Estate Planning Puts Parents in Control

I always get anxious when I travel away from my kids, and my anxiety is heightened when my husband and I travel together. So when we traveled overseas together several years ago, I insisted on taking different flights.

The logical part of my brain understood that I am much more likely to die in a car accident than in a plane crash. Yet on the heels of 9/11, my mommy brain worried about perishing in a fiery crash with my spouse and leaving our three small children orphaned.

As a parent, I believe my husband and I are the most qualified people on Earth to raise our children, and the thought of someone else doing so is very difficult to consider. No one else seems ideally suited to step into our shoes, so talking small, precautionary measures – like taking different plane flights – makes sense to me.

But ultimately I know that accidents do happen. And because I know my children better than anyone else in the world, I am in the best position to make decisions that will affect their lives.

If the unthinkable happens, I want to be the one deciding:

• Who will raise my children
• Who will manage the assets I leave behind
• How and when my assets will be distributed to my children

As an attorney, I know that if I don’t make those decisions, a judge who doesn’t know me, my children or what’s important to me, will make those decisions in my place. I’m not willing to let a stranger make those choices for our family.

How about you? Do you want control over these important decisions? If so, it is imperative that you engage in estate planning. An attorney can help you legally name a guardian for your children, and ensure that your assets will be managed by people you trust and be distributed to your children when and how you choose.

You know your children better than anyone. You’re the best person to make the decisions that will affect their lives. No one likes to think about it, but accidents do happen. Estate planning can help you arrange your affairs so that you never have to worry that someday a stranger might make your most important decisions for you.