Just a Will's Not the Way

None of us ever imagines we won't be there to raise our children. Did you know that 69% of parents have not made provisions should the unthinkable happen. It's morbid. We're busy. We don't want to spend the money to set things up. We push away the thought because it’s too scary to contemplate our child being raised by anyone besides us.

As parents, we must take the time and invest the energy in setting things up for our family should we not be there. Without prior planning, we will leave our family in a legal mess. An expensive and complicated mess that is easily avoidable.

Doing the right thing by our family does not have to be as painful as we think it will be. If we educate ourselves about what is needed and how to get it taken care of, getting our personal affairs in order can even be enlightening. It certainly takes a weight of our shoulders. Alexis Martin Neely, a renowned Personal Family Lawyer, offers the following guidelines.

Kid Protection Plan

A KPP begins with naming legal guardians to raise your children if anything happens to you and their mothe/. A comprehensive KPP will also name local friends or family as guardians for the immediate/short-term care of your children so that the authorities never have to take your children out of your home and into the care of strangers. With a KPP in place, you'll carry an ID card in your wallet listing the names and addresses of your immediate/short-term guardians as well as provide written instructions to all of the people who care for your children, such as babysitters and schools. Finally, a KPP will confidentially exclude anyone you know you would never want to serve as guardian of your children to ensure there are no court-room battles over your child's care. It will also provide detailed instructions about things like health care, education, discipline and your values, so your children are raised the way you want, no matter what.

Financial Durable Power of Attorney

A financial durable power of attorney is something every adult needs, even if you don't have children at home. This document is what will let your family access your bank accounts, pay your bills, and make financial and legal decisions for you if you are hospitalized or otherwise incapacitated.

This story should bring home the importance of having a durable power of attorney in place:

Neely's law firm was contacted by a young woman after her father was hurt at his janitorial job, hospitalized and unable to communicate. This man thought he did not need estate planning because his income was very low and he had less than $10,000 in the bank.

Unfortunately though, his failure to plan left his family in a lurch. They needed the little bit of money he had in the bank but couldn't access it without going to Court because the account was in his name and he didn't have a durable power of attorney naming anyone to act for him legally.The cost of going to Court was going to cost their family more than the money that was in the bank!

Don't leave your family in this kind of a painful situation unable to access the limited resources you have because you didn't do what you need to do. Be sure you have a financial durable power of attorney in place and make sure it's comprehensive and will work when your family needs it.

Health Care Directive (Living Will)

A Health Care Directive (also known as a Living Will or Health Care Power of Attorney) is another document set that every adult needs, even if you don’t have children at home counting on you.

These set of documents do two important things:

1. Appoint the person you want to make health care decisions for you, if you cannot make them for yourself
   
2. Tell your appointed decision-maker how you want those decisions to be made.

Each state has its own rules for how these documents should be prepared. In some cases, your instructions can be all in one document and in others they need to be two separate documents. The most important thing is that you get something down in writing.

And, once again, make sure you have got something that will really work when your family needs it. Neely recommends giving broad discretion to someone you trust to make decisions about all of your health care decisions, including not only life-saving medical care, such as respiration, but continued nutrition and hydration in case you are incapacitated. If you recall the Terry Schiavo case from several years ago, in which her husband and her parents fought over whether she should be kept alive or not and the case was brought all the way to the Florida Supreme Court, the issue was not whether to continue to keep her lungs pumping, but whether to continue to provide nutrition and hydration - be sure your medical directive addresses these issues.

A Will

When it comes to estate planning, most people think of having a Will. Unfortunately, having a Will often provides a false sense of security. Neely admonishes that belief as a myth. In fact, did you know your Will is the least important of the 5 legal documents every parent must know about.

A Will sets forth what you want to happen to your assets at the time of your death. But, here's the thing, where there's a Will and your assets are owned in your name, the Will merely acts as instructions to the Court as to what to do with your assets.
That means your family is stuck dealing with the Court after you are gone. This is not a good thing.

The Court process for handling your assets after your death is called probate. It's typically expensive, time-consuming, and always totally public.A Will alone is really only appropriate for parents who have no (or very limited) assets titled in their name. If you have assets, such as a home, bank accounts, life insurance, and retirement accounts, you need to have a Living Trust to keep everything out of court, totally private and make it super easy for your loved ones.
You may have heard that if you only have life insurance and retirement accounts that you could simply name beneficiaries on those assets and avoid probate. That's true, but not going to work if you have minor children because they are too young to be the beneficiaries of your assets and would end up in Court with a guardian appointed to handle them. Not what you want.

