Chat with Nat: 5 F’s of Caretaking Series – Episode 3: Finance

In the third episode of her “5 F’s of Caretaking Series,” Nat explores the financial realities of caregiving. Drawing from her experience caring for her mother with dementia, Nat discusses the high costs of care, the importance of early financial planning, and practical strategies for managing expenses. She emphasizes that financial preparedness reduces stress, enables better decision-making, and allows caregivers to focus on their loved ones. Nat encourages open conversations, proactive planning, and community support, framing financial readiness as an act of love that protects both caregivers and their families.

What you'll hear:

• Financial challenges and considerations in caregiving
• Importance of financial preparedness to reduce stress
• Personal experiences with caregiving and financial implications
• Out-of-pocket expenses and potential debt for caregivers
• The impact of financial stability on caregiving decisions
• Costs associated with various care options (in-home care, assisted living)
• Strategies for managing caregiving costs and financial planning
• Emotional stress related to financial uncertainty in caregiving
• Importance of early financial planning and open discussions about finances
• The cumulative financial burdens faced by caregivers beyond direct medical expenses

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Transcript

0:04

Hey friends, welcome back to chat with Nat conversations that count where we talk real life, real money, and real strategies to build wealth and a life without worry. Today's episode is brought to you by Casa de Confidence Productions. Julie and Dan Collins are absolute pros at making podcasters like myself sound polished, confident, and clear every single episode. If podcasting has been on your heart or your vision board, I highly recommend checking them out at Casa de confidence website. Y'all, this is episode three in my five FS of caretaking series, and this week we're talking about finances and how peace of mind can exist when everything else is falling apart. My money tip for this week to set the tone of this episode is caregivers spend an average of $7,200 per year out of pocket and nearly 1 in 3. Caretakers take on debt to cover those care related expenses. Emergency funds, insurance and income protection aren't nice to have. They are the stability tools that come into play when life stops being predictable. So let's jump into this week's episode. We're talking about the financial side of caretaking, the emotional relief of financial preparedness. When finances are stable, your nervous system can focus on care and not survival. Studies show caregivers with lower financial stress report better sleep, lower anxiety, and improved decision making during medical crises. Your piece doesn't come from having more money. It comes from clarity and access. So let's talk about what decisions can become easier when money isn't screaming for attention. All of them? Absolutely. All of them. First and foremost, the decision to become a caretaker. For example, you might still be working full time and suddenly your parent or spouse needs hands on caretaking. How are you going to manage that? If you have to step away from work, from producing an income to be a caretaker? If you haven't prepared for that financially, it can be catastrophic. Okay, on top of that, the decision of hiring caretakers, if that's something you want to do. Of putting a loved one in a facility, if that's what's needed or that's what you want to do. And again, I say this all the time, y'all. I do not expect everybody to step up and want to be a caretaker. We are not all wired to do it. And honestly, it's something I always wanted to be able to do for my parents, and there are still times I wonder if I'm actually wired and truly capable and strong enough to do this. Now. I'm also proving all the time that yes, I am and last week episode was on, uh, family. The week before was about faith, and I am leaning heavy on my faith through this journey because I know for the times I'm not strong enough, there's something lifting me up and strengthening me to get through that moment or that stage in the process that I'm going through. Okay, but if you are not wired to be a caretaker, money matters, y'all. It absolutely matters. And giving you options around caretaking. The week that my mom was in the hospital, I had doctors telling me that they thought the next step was to put my mom in a home, that that probably made the most sense for her and for my dad and I. But that was not the conversation we had five years ago when I flew home to help put all my parent's finances in order. With my mom's dementia diagnosis, my brother and I had these conversations with my parents, and my parents wanted to remain in their own home for as long as possible, and then they wanted to be cared for in one of our homes for as long as possible. Now look, that might have been my parent's wish. And if my brother and I were like, no, we don't have the ability to do that. We don't have the desire to do that. There would have been a lot more conversations to be had. But y'all, we are not all wired to do this. Some of us don't have the desire to. And that doesn't mean you love any less. It means you're honoring yourself and your loved one in the process. So please always remember that when I'm talking about caregiving, it is not an expectation of mine that everybody steps into that role. In our situation, though, I did want to provide the caregiving And I'm blessed to have started my business years before. My parents needed me to take care of