Life/Death/Law

Nicole Taylor: How Community Foundations Can Help You Do Good Where You Live Nicole Taylor, the CEO and President of the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, the country’s largest community foundation, talks to me about what community foundations are and how they make it easy for all of us to get off of the sidelines and make meaningful contributions in our communities. Whether you want to contribute to a fund for a particular cause, help endow your community for the long term, or open up a donor advised fund, learn how community foundations are powerful resources for anyone that wants to make a contribution to their communities, but doesn't know where to start. Think of the Community Chest cards in monopoly! To find your local community foundation, click here for the Council on Foundations Community Foundation Locator. To subscribe to my weekly Substack Newsletter, Life/Death/Law, subscribe here: https://lifedeathlaw.substack.com/ To listen to more episodes of Life/Death/Law, go to www.lifedeathlaw.com AND THANKS TO OUR SPONSOR: https://www.redesigningtheend.com/ a professional education platform for the next generation of eldercare, senior housing, estate planning, and death care leaders. To follow me: twitter-twitter.com/lifedeathlaw instagram-Instagram.com/lifedeathlaw facebookcom/LifeDeathLaw Linkedin.com/in/lizahanks

When classical pianist Adam Tendler received a surprise inheritance from his father he used it to commission 16 original works of music to explore the complexity of grief, loss, and inheritance. After each performance of the resulting program, Inheritances, he was struck by the way that the audience stayed in their seats, talking to each other. "This is something I've never seen before after a recital or any kind of classical music concert where people are just talking to each other about what just happened, usually they just make a beeline for the door. And that's exactly what I wanted because I didn't want a program that was going to be so specific about my life and my experience and my father.I really wanted something as abstract and universal that people could just come to it and just enter it at wherever, wherever they needed to." Join us for a conversation about Adam's program, Inheritances, and his reflections about why he commissioned the work, how envisioning it and performing it helped him to understand his loss, and how the composers and audiences have responded with such intense connection to its universal themes. To find out more about Adam's work, go to http://adamtendler.com/ To subscribe to my weekly Substack Newsletter, Life/Death/Law, subscribe here: https://lifedeathlaw.substack.com/ To listen to more episodes of Life/Death/Law, go to www.lifedeathlaw.com AND THANKS TO OUR SPONSOR: https://www.redesigningtheend.com/ a professional education platform for the next generation of eldercare, senior housing, estate planning, and death care leaders. To follow me: twitter-twitter.com/lifedeathlaw instagram-Instagram.com/lifedeathlaw facebookcom/LifeDeathLaw Linkedin.com/in/lizahanks

What’s a Death Doula? Tracey Walker Tells All Tracey Walker, the founder of Let It Be End of Life Planning and the Program Director for End of Life Doula Training at Going with Grace, talks with me about what Death Doulas do, why they can be helpful in offering non-medical support to people facing death and their families in all kinds of ways, how to find a Death Doula if you or a loved needs support and how Death Doulas work with other care providers, like Hospice. You can also learn about queer end of life assistance, doula work for pet loss, and, if you listen very carefully, you can hear my dog, Tater, barking in the background. To find out more about Tracey’s Doula services, go to https://www.letitbedeathdoula.com. To find out more about finding a Death Doula near you, here are the resources that we discussed: Going with Grace Death Doula Directory: https://goingwithgrace.com/death-doula-directory/ National End-of-Life Doula Alliance (NEDA) Doula Directory: https://goingwithgrace.com/death-doula-directory/ To ask a question for the show, email me at AskLiza@lifedeathlaw.com To subscribe to my weekly Substack Newsletter, Life/Death/Law, subscribe here: https://lifedeathlaw.substack.com/ To listen to more episodes of Life/Death/Law, go to www.lifedeathlaw.com AND THANKS TO OUR SPONSOR: https://www.redesigningtheend.com/ a professional education platform for the next generation of eldercare, senior housing, estate planning, and death care leaders. To follow me: twitter-twitter.com/lifedeathlaw instagram-Instagram.com/lifedeathlaw facebookcom/LifeDeathLaw Linkedin.com/in/lizahanks