Living Trust
If you have financial assets or real estate, you want to have a Living Trust. A Living Trust is the single best way to make things as easy as possible for the people you love, bar none. But, and it's a big BUT, most people who have a Living Trust in place have one that won't work when their family needs it.It’s the same for each of these documents Neely talked about; they are only going to work the way they were designed to work if the law stays the same and your life stays the same.

Neely reminds us-As your life changes, the documents need to change and as the law changes, the documents also need to change.

And, for your Living Trust, it won't work unless all of your assets are titled in the name of it, not just once, but every time you acquire an asset in the future. It is imperative that all documents are kept up to date!

Michael Jackson is a good example. He spent hundreds of thousands of dollars with his lawyers, had a trust-based estate plan that he was probably told would keep his family out of court. As we now know, it must have failed because his family has been dragged into court already multiple times since his death with everything open to the public.

These 5 documents are absolutely vital because they will make life as easy as possible for your family, keep your loved ones out of court and get them easy access to your assets in the midst of a crisis, but only if they are kept up to date and your assets are owned properly.

Most of us do not have the time, knowledge and discipline to do this for ourselves the right way. If you do, great. But, who is going to guide your family to make the right decisions and carry things out after you are gone? There's nothing more important to you than your family. They are why you do everything you do, right? So, for them, find a lawyer who will guide you right during your lifetime and be there for your loved ones when you can’t be. It's far easier for you to take care of things now, while you are living and able than it will be for them to take care of things after you are gone. Legal planning is not just about wise financial planning; it's about making life as easy as possible for the people we love....no matter what. chrissie

No Excuses

I have been thinking long and hard about a comment left on one of our blogs. A reader chastized me for saying that European and Asian students out-performed American students on the TIMMS (an international math and science test administered to students in grades 4 and 8). I could have blown it off, but I can't, because it is an important issue facing our children, one on which Americans should make their voices heard. We are settling too often for ideas and programs that are irrational.

The reader commented that special education and English language learners are tested the same as students in the regular classrooms on End-of-Instruction tests and this brings our overall test scores down in the U.S. I tend to agree, since it seems like if special education students could score satisfactory or advanced on an EOI exam, then they probably should not be classified as special ed.

But, I want to just counter that argument with a couple of points. We have reached the phase of EOI testing in which students are mandated to pass a requisite number of exams, Algebra I being one of them, or something as of yet ambiguous will happen to them, like they cannot get a diploma, only a certificate of attendance. Already, if a student does not pass the 8th grade reading test, he/she cannot get a driver's license until it is taken again and passed. That's fine - everyone has had plenty of opportunity to build on achieving an 8th grade reading level before the 8th grade, and everyone in Oklahoma should read on the 8th grade level.

Passing Algebra I is a little sketchier, probably because I have an aversion to math and I'm also not sure our pre-algebra methodologies from 4th to 8th grade have hit their stride in America yet, making students truly ready for the test. That said, I passed the math sections of every standardized test I took back in the late 60's/early 70's, and I was only an average student in math, so I know it can be done. I don't think any new algebraic discoveries have been made that would make algebra any harder since I was a student.

So I am in agreement with what the reader said, but I do want to ask another question. When did it become allright that special ed or ELL or minority students receive an inferior education? Saying our scores are low because we have this or that special population is a cop out. Consider the following:

1. Special education denotes a variety of conditions, many not even regarding mental acuity. ADD, eye-sight, learning disabilities and many other learning problems have nothing to do with a person's being able to achieve, except that it is harder. It is harder, but not impossible. By allowing both the individual and the community to accept low scores for these students we are short changing both the student and the community into which he will be an adult member someday. I do agree, though, that testing severely mentally handicapped individuals and expecting them to pass the test would be verging on insanity.

2. ELL students are a little different. Can you imagine your child having to pass a test in a school in France, given in French, when you had just arrived there a year ago for your new job? As humans our immediate reaction might be to protest vociferously at first or be in denial that it can't be happening. But an alternate response would be that you know your child has to take this test in French....it will be hard and require extra study, but if you want your child to be successful, you do it. Is it possible we are not trying hard enough with our ELL families to get across the reason why these tests are important? I understand the agony - as a child I lived in New Mexico and met many old people who spoke only Spanish. I also saw many students come to my fifth grade class from the reservation knowing only their native language. But children are very adaptive and are quick learners. To allow them to stay as they are is to short change them and their community in the long run. It is hard, but not impossible to reach them.