them, and I'm able to work from home. I'm able to build my business around my life, and my life right now is prioritized. On taking care of my mom first and foremost, and supporting my dad in areas he needs help as well. Okay, so I didn't have to replace an income. Now, there are times like right now that the care for my mom is more extensive, and so it may take up more of my time that I no longer have available to build my business. Well, I'm being more strategic in how I build my business, and making sure that I'm adjusting my times of availability for clients around what my family needs so that I can still generate the income I need, but also show up. Most importantly, show up for my mom and the care that she needs. But that decision to become a caretaker absolutely changed by being financially prepared. If you are putting loved ones in a home and a lot of people want to go into a home. My sister in law's parents recently so sold their home and moved into a retirement community. They are still completely able bodied, but they're like, we want to be in a community with people our age doing activities and getting to know people and enjoying these years of our life, and it's also setting them up. So in the future, when they do need care, it's available. It's there. That is the choice they made. That's what they wanted for their future as they continue to age. So all of those things come into play. But the cost? It's not pennies okay. So as I had people telling me, I thought, that's not the decision we made with my mom, but I need to sit with it because if truly my mom's best, the best scenario for my mom was going into a home, We would absolutely go that direction. The other thing I realized is I need to look into that now so that if and when the time comes, because we didn't go that direction, by the way. But if the time comes that we need to. What is that look like? We're not making a last minute decision to put her into a home and going with whoever has availability. We have the opportunity of time being in our side to look at different facilities, what they offer, how they can care for my mom and decide, hey, if we get to this point in the future, these are the top two or top three places that we would want to put. Mom, that's a huge relief to have that out of the way. Okay, but in my area I was looking at$5,800 a month to $10,000 a month if we were to put my mom in a home. Is your financial picture set up to manage that? That's over $100,000 a year on the high side. Okay, well, when I came back and said, yeah, I don't think we're there yet, that's not something we want to do. Then we were having the conversations about bringing paid caretakers into the home to offer support. And. Long story short, I, I've touched on this in a couple of other episodes, but long story short, for 16 hours a day it was going to be $5,100 a week. That's $20,000 a month. That's double the high side of putting my mom in a facility. Okay, so now we're talking over$200,000 a year. Absolutely not. I'm like, I don't know that I need that right now. And until I figure that out, like I'm taking my mom home, we're going to figure out our new normal, identify where we have gaps to fill, and then look at how do we fill those. Now, mind you, I was working with a service that provides caretakers for you. So there's an added cost. With that you can certainly go direct to caretakers. You can also see are there people in the family that can help fill in those gaps and maybe, maybe their situation, they still need to earn an income. And so you figure out paying them a portion for their support and help. But every single one of those scenarios is made exponentially easier if money is not screaming for attention. That's why it's so important to prepare now, not only for your loved ones who may be getting close to that stage, or already in that stage. What can you do? Where is their money? How is it set up? How do you access it? What's available overall? But in prepping for yourself to make sure that you and your family have options when that time comes for you and we none of us know when that is. None of us know if it's going to be okay, but there's ways you can prepare for that. Excuse me. With long term care, with living benefits. But I will make this one recommendation. When you're looking at either long term care or living benefits, or both, to determine what makes sense for you, make sure you're getting them included in a life insurance plan. They're exponentially less expensive. And here's what happens if your long term care is tied to a life insurance plan. If you're living benefits are tied to a life insurance plan, you're using that money one way or another. If you need the care, you can tap into your life insurance benefits while you're living to get the care that you need. So you're using what you paid for. If you don't ever need that care, it's a life insurance benefit that passes on to your beneficiaries when you're no longer here. Again, you're getting the benefit of what you paid for, not a standalone policy for the what if of long term care that maybe you don't ever need, but you paid monthly for years for that service or or that benefit. Okay. And then you don't need it. So you've got to be really strategic as you look at how you set things up to make sure that it makes the most sense for you and for your budget, what you can afford to put in place now to prepare for the future. Let's talk now about why financial stress compounds trauma. Um, it activates the same fight or flight response as grief and medical emergencies. Over 60% of caregivers report high emotional stress and money. Uncertainty does nothing but