Steph Baierl
I am, thank you for having me on, Richard. I am Steph Baierl and I was a guest on your podcast, I don't remember the number, I think it might have been in the 20th or 30th episode (actually 47th! ) and the podcast has been a guiding light for my caregiving journey. I've been on this path for a few years now. In my personal life with my dad, and I've also been working with the aging population right out of high school, so 15 years now. So even though it's something that I have more of a professional experience, going through it personally has been a challenge and very different, so this podcast has been amazing, just helping us kind of plan for the future and I think it's very important to help educate others and just having kind of a road map for them. Richard Wexler I thank you and I appreciate that. So all I'm gonna say is be easy, ma'am. You know, I've only been doing this a week or so and hopefully, I can answer the questions that you have. And I'm sure they're good questions and hopefully this will help our our listening audience. So I'm getting comfortable in my chair, ready to take you on. So fire away with your first question. Steph Baierl All right. You talk about planning is key in every episode, and one of the things that I feel could be different, but is there a certain majority or a certain common catalyst that you've seen in your professional experience, that happens and then people find themselves almost in this crisis mode? Richard Wexler In all honesty, what I'm gonna say may surprise some people, but I think that most people, when this happens in their life, it's the last thing they're expecting. Life is going on and it's crazy. If you have children, whether that be one child or multiple, you probably are involved in their life to a certain degree, you know, depending upon their age, if they're a little bit younger homework, activities outside of school, and then all of a sudden this happens again. I've talked about this a lot on the podcast. I say that my wife and I were special in that we had all four parents get ill and I've talked about the fact that it's really difficult enough when it's just one parent, and then all of a sudden something changes, whether that's an illness they're going through, whether it's a severe fall that broke something, or as I've talked about a lot, whether it may be a combination thereof- Maybe they've gotten ill, their balance is not what it used to be, they're weaker and they were walking when they shouldn't have been walking and they fall - They don't bounce back the same and something breaks. But as I started this couple minutes ago, I really think that most people just aren't expecting it, and then all of a sudden it kind of hits them square between the eyes. Does that answer your question, ma'am? Steph Baierl Yes it does, and I feel like most of the situations that I have seen also is usually that crisis piece of you're not expecting it. It is the fall and broke something or an illness that maybe just took more out of the loved one than has in the past. So with that in mind, what would your first action step be when somebody finds themselves in that crisis situation of “ohh no, my loved one is in the hospital and they need to get discharged. But maybe they can't come home, or how do we get the home ready?” What should the first step be? Richard Wexler Well, going back to what I just talked about, and what you talked about as well, the fact that most families aren't expecting it, it makes that point that time very difficult. You know, I talk about scenarios, things I've seen with clients over the years, things I've seen with my own family. So again, we'll use the scenario that maybe dad fell. Dad is now in the emergency room. X-rays are taken, and so on and so forth. It looks like something broke and a good chance it was his hip. Now things are different. Maybe Dad could be 65, Dad could be 75, Dad could be 85. This family really is never talked about it and this happening. We talk about this all the time where the phone calls, or the text messages, start going out to family members, irrespective of where they live, and I've dealt with clients and I talk about this that don't even live in the United States anymore - They have jobs that have taken them to Europe or Asia or South America or different places around the globe - and now they find out that dad fell and he may have a broken hip and and what do we do? And all of a sudden there's the spouse, there's three or four kids and everybody's flying back and then rushing to the hospital. But since there wasn't any conversation they were least expecting this when it happened. What do they do? What are those first steps? And that's where, OK, now you're you're in this. Dad's gonna need your help as far as guidance for what should take place next. You're probably, and I've seen this so many times, huddling with your family in the hallway outside of dads room. He's probably going to wind up going through surgery. The older he is, the more difficult that is, the more difficult it is not to have any reaction to anesthesia. But let's assume everything went well. The doctors and nurses are probably telling you he's there for two or three more days, then he's gonna get discharged. Then what does that mean? You're probably assuming it means, assuming a bad word, but you're probably assuming it means he just comes home. But is that real? And chances are it isn't. Then you're told no, he probably needs to go to skilled nursing, or he probably needs to go to a rehab center and they're pretty much the same place because right now he's in a wheelchair. Before he can actually start doing things “at home”, he needs to get stronger and he's needs to learn to move from that wheelchair to a walker, and eventually walking without the walker at some point. But that's quite a bit in the distance. And again, a lot of this depends on his age, and his attitude. The rehab from a broken hip is difficult. After so many days in skilled nursing or the rehab center, they're going to want him to start working that area in his leg and around the area that was broken and that can be difficult. Then the decision is “OK, he's in rehab. He's in skilled nursing for three or four weeks now what? Is he going to come home? Is a spouse there, a partner there that can take care of him? Is he going to go someplace else? I mean, where? The family has not talked about this and all of a sudden, now they're having to talk about all of this. Find your resources. We've talked about this so many times. One of the biggest issues when it comes to care is cost. They've never talked about that. They haven't planned for it. And now all of a sudden they're there and reality is staring them in the face. One of the things I've talked about on previous episodes, I'm in the process now with some business partners