Green Burial: Elizabeth Fournier, The Green Reaper Elizabeth Fournier, owner and founder of Cornerstone Funeral Services in Boring, Oregon, and the author of The Green Burial Handbook, talks about what green burial is, what it isn’t, and how you can work with a funeral director to get the kind of burial you or your loved ones want. Learn about the surprisingly non-environmentally friendly footprint of traditional cremation and the new practices of aqua-cremation and organic reduction. To find out more about Green Burial Resources: https://www.cornerstonefuneral.com/green-burial-resources Elizabeth specifically mentioned the Funeral Consumers Alliance and the Green Burial Council during the show. To ask a question for the show, email me at AskLiza@lifedeathlaw.com To listen to more episodes of Life/Death/Law, go to www.lifedeathlaw.com And follow me: twitter-twitter.com/lifedeathlaw instagram-Instagram.com/lifedeathlaw facebookcom/LifeDeathLaw Linkedin.com/in/lizahanks

That Good Night: Dr. Sunita Puri Dr. Sunita Puri, Program Director of the Hospice and Palliative Medicine fellowship at University of Massachusetts, and the author of That Good Night: Life and Medicine in the Eleventh Hour, talks about palliative care, what doing "everything" really means, and how to tell your loved ones and your doctors what you do and don't want at the end of life. You can find her book and more about Dr. Puri here: https://sunitapuri.com/ And here’s a link to The Conversation Project, a resource for people seeking to have end of life conversations: https://theconversationproject.org/ To ask a question for the show, email me at AskLiza@lifedeathlaw.com To listen to more episodes of Life/Death/Law, go to www.lifedeathlaw.com And follow me: twitter-twitter.com/lifedeathlaw instagram-Instagram.com/lifedeathlaw facebookcom/LifeDeathLaw Linkedin.com/in/lizahanks

Donate Your Brain To Science: Tish Hevel, Brain Donor Project In this episode of Women & Wills, Tish Hevel, CEO and Founder of the Brain Donor Project, explains why donating brain tissue for basic research is an incredible gift, helping researchers working to treat and cure neurological, neuropsychiatric, and neurodevelopmental disorders such as dementia and Parkinson’s. Her father , Gene Armentrout (pictured above) wanted to donate his brain to science when he died in 2015. Back then, it wasn’t easy. This inspired Tish to create the Brain Donor Project, which works with the NeuroBioBank of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to make it easy for people to register in advance and arrange for brain donation upon death. The donation of one brain will provide tissue for dozens, sometimes hundreds, of neurological studies. There is no cost to the family of the decedent, and a family can receive, upon request, a comprehensive report on the neuropathology of the donated brain. This report can provide answers for the relatives of the donor that may not have been answerable without a post-mortem examination. Anyone over the age of 18 can donate their brain, and healthy brains are needed too. The Brain Donor Project makes it easy. To find out more: braindonorproject.org To learn more about brain donation: https://neurobiobank.nih.gov/donors-how-become-donor/ Follow me on: twitter.com/womenandwills Instagram.com/womenandwills facebook.com/WomenandWills Linkedin.com/in/lizahanks

In this episode of Women & Wills, Dr. Jessica Zitter, the producer and Director of the new movie, Caregiver: a love story talks about the crisis in family caregiver burden and how the movie she thought she was making, about the hospice experience of Bambi, a 59-year old woman, who decided to die at home under hospice care, became instead the story of how her husband, Rick, became her primary caregiver, and the toll it took on him. In a verité fashion, the film takes you inside Rick’s journey as the caregiver, and highlights the issues faced by the 53 million non-professional caregivers working double-time and for free in jobs that they are completely untrained for. If you are already a family caregiver, or are anticipating becoming one, listen to our conversation about family caregiver burden, what hospice can, and can’t do, and how to plan ahead for managing a truly difficult, but almost universal, experience. To find out more about Caregiver: a love story, visit https://caregiveralovestory.com To find out more about resources for family caregivers, visit https://caregiveralovestory.com/resources Follow me on: twitter.com/womenandwills Instagram.com/womenandwills facebook.com/WomenandWills Linkedin.com/in/lizahanks

