The Hidden Financial Burden of Long-Term Care: A Personal Story

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One of the simplest, straightforward but most painful procedures you can have is hemorrhoid surgery, which involves a 6cm hole and around 5 grams of blood vessels.
It is understood that pain is subjective, and that each person will prioritize their own experience, but wow, mine was excruciating.
It takes relatively a long time to recover—between 25 and 60 days—before returning to a normal life.
Now, I am not only talking about my painful medical experience—I am also talking about my thoughts. What would a more involved surgery or recovery entail if that small operation took so long to heal and needed help?
My dad passed away 3 years ago; he was 93. He was fully alert and lucid, reading the newspaper and listening to the radio, watching basketball games on TV.
He had polio since he was a child and when he was 89 years old, he had a fractured leg following an accident. Sitting all the time, he developed digestive issues that required another surgery.
Being the resilient man that I always looked up to, he was able to recover and lived 4 more years.
Both my dad who was 89 years old, and I who is 54, needed homecare support at some point. My dad needed it for longer, obviously.
When someone has health insurance, they often do not know what their policy does NOT cover:
–         Round-the-clock nursing
–         Hospital bed at home
–         Prescription drugs
–         Medical gear
–         Wheelchair,
–         etc.…
The cost of home care is high and depletes your finances.
When we consider retirement, we frequently consider how we want to spend our time after putting in so much time at work, how we will maintain our standard of living, how we will pay for our insurance, or how we would enjoy spoiling our grandchildren. Fair enough!
However, we fail to think about how we can take care of ourselves and put part of our saving towards in-home health care. Today, retirement is not our only concern, longevity is. The longer we live, the more expenses we will incur, especially at the medical level.
Don’t count on your family only, remember that your children are not your retirement plan.

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