magnify that when every single decision, which it does in caretaking has a price tag attached, it can create guilt, second guessing and delayed care decisions. And those things can impact yourself or your loved one significantly. There is so much guilt that comes with caretaking. The other day was a rough day for my mom and she didn't want to take her meds. However, her blood pressure was through the roof. So I'm weighing the. How do I get her to take her meds to help manage her blood pressure? Because she needs that. Versus how do I give it time to get her to be agreeable? And y'all, I will honestly say that I was like, come on, mom, you got to take these meds. And she opened her mouth just enough, and I put them in there, and she went to spit those medications back out at me. I gently covered her mouth with my hand and was like, no, mom, we've got to take these pills. And between trying to coax her to drink water and her actually chewing the pills up, which had to taste horrible. Long story short, we got through the process, but there was so much guilt after that of feeling like I needed to get her to take her meds and feeling like I pushed too hard, or there was a better way to do that. And believe me, I did the research after and we're mixing them in with yogurt or applesauce or something to make that process easier going forward. But y'all, you are learning as you go. As a caretaker. You don't know everything. You don't know every disease, every situation, every medical scenario. You are going to learn as you go and you're going to make mistakes. So give yourself some freaking grace. That's what I had to do, okay? But if you if you are stuck trying to figure out how to pay for something or how to apply for aid or care or whatever, that can delay very important decisions that are needed for the person you're caring for. And that's a nightmare scenario. Talk about compounding that guilt or second guessing yourself. And did I do the right thing? Did I do it fast enough or why wasn't I more prepared? Money problems don't just hurt your wallet. They still capacity. They steal capacity when you need it the most. And when you are facing stress and overwhelming caretaking, that capacity Is everything to to be able to pile more on your plate, to be able to navigate what has to be paid for, who needs to be paid? How best to do this right? Those decisions all become heavier. So what are the real costs caretakers regularly talk about? And this is this is one of the big components about why you're going to hear me talking so much more about caretaking. Throughout everything I do, my social media, my podcast, everything is because there's so much as caretakers that we don't talk about. We don't want to embarrass our loved one. We don't want to talk about the hard things. But there are millions of us out there that need to know we're not alone. And so I'm using my voice in the hopes that it helps somebody in that way. But when we're talking about the real, those real costs that we don't talk about beyond the medical bills, it's that lost income, Missed work, reduced hours. Right. How are we getting by? Not just how are we providing for our loved one, but how are we getting by? The travel required, the meals, the lodging. So if you're a support caretaker for a from a distance, how are you managing the costs of getting there when you need to get their medications that aren't fully covered by insurance and long term care planning gaps? I've already talked a little bit about that, and I'm I am blessed to have some amazing people in my community that are and have been in different, different types of caretaking roles. Um, my good friend Jessica that I met through Instagram, who has been a godsend, is a hands on caretaker like me, and she is significant stages ahead of me in her mom's care. And so I'm blessed to learn from the things she shares from her experience, my friend Julia that I, I just talked to the other day about caretaking. Uh, her parents have both passed on, but her mom, she was a a distance caregiver. She was a support care caregiver for her mom. She was not the hands on person. Right. And so those long term planning gaps, who fills those gaps? My friend Jessica, even though she's hands on, she has a business. She speaks on caretaking. She travels for that. So she has to fill in those gaps with somebody else to take care of her mom so that she can go do the things that earn her an income. Okay. And the times you can't find that support can just raise that financial stress even more, because you can't go and do those things. And I know for, for for you, my friend Julia, she was incredibly blessed financially. Her parents had set up for everything, and they had told her what they wanted. They wanted the money was there on purpose to pay for the caretaking they need so she didn't have to do it. Okay, so she she didn't have that worry. It's different for every single one of us. And in some situations you may not have a worry, but in others you may. When it becomes exponentially more expensive, like 10 or $20,000 a month for a facility or in-home hired caregivers. But many caregivers underestimate the costs that are going to be coming down the road by 30 to 50%, because those expenses arrive in waves, not all at once. It's not like, hey, this month, you know, uh, my, you know, my loved ones become incontinent. And so we need to buy the supplies to help with that. And then next month, it's whatever else, right? It's usually this has happened. And because of that A, B, C, D and E all need to happen and they all cost money. That's how that usually happens Okay. As a financial professional, I've