Member-only story
You Might Be Financially Responsible For Your Elderly Parent
Whether you want to be or not.
It’s day 10 or 11 of sitting in the hospital with my 94-year-old mom. Ten if you don’t count the ER, 11 if you do.
I cannot even begin to imagine the size of the medical bills that will be winging our way. When my first husband was life flighted from the scene of his motorcycle accident, we got a bill for $20,000. I laughed and threw it away.
My mom has Medicare and secondary insurance that will cover almost everything, thanks to my late dad’s union job.
Legal secretaries don’t have unions, so if anything really bad happens, I’m just walking into the sea.
Since I live in Ohio, I should probably start walking now.
As I sit here and obsess over nursing home costs (no insurance help there), I discover all kinds of fun facts that I never knew.
For example, what the heck are “filial responsibility laws”?
I’m a big believer that children have a duty of care to parents who need them. Your parents took care of you as a child in every way, shape, and form, and now it’s time to return the favor.
