Nancy....

lindaprocopio said:

I did family recipes books for everyone last Thanksgiving. FUN!
As soon as I recurred I started giving shares of my business to my sons, and now they officially own my business free of inheritance tax. I cashed a bond and beefed up the grandkid's college accounts. We re-did our wills. I had all my good jewelry cleaned and the stones tightened and made up little cards to go with each piece for the intended recipient. Those were the big things.

And there were a lot of little things I did, important to do (if you're gonna) while you still feel good and there won't be unnecessary drama attached to it. I used snapfish.com to create photobooks for my family since it is fast and easy. I did a hardcover book with a collection of family recipes for my children and step-children and gave them out at Thanksgiving dinner, and it was fun to combine photos of my own children cutting pumpkins, and rolling pie crusts, and baking gingerbread houses, etc. and positioning them alongside photos of the grandkids doing the same things with me. And I made hardcover photo books of our last 2 family beach vacations and Christmas's. I did birthday cards and Christmas cards for my 2 grandchildren, with a note trying to imagine them at that age and an annual $ gift tucked inside for each year until they are 18. I gave my (grown) children the cards they'd made me as children and their old report cards, and their baby albums, and newspaper clippings of when they made the paper. For my grandchildren I filled an under-the-bed storage chest with heirloom Christmas ornaments and little things I saved that they drew or made for me and the baby albums I created for each of them and the studio portraits I was given as 'grandma' that they might want to have one day. My family knows I did these things and there was never any angst about it; they know I like to have a plan and hate loose ends. Once I got all these little things done, I felt better.

Once I got the liver mets, I realized I wasn't REALLY ready. I don't think I've left anything important unsaid with my darling husband or my 2 sons, but I still want to leave a posthumous letter to help them get through their early grief. It is a custom where I live to display photos of the deceased at a funeral, so I went through the photos in my computer and had 3 identical hardcover books made of photos of me with photos of when I was a baby, as young mother, and then later in my life, choosing photos with my family in them. Now the task is to write the letters to tuck inside the books. That IS hard. I have my husband's half done and can't seem to get on with the task. I will make a renewed effort once I feel better from this radioembolization. My hope is to somewhat pre-arrange my funeral and leave the "Linda" photo books and letters with the funeral director to distribute. AGAIN, this is hard; this is dramatic; I can't seem to move forward on this, but I will. We get cremated in my family and although I'd like the majority of my ashes spread on my bulb garden so I can bloom again each spring, I did look at little vials that I may have engraved so that family members can have some part of me with them. Hanging onto those vials and filling them with some of my ashes would be the other thing I would pre-plan with the funeral director. (I want my family to have some say in what would be comforting to them.) They sell these ashes vials as jewelry but I really see them as laying in a jewelry box and a way to 'visit with me' since I will have no grave:
http://www.perfectmemorials.com/silver-classic-cylinder-cremation-jewelry-pack-engravable-p-2634.html

And craziest of all, I recently boxed up all of the Christmas presents I have already purchased for next Christmas (year-round shopper & eternal optimist!), and tucked cards into each box, afraid that my husband wouldn't have a clue who gets what. Then of course, the worry is that there isn't something yet for EVERYONE on my list yet, and not NEAR what I hope to give any of them, and people might be confused and hurt by the minimal effort my little stack, to date, looks like. What can you do? I'm trying.

And a final PS to this embarrassingly long post:
I am happy to report that I've ALREADY had to pull out the heirloom ornaments from the grandkid's box to hang on my tree; and I've ALREADY been able to rip up one of the posthumous birthday cards and deliver my gift in person since I'M STILL HERE!

kayandok said:

Wow!
Linda, thank you for that! You could write a book/do a class for cancer survivors on how to prepare for the end, just in case. These ideas are really helpful. I like the idea of giving the recipe books and some photo albums out for gifts now. That encourages me to hurry and get it done! Also LOVE the idea of giving cards back to the kids that they have given me, although I might have a hard time choosing which ones. (My kids always draw a lot of pictures and they are all treasures to me.) Nancy mentioned that she had attended a class on how to do this, did you do that too?

lindaprocopio said:

I did family recipes books for everyone last Thanksgiving. FUN!
As soon as I recurred I started giving shares of my business to my sons, and now they officially own my business free of inheritance tax. I cashed a bond and beefed up the grandkid's college accounts. We re-did our wills. I had all my good jewelry cleaned and the stones tightened and made up little cards to go with each piece for the intended recipient. Those were the big things.