always thought it costs about 60 to $80,000 a year for a private home in a care facility. You heard me say earlier, it's more like 6000 to $100,000. In my area, at least. Do you know what that looks like in your area or where your loved ones live? It's important y'all do the homework now. It becomes so much easier to maneuver things around to pull the levers that need to be pulled in the future. If you already know the answers of what you're facing. To some degree. Okay. And so take those steps. Get that information. Now that the the new year is here, one of the things I'm doing is setting up times to go and tour some of the facilities around me to reach out to some other in-home care giving people, individuals or services and get comparative rates. So I know, hey, this is why I would want to go in this direction, and this is what the cost is going to be associated with that. Let's talk a little bit about what's surprised us when we what surprise us most financially when caregiving began. Just the absolute cost of everything. My mom right now has two pressure ulcers. Okay. One thing that happens as diseases progress. Dementia. Specifically, my mom sits a lot more and she developed two pressure ulcers. Jill, this is my first time through this and being in a decline where she doesn't get up and move much anymore. Okay, when you sit in one spot for a long time, it's like bed squirts. I mean, I've heard of those before. Likely you have that when somebody lays in the same position for an extended period of time, it causes bed sores. That's what these pressure ulcers are from sitting in the same place all day, every day. I've never dealt with those before. And so my mom got two of them, and now we're treating him. They're healing great. But again, it's where okay, how do I avoid this in the future? How do I prevent this in the future? How can I help combat these situations? So I'm learning as I go and I'm implementing all those things. But with those pressure ulcers, the bandages, it's not like you just put a regular bandaid over them. For five bandages, it's almost 20 bucks and that's a low cost expense that's come down the road. But in addition to that, medication, medication shifting and changing on a dime. So we may have just filled some medications. We got to fill more. My mom is on Medicare. Those things are covered. Thank goodness. We very rarely have anything out of pocket to pay. Um, but some new vitamins we're putting her on. Well, that costs money. Okay. And depending on what that looks like, that can be an extra 20,$3,000 a month when we're trying to get her more nutrients that her eating is shifting. And so I'm trying to make sure we're getting all those vitamins and nutrients she needs to stay as strong as possible. Okay. On top of that, what if you go to a meal plan, which I'm starting to think about doing is going to a meal plan for some of my mom's meals so that it's just really easier. She may sleep in somedays, she gets up early some days, and so I'm juggling around with my schedule based on her needs. If I don't have to stop and cook, or if I don't have to spend half a day on Sunday prepping food. What does that look like cost wise? Okay, so all of those different scenarios add up, and just realizing how quickly those expenses can add up is one of the biggest surprises for me from a financial perspective. And then like I said, you know, the big huge ones that we were looking at and considering last month. So for you guys, I would love for you to reach out and share with me. What are some of the financial Surprises you run into as a caretaker and how have you managed them? If you're looking for support and being prepared, I would love to have a conversation of what that might look like for you or for your loved one, and show you some options that are available to put things in place to give yourself peace of mind. Now that being able to sleep better and having less stress is a game changer, y'all. Because as a caretaker, you will go through times where sleep is few and far between, and if you are sleep deprived and trying to make heavy and hard decisions, especially around finances and finances that may not exist next level. Okay, so everything is about setting yourself up. You will have stress. It will be hard. You will find moments of joy. All of those things will happen as a caretaker. One thing you can control is being financially prepared for them. You may not know exactly what timing, what timing will exist for those finances to come into play. But if you know they're there again, it just alleviates so much pressure, so much stress, and makes those decisions a lot easier to make. One of the other things I want to touch on today is planning as an act of love, not out of fear. Okay. Planning ahead isn't a pessimistic thing. It's a protective thing. And this is coming from a girl who. I've said it before. My brother and I didn't want to sit down with my parents and look in their little red folder, which people say all the time. Oh, your parents had a red folder. It'll come up because I've talked about it. It's literally right there behind me on the shelf. If you're watching this video, that's the red folder. I still kept it. It had all of their financial information, what they'd paid for prepaid for funeral expenses, all of the things in there, and they wanted to show it to my brother. And I talked to us about it. We avoided it and avoided it and avoided it because that's depressing. We don't want to talk about our parents dying. We don't want to think about our parents dying. We don't want to talk about us dying. We don't want to think about us dying. It's a reality. You are