Category Archives: Non-financial Aspects of retirement

Asked To Delay Retirement, Should You Accept An Offer To Stay? 

Non-financial Aspects of retirement, Retire Often, Working In Retirement,

It doesn’t happen to everyone, giving notice and being asked to delay retirement by your boss. What was once something limited to only those performing critical functions can now happen to anyone in today’s low unemployment environment. Then comes a big decision, should you accept an offer to stay longer? It isn’t always an easy question to answer. There’s a whole lot of financial and mental efforts to get to this celebrated moment of life called retirement. Only to find yourself on the spot questioning the right move to make. Here’s what I experienced and some of the things to consider before giving your answer.

Asked To Delay Retirement, Should You Accept An Offer To Stay? 

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Asked to Delay Retirement? What To Consider Before Accepting An Offer To Stay

My employer request to delay retirement moment came after my second early retirement.

I had always intended to retire early and often. Focusing on opportunities during retirement of interest using the skills I love using while shedding the skills and tasks I don’t. I was in early retirement number two for several months when the client mega-corp of my encore career specifically recruited me for a sweet 2 month project. It was the best working experience of my life. As my project was ending at the end of the year the manager asked that I delay returning to retirement. I was asked if I would accept a contract extension for some more project work. 

I was ready to return to retirement life. 

It was a great experience and I had a great time. The bonus was banking some good money to go towards other early retirement interests. The two months flew by painlessly and I had some things I was looking forward to doing in retirement freedom-mode again. But I enjoyed the short gig so much and I was treated well so I decided to accept a contract extension with conditions. I would stay for only a few months, only technical project work with a deliverable aligned with my departure date, no operational babysitting, and absolutely no project management responsibilities herding their cats. The deal was made for 4.5 months. I was happy to live with delaying my return to retirement under the negotiated terms and conditions until spring time.

Then it all went to hell with shifts in corporate management and funding. 

I returned to my desk January 2 to find all management in meetings and no project assignment. After a week of busywork I was notified that the manager I signed with was no longer calling the shots. The new manager called a staff meeting and spelled out her expectations, of which some critically crossed my set boundaries. I met with her and explained the agreement to my accepting the contract extension. She didn’t like it so I agreed to terminate immediately and return to retirement. She then said sit tight for a couple of days. Lets just say my conditions held but it was a hostile working relationship and an unpleasant working experience. I finished my project early and was happily back in retirement four months later, two weeks before the planned contract end. 

Things To Consider When The Boss Asks That You Delay Retirement And Stick Around 

Think hard and honestly about what percent of a decision to stay is about the money.

If the biggest reason to stay is money, then maybe you aren’t really ready to retire. Retirement means leaving paychecks behind. We should have figured out how we are going to pay for our retirement lifestyle before we retire. Extra money to spice up a retirement goal is one thing, but needing it to meet retirement financial needs is another. If that’s the case then there really isn’t a choice but to accept the offer to stay until financial confidence is reached, both literally and mentally. Otherwise, turning down the offer and leaving money on the table could result in retirement regret during times of financial worry. But you should still weigh in on the terms, even though you’re probably going to be more agreeable under this condition of financial need.

Delaying not only retirement but also delaying the ability to pursue passions and interests.

We set goals for our retirement. Is accepting an offer to stay worth trading your time for money when your heart is set on doing other things? Retirement is a major life milestone. Putting it off to stay in the grind needs careful thought. Leverage your freedom to your benefit. While some offers to stay can be mutually beneficial to both business and employee, always consider that the terms they are offering are more to their benefit than yours. Your retirement time has great value.

Determine what it would take to make the experience better than just the same job you are retiring from. If you really loved it so much you probably wouldn’t be retiring in the first place. Set work requirement boundaries. Would flexibility in schedule, required tasks, or number of hours worked make it mutually rewarding? If so, then negotiate for it. Then set the length of time you are agreeing to stay. If things work really well then extending longer can possibly be renegotiated. This way you can easily calm any retirement voice in your head that may come by knowing your exit date.

Know your place, you are not in the same position or the superhero you were.

Think of yourself as a consultant to help the staff going forward with a possible exit at any time. In most cases we delay retirement only temporarily. The cat is out of the bag and any decent management team is working to sidestep our sticking around because we are a known flight risk. Don’t start to believe this is more than what it is. Check your ego and keep your eye on the prize of your delayed hard earned retirement. 

You should have a say about the working terms.

Consider that retirement delay is worth more than your standard salary and negotiate with that mindset. Just because money isn’t the primary motivation to delay retirement doesn’t mean we have to be a sucker. If money is non-negotiable then use that as a bargaining chip to get better working terms to make a deal you really want to make.  

Be mentally prepared for workplace blowback.

I know very well how this works. When it’s obvious you received premium working conditions and/or more salary to delay retirement, then others will have certain feelings about it. There can be issues that need worked through. Just be honest. You’re delaying your retirement to help out with XYZ and will eventually leave. I found being honest about why I had what I had, my negotiated exit date, and being the most pleasant person in the office to work with softened resistance. Why wouldn’t we be the happiest person in the office? We set the perfect work conditions to stay. 

Be prepared to end the arrangement at any time.

You have to be ready to accept that things won’t work out. You may find yourself leaving sooner than expected for any reason within and beyond your control. That is unless there are specific contractual issues about ending the working arrangement early. Normally as a delayed retiree, cutting the arrangement short shouldn’t be an issue. After all, if you’re retirement ready, money isn’t the primary reason for sticking it out longer. 

In my delayed retirement experience, my saying “since the terms of my extension are no longer acceptable to management, I will be happy to end our arrangement right now” was met with disbelief. The manager was dumbfounded that I would walk away from a high paying gig like that over their insistence that I herd cats. In hindsight, I should have just left because they’re having to keep that contract extension condition was obviously a sore spot with the new management. It heavily tarnished what was a great working experience to that point for both of us. 

Turning down an offer to stay.

It’s best not to burn any bridges. You never know what will happen in the future where paths will cross. There’s always a possibility for new opportunities that align with your interests and passions coming your way. Whether your initial reaction to an offer to stay is to immediately say no thanks or you come to that decision after negotiations, be gracious when you decline an offer to stay. 

“I appreciate the offer, however at this time, I have made the decision to retire as initially planned. While I’ve enjoyed my career, the role I’ve played in the many accomplishments, and the opportunities that working here provided, I have already set my focus on the next chapter of my life. Thank you for the proposed offer.”

 

A decision to delay retirement and accept an offer to stay on the job can either be an easy NO or something requiring careful consideration. The thing to remember is that once you’ve properly announced your retirement intentions to your manager, you’re now in the driver’s seat. Where all lanes point to a life on your terms.

Beware The Unreasonable Boss In Retirement: Yes, It’s You

Non-financial Aspects of retirement

Having a bad boss can suck the life out of us. They can push us to do stuff we hate doing and take us away from things we want or need to do. