Courageous Conversations

Liz Smith 49th Estate Planning knows Estate Planning - all the pitfalls and protections.

Join her in Ketchikan on November 14th for a "Lunch and Learn". Register early at the link provided. Hope to see you there!

📽️ You don't need to be a movie star or be super rich to leave behind a mess for your loved ones. Shelley Duvall's death teaches us that everyone needs a solid plan.

⭐Check out our new article now to learn more!

Link to blog post:
https://49thestateplanning.com/2024/10/26/shelley-duvall-and-what-we-can-all-learn-from-her-death/

Contact us!
☎️ 907-312-5436
🌐 http://www.49thestateplanning.com
📩 [email protected]
📅 https://bit.ly/49thEPsched
📍 Jordan Creek Center, 8800 Glacier Hwy, Suite 222, Juneau, AK 99801.

Schedule a meeting with Liz in Wrangell through this link: https://bit.ly/49thEPsched
🔷 Liz in 𝑾𝒓𝒂𝒏𝒈𝒆𝒍𝒍 on October 29-30

Join our events by registering here: https://bit.ly/49thEPregis
🔷 Life and Legacy Planning Webinar on October 30
🔶 Pints and Planning in 𝑱𝒖𝒏𝒆𝒂𝒖 on November 12
🔷 Lunch and Learn with Liz Smith in 𝑲𝒆𝒕𝒄𝒉𝒊𝒌𝒂𝒏 on November 14
🔶 Life and Legacy Planning Webinar on November 18
🔷 Life and Legacy Planning Webinar on November 21

Visit our website for more details ✨

Please join us this coming Wednesday 6pm at the Ketchikan Public Library. Licha Kelley-king and I are great listeners and offer ideas to life's greatest challenge. Please complete your Advance Directive and Power of Attorney asap. They are the two documents that can protect your wishes anytime you cannot speak for yourself!

Courageous Conversations - Check us out!

Wednesday, January 24th 6pm at UAS Ketchikan Campus Library. It will be an inspiring evening!

Brief description of the film: “This documentary grabs life through song. Six hospice patients allow us into tender, vulnerable and funny moments of their lives. Singing unlocks the patients' pasts, guides their dreams and their futures.

Encouraged by one nurse who loves to sing, and a collaborative filming process, they wrestle with the new insecurity facing us all: recent advances in biomedicine mean we can now live for years rather than months after a terminal diagnosis. Sometimes. But not every time. How do we cope with this uncertainty? Just as it takes a village to raise a child, it takes a community to help face your own mortality, making the process of dying itself safe, individual, and as gentle as possible.”

Please join us this Saturday 1/20, 3-5pm at the Ketchikan Public Library. We've got great information and documents, need a notary? We can do that too!

Are you interested in learning about Burial-At-Sea? VSED Voluntary Stopping of Eating and Drinking? Dementia and Alzheimers Directives?

Join us this Saturday, November 18th the Library -

Just a reminder - life is calling!

Please join us on Saturday, January 14th. We will gently explore topics and documents related to end-of-life planning. Please bring your questions, fears, dreams and worries. Free and surprisingly comforting! Bring your loved ones, friends and family. Everyone over the age of 18 needs an Advance Directive - just ask HIPAA.

When: Saturday, January 14th, 10am
Where: Rendezvous Sr Day Services, Corner of First and Jefferson
Questions? 907-617-7623 or 907-821-0917

Quality vs quantity? What are your wishes for the end of your life?

Please join us this Saturday at 10am-12pm, at Rendezvous Senior Day Service, Inc on the corner of First and Jefferson for a discussion about how you can share and record your end-of-life wishes.

Questions? 907-617-7623 or 907-821-0917

There are a lot of diseases that result in death but have no pain in the journey. There are also many diseases that do cause pain, a lot of pain.
We must look at the person’s disease history to evaluate pain status. If they have a history of physical pain, then we must treat that pain until the person’s last breath. Just because a person is not responding does not mean that pain is gone. Whatever is causing the pain is still in the body.
Over time a person’s tolerance to the pain medication may increase and the dosage will gradually have to be increased. When a narcotic is administered in small, graduating dosages (to find the place in the body where the medication addresses the pain but does not exceed the amount of pain present in the body) you will have no problem with addiction or overdose.
Obviously there is a complicated skill to end of life pain management and I have described its management in kindergarten terms. I suggest that you get my booklet, Pain At End of Life as a tool to support families whose special person is dying.

When is the appropriate time to make the change from being “full code” to being “no code”? Full code means that when your heart stops, and you have died, medical professionals or paramedics will do everything medically possible to try and restart your heart. No code means that if your heart stops, medical professionals or paramedics will NOT try to restart your heart. They will let a person stay dead. They will not intervene and try to bring them back.

This sounds very harsh so let's explore this idea further. We are conditioned to think that a call to 911 can help us no matter what the emergency is and to think that the doctors will always be able to "fix" me.

Because everyone dies, whether or not we want to admit it, there will come a point when the medical system will "fail" us. It will be our time to die. When the doctors have said, "I can't fix you" it is time to reconsider what medicine can do for us.

Medicine and medical technology can prolong our life but not indefinitely and it is generally at the expense of our quality of living. Or we can reframe how we think of medicine, using it as a tool to provide comfort, dignity and support as our final life experience unfolds.

If I stuck my finger in a light socket and my heart stopped, I would want you to call 911. The paramedics could probably restart my heart and I would return to my normal life and activities.

If my body is filled with a disease that the doctors have said they cannot fix, my heart stops, and I do not have a No Code order or DNR, DNAR form completed and signed by a physician, the paramedics or doctors are bound by their profession to try to start my heart again. And they may succeed BUT in most cases I will not be as able as I was before my heart stopped. My disease will still be non-fixable. I will die again in a short time.

And in that short time there will be continued decline of my body, continued progression of the disease, the pain will remain and there may be increased pain from fractured bones due to the resuscitation efforts.

Life will have less quality. What is quality? Is it heart beating, lungs exchanging air, kidneys working all with the help of machines, quality? OR is quality thinking, feeling and interacting? Something to think about.

Something More About... Do I Want FULL CODE or a NO CODE?

Pages 12-15 of BY YOUR SIDE, A Guide for Caring for the Dying at Home, covers end of life decisions that need to be made before they are needed. POLST, Advance Directives, DNR, DNAR and Durable Power of Attorney information is laid out clear ways.

Please join us on Saturday, January 14th. We will gently explore topics and documents related to end-of-life planning. Please bring your questions, fears, dreams and worries. Free and surprisingly fun. Bring your loved ones, friends and family.

When: Saturday, January 14th, 10am
Where: Rendezvous Sr Day Services, Corner of First and Jefferson
Questions? 907-617-7623 or 907-821-0917

Holidays can often be difficult for many children and families grieving the loss of a loved one.

Starting tomorrow, we will be doing a mini-series called 12 days of Children's Grief Tips & Support on our social media.

We will be sharing activities, tips, and programs to help grieving children and their families in Canada.

Stayed tuned! 💚