If you are stuck at home and without basic legal documents, listen up. In the spirit of offering what I can to help people gain some piece of mind amidst the panic and uncertainty of the pandemic, here are some resources that you can use to get the basics in order, for now. Although none of the documents I’m discussing take the place of a comprehensive estate plan, they are all good things to have. And most of them are documents that you can put in place with minimal or no expense as long as you have access to the internet, a printer, and some cooperative neighbors willing to stay six feet away while you sign them. Once you do sign them, place them in a safe place, let your loved ones know where to find them in case you do get sick, and then, please, go out and take a walk. Advance Health Care Directives An Advance Health Care Directive, also known as a Health Care Proxy or Durable Power of Attorney for Health Care and Living Will in some states, appoints people to act as your Agents to make medical decisions for you if you are unable to make them for yourself. Here is a downloadable Advance Health Care Directive form for California that follows the California Probate Code’s statutory form. The AARP offers free, downloadable Advance Directives for all fifty states here: The California Hospital Association offers a free downloadable form for California here. If you are a Kaiser member, Kaiser Permanente offers a downloadable form here. If you would like to learn more about end of life planning and palliative care, please listen to Dr. Jessica Zitter’s interview on my podcast, Life Death Law. She has so much to say about how to be prepared, who to choose as your Agent, and how to negotiate a vist to the ICU. DNR and POLST forms A DNR Order tells emergency medical personnel that you don’t want CPR or other measures, such as intubation, if your heart stops beating. This form, however, needs to be signed by a doctor to be valid, so it’s not exactly a DIY resource. Still, if you are concerned, please do contact your doctor or local Health Department to find out how to get this in place. A POLST form, which is often printed on bright pink paper, is another medical order that is similar to, but broader than, a DNR Order. The name stands for Physician Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment and it is exactly that — a medically binding order that states what you do, and don’t, want at end of life. For more information about POLST forms, you can go here. Durable Power of Attorney A Durable Power of Attorney is a legal document that names Agents who can act for you financially, doing things such as writing checks on your behalf, paying your bills, managing your investments, withdrawing assets from your retirement accounts, and paying your taxes. California offers a simple Durable Power of Attorney as part of its Probate Code. You can find this many places, but here’s one link. Wills A Will is the last on my list of basic estate documents that everyone should have. If you don’t write one, each state has a set of rules that will determine who will get your property at death (called the laws of intestate succession) and a judge will have to appoint guardians for your minor children without any input from you. So, how can you make a Will right now, if you can’t leave the house? I have three suggestions: hereQuicken WillMaker and Trust 2020.Online Will

In this episode of Life/Death/Law, Rebecca Soffer, the CEO and co-founder of Modern Loss, shares the insights she's gained from starting a ground-breaking website, Modern Loss, publishing a wonderful new book, Modern Loss: Candid conversations about grief. Beginner's Welcome, and hosting a national series of live storytelling events that discuss grief and loss in honest, vivid, and, above all, human,terms. Rebecca, and her co-founder and co-author, Gabrielle Birkner, both suffered loss at a young age, felt the isolation that comes with that, and decided to create a community to destigmatize grief and loss. If you, or someone you love, is dealing with profound loss, Modern Loss offers community, great advice, and a place to share, in their own words, "the unspeakably taboo, unbelievably hilarious, and unexpectedly beautiful terrain of navigating your life after a death." Here's what Modern Loss isn't: too clinical, overtly religious, patronizing, or cheesy. Instead, it offers well-written personal essays, tons of resources for the confused, links to relevant articles and a way to connect with others who understand what it means to survive loss. I loved my conversation with Rebecca, you will too. Enjoy! Click here to find out more about Modern Loss. Click here to find out more about Modern Loss: Candid Conversation About Grief. Beginners Welcome. Please follow me at Twitter: https://twitter.com/lifedeathlaw Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/LizaHanksAuthor/ Linkedin:https://www.linkedin.com/in/lizahanks/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lifedeathlaw/