going to die. I am going to die. We don't know when. We don't know how, we don't. We don't know any of that. But what we do know is it costs money. When you die. It costs money if you're diagnosed and need care. So why not prepare for the one thing you can control in all of this? By having those conversations early and then they're out of the way. They're out. Yes, they're hard, yes, they're emotional. But when you have them early, you are so much better prepared and equipped to step into those moments when they do arise. Okay, that is what I'm talking about when I say planning ahead is not pessimistic, it's protective. Life insurance gives you options. Emergency funds give you breathing room. Income protection allows for dignity. Clear plans equal fewer emotional decisions under pressure when finances are prepared. Love gets to lead, not panic. We can show up better. We can show up more consistently, and we can definitely show up more confidently when we're financially prepared for those instances. So as I wind down this episode, I want to close by talking about why waiting for later is riskier than starting now. Well, that's just the case when it comes to your finances. The sooner you start, the more time you have on your hands, the more time you have on your hands, the more progress you can make to reach financial freedom in general. Okay, but. Waiting for later. When it comes to being prepared financially for the medical side of things, the caretaking side of things, the cost associated that with with those things is exorbitant compared to living in retirement, continuing to be able to buy your groceries, pay your bills if you still have bills or travel. All those are things you're looking forward to. Stepping into retirement. Nobody's looking forward to becoming disabled. Looking forward to getting a medical diagnosis. Looking forward to becoming a caretaker. Okay, so saying to yourself, I'll deal with it when it happens or I don't make enough money to do this right now or I'm already overwhelmed, I can't add one more thing to my plate. Yeah you can. You're choosing not to. And by choosing not to, you're putting it off to potentially happen when you have ten times more things on your plate than you do right now, and you're trying to figure out the finances. Okay. Starting today is always better than starting tomorrow, next year or next decade. And honestly, waiting usually makes things cost more because you're in a panic. You've got to find the first place to put a loved one. You gotta hire the first caretaker that's available. Well, it could cost you a lot of money because it's the most expensive option and that's all that's available. Or it could cost you a lot of money because you make a brash decision, and then you realize this is not the best situation. I've got to spend more money to make some changes or adjust some things. Okay. Waiting is the worst thing you can do. It can create urgency in even more areas, and exponential urgency in areas that are going to be heavy and hard no matter what. Okay. Crises don't wait for readiness, y'all. Preparedness gives you a choice even when your circumstances don't. And there will be times that your circumstances don't. I promise you that. My hot take for this week is money doesn't solve grief, but it can keep you from drowning while you're grieving. I posted a shared a post. I think it was. I think it was a post or real something on my social media last week where I talked about the grief of caregiving and its different, y'all. There is grief when you lose a loved one. Absolutely. There is exponential grief when you lose somebody unexpectedly, but in caretaking, you are often grieving a long, drawn out loss process and losing your loved one multiple times over. Especially when you're talking about memory care. There's, you know, losing the initial, the initial shifts, the memory loss, the things you can't have the same conversations or they don't remember the same stories and things like that. And then there's the loss of their physical ability and maybe the loss of their personality over time, and eventually you lose them all together. But it is a long, slow, drawn out loss. Money doesn't solve that grief, but if it can keep you from drowning, God, that's so important. The grief is hard and there's joy to be found in the process, for sure. I talk a lot about that as well, but I can't imagine the slow, long, drawn out grieving of losing my mom and having financial stress piled on top of that. Don't set yourself up for a situation where you're drowning because of more than you need to, because of a lack of preparedness. If you're a caregiver or you know you might be one someday, this is your reminder. Peace is something that you can plan for. Not perfection. Not wealth overnight, just preparedness with purpose. If today's episode resonated, I ask you to please share it with someone who is quietly carrying a lot right now. And if you want help creating a financial foundation that supports you in real life, not just on paper. Please reach out. You can get in touch with me through a link in the show notes on this episode. You can also reach out to me through my social media Natalie Kime on Facebook and Instagram, and I would love to have a conversation to support you in any way that I can. We'll start with clarity, not pressure, and I promise we'll take one step at a time to creating the protection and the peace that you want for yourself and your loved ones in the future. Thank you guys for spending this time with me as always. Until next week, protect your peace, protect your people, and protect your ability to show up when it matters most.