And there were a lot of little things I did, important to do (if you're gonna) while you still feel good and there won't be unnecessary drama attached to it. I used snapfish.com to create photobooks for my family since it is fast and easy. I did a hardcover book with a collection of family recipes for my children and step-children and gave them out at Thanksgiving dinner, and it was fun to combine photos of my own children cutting pumpkins, and rolling pie crusts, and baking gingerbread houses, etc. and positioning them alongside photos of the grandkids doing the same things with me. And I made hardcover photo books of our last 2 family beach vacations and Christmas's. I did birthday cards and Christmas cards for my 2 grandchildren, with a note trying to imagine them at that age and an annual $ gift tucked inside for each year until they are 18. I gave my (grown) children the cards they'd made me as children and their old report cards, and their baby albums, and newspaper clippings of when they made the paper. For my grandchildren I filled an under-the-bed storage chest with heirloom Christmas ornaments and little things I saved that they drew or made for me and the baby albums I created for each of them and the studio portraits I was given as 'grandma' that they might want to have one day. My family knows I did these things and there was never any angst about it; they know I like to have a plan and hate loose ends. Once I got all these little things done, I felt better.

Once I got the liver mets, I realized I wasn't REALLY ready. I don't think I've left anything important unsaid with my darling husband or my 2 sons, but I still want to leave a posthumous letter to help them get through their early grief. It is a custom where I live to display photos of the deceased at a funeral, so I went through the photos in my computer and had 3 identical hardcover books made of photos of me with photos of when I was a baby, as young mother, and then later in my life, choosing photos with my family in them. Now the task is to write the letters to tuck inside the books. That IS hard. I have my husband's half done and can't seem to get on with the task. I will make a renewed effort once I feel better from this radioembolization. My hope is to somewhat pre-arrange my funeral and leave the "Linda" photo books and letters with the funeral director to distribute. AGAIN, this is hard; this is dramatic; I can't seem to move forward on this, but I will. We get cremated in my family and although I'd like the majority of my ashes spread on my bulb garden so I can bloom again each spring, I did look at little vials that I may have engraved so that family members can have some part of me with them. Hanging onto those vials and filling them with some of my ashes would be the other thing I would pre-plan with the funeral director. (I want my family to have some say in what would be comforting to them.) They sell these ashes vials as jewelry but I really see them as laying in a jewelry box and a way to 'visit with me' since I will have no grave:
http://www.perfectmemorials.com/silver-classic-cylinder-cremation-jewelry-pack-engravable-p-2634.html

And craziest of all, I recently boxed up all of the Christmas presents I have already purchased for next Christmas (year-round shopper & eternal optimist!), and tucked cards into each box, afraid that my husband wouldn't have a clue who gets what. Then of course, the worry is that there isn't something yet for EVERYONE on my list yet, and not NEAR what I hope to give any of them, and people might be confused and hurt by the minimal effort my little stack, to date, looks like. What can you do? I'm trying.

And a final PS to this embarrassingly long post:
I am happy to report that I've ALREADY had to pull out the heirloom ornaments from the grandkid's box to hang on my tree; and I've ALREADY been able to rip up one of the posthumous birthday cards and deliver my gift in person since I'M STILL HERE!

lindaprocopio said:

It's funny about my good jewelry,...
Way before I got cancer, when my DIL would admire my diamond tennis bracelet, I'd tease her that "One day this will be yours." The same is true of my best earrings; my 10-year-old granddaughter has always thought of them as hers even when they sparkeled on my ears. (In fact when I lost one of them at the airport in Germany, she was personally tragic-striken until I had it replaced!) She's tried them on numerous times over the years. HA!

Nothing I have is worth 10's of thousands or anything, but I have some beautiful pieces, gifts from my husband. I chose for my oldest son my Victorian slide bracelet, and he will just have to one day find a woman worthy of wearing it. (He's single.) My sentimental hope is that it would be his wedding gift to her, making a place for me on that day. I chose pieces for my sister and step-daughter based on their personal style, and lesser pieces for my very best girlfriends. The rings I always wear I would hope my husband would want to keep himself or keep in the family; that will be his choice.

There are no comprehensive emotional support groups for cancer survivors here in the sticks where I live. But the birthday and Christmas cards was my younger son's idea, something he read in a book. And I started making various "occasion / vacation" hardcover photo books for YEARS before I got cancer, so expanding that idea was easy. & Nancy was a big inspiration to me; she really got me thinking about this. I couldn't do videos and I think my grandkids are old enough to remember my intense love for them if they have the photo books to verify it if the memory fades. I guess we've all TALKED about my not being here; maybe that was why this was fairly easy for us; we have it in the open. We had a family business to secure and our succession planning started over 2 years ago when I got sick and I've always answered the grandkids frank questions openly so they won't be caught by surprise. I try to lead by example. I look on death as inevitable and universal for all God's creatures, and I don't think anyone really fears death in my family. That's the biggest piece of making plans: getting everyone you love to a good place about it.

wow. Sounds like I think I'm the next to go here. Very possible with a CA125 of 8500 and extensive liver mets, but once I shake off this malaise from the radioembolism I had Wednesday, I'll be off to the beach and planning the next fun things for us all to do, and LIVING. That's all we can do, ladies. LIVE. with zest.