3. You often hear people say, "Well, you have a lot of 'those' children in your school, what do you expect?" Yes, the statistics are stacked up against schools that have more of "those" children, whoever they are, making it harder, but not impossible to achieve at certain levels. Since when did it become okay to try less hard? To settle for excuses? To let "those" people slip into the cracks? "Those" children, whoever they are, are not dumb - it is just a diffucult job. Since when did we become a nation of excuse-makers and wimps afraid to try hard?

Kudos to those teachers who go into the classroom everyday to fight the good fight. The year has only just begun, but already their focus is on raising the bar in the high stakes testing arena. They need the help and appreciation of the federal and state government, schools and parents. Their job is hard, but they do it.

We can't settle for excuses anymore - kids' lives depend on it. The idea that everything will be easy is irrational. Students and parents need to be trained less in feel-goodism and more in the proven principles that allow for success in life. Let's approach education with more compassion for the struggle to achieve and a more logicical approach to the problems while accepting fewer excuses.

Earning Freedom

The mom of a teenager and I got in a discussion about teens and curfews. She asked for my input on curfew times for her teen. New curfews and questions about updated rules are definitely on everyone's radar now as a new school year begins. As they go up a grade, teens may have expectations for additional freedom. They will likely be making some new friends and opportunities for new social activities are down the road. This is a good thing. As I often have said, as a parent, you want the phone to ring. So, looking at curfews in the context of additional freedom for Mr. or Ms Independent seems relevant.

What kind of additional freedoms are appropriate as our children grow? Unfortunately, there is no pat answer. Curfew is a personal choice; the right answer for one family may be different than the answer in another. What's important to keep in mind, is that while your teen is learning to manage additional freedom s/he needs to be taking on additional responsibility as well. When the two are not linked, a sense of entitlement may develop that could undermine your best intentions. That sense of entitlement can destroy a teen's progress to maturity and responsibility.

How exactly to link freedom and responsibility? It's not difficult - but it does take intention and attention as a parent. A new drivers license could be accompanied by the responsibility to buy their own gas, or pay for insurance or drive a younger sibling to a class or practice. An extension on the curfew for your new high school freshman could link to a commitment to babysit younger siblings weekly or the requirement that your teen spend Saturday mornings doing chores. Be clear that additional freedom links to additional responsibilities so that your teen learns there is no "free lunch." This is real world life-lesson material.... Perhaps those in our government might disagree, but you don't get something for nothing.

The right curfew time and the right level of freedom for your teen will be determined by his/her level of maturity, your trust in their judgment, your knowledge of their activities and whereabouts and your level of comfort with their friends…. among other things. Talk to other parents. Communicating can provide good ideas as well as a sense for what your teen is expecting. But ultimately, the level of freedom you allow or the time of the curfew is personal choice; don't feel the pressure to do what "everyone else is doing.".

Linking freedom with responsibility heightens the value of the freedom and helps your teen respect their new privileges. Being attentive is required to maximize the value in this approach, so be prepared and tuned in to the role you will need to play. Trust me on this.... you are just loving your child and doing him or her a favor by connecting these two things and not giving them a free ride.

As a side note from one parent to another- Nothing good happens after 12:00. chrissie

Seeing the Potential

The cover of this week's MY Magazine features a picture of Muskogee Early Childhood Center (ECC) students looking blithely into the camera, personalities already evident by the age of four. Many people see only adorable pre-schoolers, but I see potential doctors, lawyers, nurses, store managers and teachers starring back at me.

A strange phenomenon occurs when I run into members of this year's Muskogee High School senior class. It seems like just yesterday they were funny little children, caught forever running and laughing in that camera of my mind, the exact opposite of what I experience when looking at those kindergarteners. The mind can fly both forward and backwards in time, unbounded by any laws of physics, except for the sheer potentiality of what all of these young people may become - what any of us may become at any given time in our lives.

To quote Ophelia in Hamlet, "We know what we are, but not what we may be." As parents and teachers we often understand this quote all too well. The line that separates a child from a future of addiction and failure or unbelievable success is sometimes a fine one. We approach our first, second, and third born children differently, and due to a myriad of factors, children from the very same family turn out differently. As parents we often blame ourselves for lack of the same degree of interest in all our children. As teachers we may feel we did not do enough to save this or that person from him/herself.