In this episode of Life/Death/Law, Dr. BJ Miller shares insights from his new book, A Beginner's Guide to the End. Written with co-author Shoshana Berger, the book is practical, detailed, surprisingly funny and always completely honest. From what to bring with you to the hospital (your favorite quilt, your phone charger, pictures from home), to how to tell your boss that you are really sick, to how to cultivate sex and intimacy in the face of serious illness, this is a guide for both the sick and their caretakers. Dr. Miller is a hospice and palliative care physician, practicing at UC San Francisco, and the former Executive Director of the Zen Hospice Project, so he knows, first hand, what he's talking about. He wrote the book, he told me, because he saw, over and over again, how people were suffering unnecessarily for lack of basic information. But A Beginner's Guide isn't just a set of nuts and bolts instructions, it is also a wise and thoughtful guide to what's most important to people facing critical illness and those who care for them. Here's how Dr. Miller puts it, "In a nutshell, probably the biggest takeaway is that love matters...when a person watches their life come to a close, everything else falls away and it turns out that something as easy as love is so often the only thing that matters." Click here to find out more about A Beginner's Guide to the End. Please follow me at Twitter: https://twitter.com/lifedeathlaw Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/LizaHanksAuthor/ Linkedin:https://www.linkedin.com/in/lizahanks/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lifedeathlaw/

Emily Nagoski, PhD, and her sister Amelia Nagoski, DMA, authors of the new book, Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle, know all about accomplishment -- Emily is the author of the New York Times best-seller, Come as You Are: the surprising new science that will transfrom your sex life, and Amelia is a professor of music and a classical conductor. They also know, first hand, about the feelings of emotional overwhelm and exhaustion that can come with that accomplishment, so they wrote a book about how to overcome it. Death and dying are incredibly stressful moments in a family's life and many women are the caretakers for the old and sick. I asked Emily and Amelia to be on Life/Death/Law because feelings of overwhelm, trying to control the uncontrollable, and feeling isolated and sad are so common for the people that I work with--I think Burnout is a must read for just about everyone. In this episode of Life/Death/Law, join us for a long-ranging discussion of why women experience burnout differently than man do, and some simple things that you can do to minimize stress, manage your emotions and live your life with resilience and joy. (You will also find out why babies love to be bounced!) Forget about slavishly meeting everyone else's expectations or feeling inadequate when you can't manage the impossible! Instead, Emily and Amelia speak eloquently about how to manage the body's stress cycle and why rest and human connection are the key to recovering your inner strength and to managing difficult circumstances with compassion and grace. To learn more about Burnout, go here: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com To learn more about Emily and Amelia Nagoski, to here:https://www.prhspeakers.com/speaker/amelia-emily-nagoski To learn more about Emily Nagoski, go to www.emilynagoski.com Please follow me at Twitter: https://twitter.com/lifedeathlaw Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/LizaHanksAuthor/ Linkedin:https://www.linkedin.com/in/lizahanks/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lifedeathlaw/

In this episode of Life/Death/Law Elizabeth Mattis Namgyel, author of The Power of an Open Question and The Logic of Faith, joins me for a wonderful conversation on finding grace in a world we can't control. A longtime buddhist practitioner and worldwide teacher, she brings humor, insight and compassion to the issues we all face as human beings: how to find faith and live with grace in a life that is short and full of challenge? “As long as you are breathing and your heart is pumping in your chest, you will never escape the need ‘to faith,’ and why would you want to? The human predicament literally pushes at you day after day, calling to your courage and intelligence, imploring you to pay attention to life as it is, urging you to let go into humbleness. How long can you ignore it?” If you've ever found yourself overwhelmed or powerless in the face of old age, sickness and death (and who hasn't?) listen to what Elizabeth has to say about finding grace in the most ordinary truths of our human lives. To learn more about Elizabeth's work, go to her website: https://www.elizabethmattisnamgyel.com/ Please follow me at Twitter: https://twitter.com/lifedeathlaw Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LizaHanksAuthor LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lizahanks

