE stands for In Case of Emergency. It has everything organized for you, including Alessandra's 4-page worksheets so that you can stress less and do more. Thank you for listening. Please subscribe, download episodes, and share with anyone who could use extra resilience right now. If you found this episode helpful to you, please leave a review. Go to mindbodyspace.com where you'll find online courses, all of these interviews, and meditations organized into separate pages. If you have questions or interview suggestions, email us at info@mindbodyspace.com. Stay well, stay strong, and wishing all of you and your loved ones health, happiness, and hope.