Regardless of our approach, one thing we must do is see and trust in the potential of our children. Covey has said in The 8th Habit that trust becomes a verb when we see and communicate the worth and potential in someone so clearly that he or she is able to see it himself. This one factor, regardless of other variables in raising a child, can be the difference between giving a child the power of self-efficacy and a feeling of powerlessness. Seeing that potential requires a profound faith in the individual and in the belief that things will turn out as they are meant to be. It cannot be separated out from the love needed to affirm children that they are capable of goodness and greatness.

When I see those children, whether this year's kindergarteners or Class of 2010 seniors, I have the greatest love and respect for them. Regardless of their age, they are our equals, just on a different leg of the journey. They have the potential to solve problems we cannot imagine and to take care of us in ways we do not yet understand. Seeing the potential in our children and clearly communicating it in affirmative ways is one of the best gifts we can give.
-------Melony

Shut Up and Listen

Have you ever done something embarrassing? Something you were ashamed of? Something you wish you could take back? Of course. Haven't we all? I still shudder about an incident or two.

Shame undermines one's confidence. If you are a teenager your confidence is likely to be fragile and ever-changing anyway. Even if your teenager has done something very dumb, and needs to have some serious correction, tread carefully. You don’t want to shame her...that is counter-productive.

A teenager is going to make mistakes and need correction. While we guide our teen to learn from his mistakes, we need to try to do this in a way that is positive and builds him up. Helping our teen develop a strong sense of self is essential to developing his ability to say no at times, to extricate himself from bad situations, and to ultimately make choices that reflect his (and hopefully our) values.

This won't always be easy. You may have to bite your tongue at first. This buys you time to think strategically and control what is said. Deep breath. Deep Breath.

Some tips from Sue Blaney-( http://www.parentingteensinfo.com) Tread carefully; try not to over-react; think things through before you respond to delicate situations, and when you do respond it's probably best to do it privately. Helping your teen to save face ensures you are on the same side of the table, not adversaries with opposing goals. Humiliation is not a good companion to criticism.

When an incident occurs that needs discussion or action, wait at first. Let your teen talk. Lead the conversation so it is not just making excuses but results in serious evaluation and reflection. Discuss reasonable consequences with your child. Make a negative a positive by establishing expectations, boundaries and possible repercussions in a calm and non-judgemental way. As someone once said, hate the sin, love the sinner.

If wishes were fishes, I'd wish these "awkward" or "dangerous" moments never happened with teens, but as the Mother of four, I can promise you that they do. Handling them in a rational and constructive manner makes life with your son or daughter easier and less traumatic. Keeping the lines of communication open, no matter what the phone call, is one of the most important tools we can use as a parent. chrissie

Talk To A Grown-Up

It is entirely likely your teenager will encounter a situation about which your teen will need adult input...and won't always want it from a parent. For many reasons teens may not want to go to us for help... and it is in our best interest to facilitate and support our teen's relationships with other adults. Aunts and uncles are often the best candidates for such a role, but truly this role can be fulfilled by anyone who is trustworthy. Family friends, cousins, teachers, coaches, school counselors, youth leaders…. it seems obvious. The more positive adults in our teen's life, the stronger the support network will be. Even better, the less likely that our child will run into serious trouble.

Some parents are jealous of a special relationship between their child and another adult This has always struck me as being selfish and short-sighted. There is no room for jealousy here, a supportive adult can be a life-saver. As long as the "significant other" adult in your teen's life is a positive and constructive influence, do the Happy Dance. A mature confidant is a blessing for your child.

There is an interesting side note here. Often those“fun adults” our children find so easy to talk to find things a little different when they have kids of their own. It's funny how their own kids consider their parent quite strict and serious. See, our role is different and we play it differently when dealing with our own children. Maybe you will even be the supportive adult in another child's life.

What adult does your teens consider close enough to confide in? Let your teens know that this is important and that you support them in these relationships. If there are adults that you feel don't share your values, speak about this with your child so you can provide some subtle guidance. Then sit back and don't try to control it, because ( I know this one is hard) this relationship is not one for us to manage.

We are the on the front line as role models for our teenagers. There is no doubt about that. But the back-up support of other interested adults is reassuring and comforting. Think about who this might be for your child. I am not above cultivating a relationship by encouraging interaction. Just don't be too obvious. It's the kiss of death if our kids know their parents are promoting anything!!!! chrissie