Dara Kosberg, is the Director of Programming for the Reimagine End of Life Conference, beginning October 27, in New York. It will be a city-wide event that will include over 300 events, 60 Interactive Rituals, 32 performances, and 15 comedy shows. Dara is also a member of the Founding Team for The Dinner Party, a community of mostly 20-30 somethings who have each experienced profound loss and connect around potluck dinners to talk about it. Dara's vision is vast. She's on a mission to break down taboos in society around death and loss. She believes that the experience of loss and the exploration of death can be catalysts to build more meaningful connections and a more meaningful life. Join us in this episode of Life/Death/Law as Dara discusses her creative and inspiring work in helping people to connect and talk about death, dying, and, most importantly, living.

In this episode of Life/Death/Law, Michael Hebb, the founder of Death Over Dinner, discusses his new book, Let's Talk About Death (Over Dinner): An Invitation and Guide to Life's Most Important Conversation. Since he founded Death Over Dinner in 2013, more than 100,000 dinners have been served where people have sat down together over a home-cooked meal to talk, really talk, about what they do and don't want at the end of their lives, and what they can do, now, to make both their lives and their deaths more meaningful for themselves and their loved ones. Michael is 100% right when he says that how we end our lives is the most important and costly conversation America is not having. If you have ever wondered how to get that conversation started, either for yourself or for someone you love, please listen.

In this episode, award-winning journalist and author Katy Butler discusses her newest book, The Art of Dying Well, as well as her memoir, Knocking on Heaven's Door, two books about meeting aging and death with grace, intelligence, and resilience. If you have ever struggled with how best to support a loved one as they confront old age, sickness, and death, or wondered what you can do, now, to make sure that your old age is as independent and healthy as possible and that your death be a natural one surrounded by love, listen to Katy Butler.

In this episode of Life/Death/Law, Dr. Jessica Zitter, author of Extreme Measures: Finding a Better Path to the End of Life, talks openly and honestly about how to communicate with your doctors about what you or a loved one wants, and doesn't want, for end of life care; how to pick the right person to act as your health care agent and make medical decisions for you; and what palliative care can offer those facing chronic illness. But more than that, she is a compassionate and articulate voice for changing the way that people die in this country and the role that the medical profession can play in improving end of life care. I loved talking to her and I think you'll love listening. She is Harvard and UCSF-trained to practice the unusual combination of Critical and Palliative Care medicine. She works as an Attending Physician at a public hospital in Oakland, California. She is a regular contributor to The New York Times and her articles have appeared in The Atlantic, Time Magazine, Journal of the American Medical Association, The Washington Post and many other publications. Dr. Zitter’s work is featured in the Academy and Emmy-nominated short documentary “Extremis,” available on Netflix. Her media appearances include CBS Sunday Morning, NPR’s Fresh Air with Terry Gross, The Doctors, The Leonard Lopate Show, and a Dr. Oz special, “The Death Show.” If you've ever been frustrated with a doctor that doesn't listen to you and wondered how to talk to them effectively, or worried about who to name as your health care agent, or are interested in finding out more about palliative care, please listen to this episode. To learn more about Dr. Zitter, please go to her website., www.jessicazitter.com. Please follow me at: Twitter: https://twitter.com/lifedeathlaw Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LizaHanksAuthor LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lizahanks