of launching a national foundation. It's not here yet. It should be here sometime next year. It's called a Plan2Age, and with that it'll be an app, an application where folks can go and learn about planning and learn about all the things we're talking about, plus get connected to the resources that they need. We really hope that people will start planning and thinking about this and not least expect it when it happens and then need to find those resources. As I bring up this little tiny word again, cost. So who's gonna take care of dad? What's it gonna cost? How are they going to pay for it? What's the process? And so on. I know that was a lengthy answer, but I hope it answers your question, ma'am. Steph Baierl Yeah, I think that gave some great advice and great starting points. The app I'm really excited for, my mom and I have been having more conversations around care in the future, what it might look like for my dad as he was diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer's, so as that progresses and his needs change, how can we help support his independence and help support my mom as the main caregiver. So having an, almost like a checklist, or one spot to go to at any time of the day. I know there's great resources out there, the Commission on Aging, there's one in every state, if not region, is a fantastic resource, but most also have business hours Monday through Friday, during other working hours. Having an application that you could just log into to see what is, you know, what financial steps can I take right now, when it's 11:00 at night and I can't sleep? What can I learn about or where can I start that research? Having that accessible at any time of day, I feel will be very important in helping people with their loved ones when they go through situations like that. Richard Wexler Thank you. I mean, that's what we're trying to do. I've said many, many times over the years- when someone falls, someone gets ill, both happens, it's not easy. But what we're trying to do through the podcast, through all the education I've done in the past, and then through this application, is to try to make it easier for folks. I mean, I talk about this all the time- We have almost 80 million baby boomers. If someone asked me for some numbers recently, there's almost 150 million people in this country that are 40 and older, 50 and older are about 110 million. These are approximate numbers. Then the almost 80 million baby boomers, I talked about this a lot, the oldest, which is kind of hard to believe, will start turning 80 in 2026. That's a year and a half away. Unfortunately what I've seen, I've seen a lot of people in assisted living. I've seen a lot of people that are mid 80s and older and I've never seen many that were overweight. They seem to have taken a pretty good care of themselves. When I look at the boomers, that I'm smack dab in the middle of, they are overweight, they haven't taken care of themselves. When I talk to comrades around in the senior care industry around the country, they're working with boomers at a younger age, in their early 70s. So over the next 5 to 10 years and beyond, we're gonna see the age group of people that need care even getting that much younger. If I can add something, you know I've been asked before, when's a good age and a family to start thinking about this and I've always said 35-40. You're the adult child, so if you add 25-30 years on top of your age to get what mom and dad, maybe what the in laws may be. I mean, there's a good chance you still have grandparents alive. Understanding, like what happened in my family, when it affects that 90 year old grandparent or that that 70 year old parent, it trickles down to you as the 35-40 year old. If they can't, because they didn't save enough, and a lot of people haven't been able to and haven't thought about this, enough for care, t hey may come to you and say we need some help financially. Can you guys do that? So 35-40, maybe even a little bit younger, really starting to think about this and understand that at some point it's gonna be you, but most likely parents somewhere down the line, grandparents as well, I hope that helps. Steph Baierl And that brings up another really good, point is I'm sure many of the listeners have heard about the sandwich generation. But in our 30s, we're going to be smack dab in the middle of that - where we might have our parents or grandparents that are needing assistance, and you're also taking care of young children. And I know that, Richard, you were married later in life and you had young children when your chapter of care started- How did that impact that grandparent/grandchild relationship? Richard Wexler Well, I'm glad you asked, and I talk about this a lot, and I don't really don't go into too much depth. But I mean, we were that family that was least expecting it. I don't know what we were thinking. We had all four parents- My wife's two parents, and my parents in their 80s. We thought they were doing great. We did get married later and our son was 11 when this (care) started; and our daughter was 7. So how did that affect them? It really affected them. All of a sudden now we're taking care of these parents. I'm still trying to work and bring income into the family, my wife is running around trying to take care of them, and we have two young children. They're not driving. They're eleven and seven. They're in school. They have homework. We wanted them to try and have a “normal life”, if possible. My son was heavily into sports playing baseball, and as he got a little older and high school started, started playing football, wanted to take those as far as he could and he was on his way until an injury happened. Our daughter loved to dance and was with a dance school that was a competitive school and would go to competitions. That she loved. Our son loved the things he was doing. But they knew that their four grandparents were now very ill so it directly affected them. We got pulled away from both of them to take care of our parents. I recall many nights my wife would look at me after a phone call late in the night saying “I have to go to my parents house”, which meant, I'm still working and I have a 40 mile commute in the morning to work, but I have to somehow get our kids ready and off to school. So in our case, and I know a lot of people are somewhat similar, it really had an effect on them. I wish I didn't have to say this, but I know, you know our last parent passed away in 2019, five years ago at 96, but I know this still affects our kids. Steph Baierl Thank you for sharing going into more detail on that because it is really important. I'm very fortunate that I have my mom's parents still around and my great grandma, who is 104, and the relationship that I have with my grandparents has been a big part of my life. They helped care