In this episode of Life/Death/Law, join me for a conversation with Dr. Shoshana Ungerleider, a physician, speaker, writer, activist, and the force behind two amazing movies about end of life: Extremis and End Game, both available on Netflix (so watch them!). Dr. Ungerleider also (when not producing movies and making social change) works as an internist practicing hospital medicine at California Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco. She received her medical degree from Oregon Health & Science University in Portland, OR and completed residency at California Pacific Medical Center where she is now on the teaching faculty and serves on the Executive Board of the Foundation Board of Trustees. Extremis, which is about end of life decision making in the ICU at Oakland's Highland Hospital, won best Documentary Short at the Tribeca Film Festival in 2017, and was nominated for an Academy Award and two Emmies. End Game recently premiered at Sundance, and is about palliative care and end of life planning in the face of terminal illness, and was filmed at UCSF and Zen Hospice, in San Francisco. Both movies are heartfelt, engaging, honest and important. They show, without preaching, how important it is for your loved ones to know what you do and don't want at end of life and how palliative care and hospice can add quality to that time. Dr. Ungerleider is also the founder of the End Well conference, which will take place on December 6, 2018 in San Francisco. The conference is a dynamic convening of design, tech, health care, policy, media, the arts and activist communities committed to generating human-centered, interdisciplinary innovation for the end of life experience. I can't wait to attend. If you would like to know more about how to prepare yourself or your loved ones for an empowered end of life, and how to talk to your family about what you do and don't want at the end of life, please listen to today's show. Here are links to the resources that Dr. Ungerleider mentions on the show: 1. Go Wish-card game conversation starter. 2. Five Wishes Advance Directive. 3. Getpalliative.org - resources on palliative care Please follow me at: Twitter: https://twitter.com/lifedeathlaw Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LizaHanksAuthor LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lizahanks

In this episode of Life/Death/Law, Einat Sandman Clarke, Senior Counsel at Google LLC provides an inside look at how Google handles requests for digital assets (like emails, photos, and videos) after someone has died and discusses the broader legal landscape that governs all service providers facing requests to release digital communications belonging to their users. Learn how to use Google's Inactive Account Manger to control access to your digital assets (like email, videos, images, and documents) and why service providers (like Google, Apple, facebook, and Yahoo) can't give anyone access to your stored electronic communications without your consent, or a court order. If you've ever worried about what will happen to your digital life after you die (and who hasn't), please listen. To read more about Digital Estate Planning, download my free ebook. Please follow me at: Twitter: https://twitter.com/lifedeathlaw Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LizaHanksAuthor LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lizahanks

In this episode I'm taking to Dr. Muffie Weibe Waterman, author of Wired to Listen, a book about how what we say to kids, and don't, impacts the way that kids see the world and act in it. In her book, Dr. Waterman writes about how, and when, to talk to kids about the hard stuff; death, divorce, and sex--topics that we all struggle with addressing honestly and effectively with our kids. I asked her to be on the show because many of the people that I work with, and many of the people listening to this show, struggle with talking appropriately, and effectively, to kids (of all ages) about death and dying. These conversations can be around the death of a beloved grandparent, or about the process of estate planning, or, even, between adult children and elderly parents, about the reality of end of life planning. If you have ever struggled with how to talk honestly and openly about death and dying with your children or your parents, and honestly, who hasn’t?, I think you’ll enjoy listening to today’s show. Please follow me at: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LizaHanksAuthor LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lizahanks

What is estate planning, really? I know that most lawyers focus on reducing taxes, or the creation of documents, but when you get down to it, what you’re really doing when you make an estate plan is giving everything away, right? So, to me, understanding the practice of generosity and what gets in the way of being generous are central to effective estate planning, and who better to explore that territory than my guest for episode 3 of Life/Death/Law: Myoshin Kelley, an eloquent teacher on the key Buddhist teachings on the wisdom of opening the heart. Myoshin is a Senior Instructor with the Tergar Community, which supports the worldwide vision of Tibetan master meditation teacher and author Mingyur Rinpoche, tergar.org, and it is an honor to have her on the podcast. If you’ve ever been curious about the practice of generosity or the value of it, or found yourself wanting to be generous but somehow holding yourself back, and wondered what was getting in your way, please listen.