for me when I was sick, when I was little. So now, on the other side, and they're in their mid 80s and over 100, it's now my chance to be able to help care for them. So as the young child that got to grow up with grandparents, I can see how important that relationship is and I'm very glad that they were able to be a part of their relationship, and even though that is hard. Richard Wexler It it really is and it's something again that a lot of people don't think about. Steph Baierl Richard, with the experience and the wisdom that you now have with, over the last 20 years, are there maybe a few things that, maybe two or three things, that you would would have done differently looking back? Richard Wexler Yeah. I mean the two words that come to mind are wake up. The fact that, I think both my wife and myself are reasonably intelligent individuals, the fact that we had the two small kids, the fact that we had four parents in their 80s, irrespective of the fact that we thought they were doing well, we should have talked about this. I was older than 35-40, I was around 50, but still I wish we had simply sat down, between my wife and myself and our children, and had a conversation that our parents, their grandparents, were aging and that at some point, something may happen that's probably going to have an effect on our life and our children's life. And then beyond that, and I talk about this a lot, I call this the family conversation- I wish we had sat down with my in laws and sat down with my parents and had a comprehensive conversation. One of the first things you want to find out is, if something does change in their life, from a fall or an illness, or both, what do they want? Where do they want to live? Most people are going to say they want to live at home. OK. Well, is that real? We talk about all the time. We were at least fortunate that one set of parents were 40 miles in one direction and the other parents were 40 miles in a different direction. But so many people live hundreds of miles, or multiple states away from their parents. So if something does happen, OK, mom, I know you wanna stay at home- We live in California, you live in Ohio. How are we going to make this work? Who's going to take care of you? Then you look into what care is and what it costs, and you start realizing you don't know if if we can make that work. And then you try to figure out, well, what does that mean? That conversation is probably not comprehensive, covering everything initially, but you want to start the conversation and slowly start talking about these different aspects of this. We saw first hand, and I've seen first hand with so many clients, that it will probably happen in your life, and what do we do if you're in Ohio we're in California and we have young kids and jobs and have to make income and so on. It's challenging and difficult, and that's why too, I talk about financial planners and really encouraging them to understand this whole issue of care and the cost of care. And besides just having a conversation about retirement, let's say with a couple, they start talking and have a conversation about care and what it costs. Whether we are talking about older loved ones, or someday talking about them, and if they're 35-40 years old, they could be quite a while before they need care, and if it cost what it does now, what's it going to cost then? So starting that conversation with your spouse, your partner, your kids, and then taking that conversation to those loved ones in your life. Steph Baierl Do you feel that that's really the kind of the starting point? The key is really to just start that family conversation to get everyone on the same page, and to open that communication channel. Richard Wexler You took the word out of my mouth. I think that the the one word is communication. It's like what my wife and I didn't do. We were so busy between what we were doing job wise and the children and their activities and so on, and we weren't communicating about it. And you get, like I said, you have got to wake up. You have got to realize, OK, our loved ones are getting older. Maybe Dad's not in the best condition. Maybe moms already had some health issues. Maybe our 88 year old grandmother has already fallen once. You need to start understanding this and need to communicate. That communication with the partner, the spouse, the children, that communication with the older loved ones, that communication with you have multiple brothers and sisters. I've heard well, “my brother lives in Germany and what can he do?” Well, he can do a lot. Most things are online now, and maybe he has a knack for numbers. So maybe Mom and Dad aren't capable of managing their money anymore, but he can do it from Germany. So there are things that family members can do. That communication with your immediate family, with the loved ones, with brothers and sisters, maybe it's also communication, let’s say Mom and Dad have lived next to the same neighbors for 60 years, and they're best friends- maybe communicating with those neighbors. If something were to happen, give us a call. And then maybe they can do some things to help out with care as well. Steph Baierl This was awesome. Thank you so much for letting me flip the script and ask you the questions. I hope that the listeners find some value and I feel that having that action step, I know it's been mentioned in almost every episode, but just take that action step: Start the family conversation. Make a point to just have that be a goal, whether it's this month or this year, just start there. Richard Wexler Thank you Steph. I very much appreciate this and it wasn't as painful as I thought. I appreciate the thought you put into the questions. And again folks, I mean the whole idea in doing this podcast is, my experience, the experience I've had with with so many clients, the experience that Steph is going through, really trying to get people to understand. I know this is a tough topic. I've stood in front of so many people and I've seen the look in their face and they think “well, it's not gonna happen in my life and it's not that difficult.” But it is. I really want people to get ahead of it and I I want everyone to live that life with quality, whether it's the older folks, the adult kids, their grandchildren, and this makes it challenging when something happens. So if you can get ahead of it, if you wake up. You realize that something might happen at some point you're communicating, it will, it will make it easier. So thank you, Steph. I very much appreciate it. Steph Baierl Yes, thank you. And again for all the listeners, if you have other questions that you want Richard to answer, you can e-mail [email protected]. Richard Wexler Thank you, ma'am. Have a great day. See you folks. Have an awesome day. Bye. Bye.
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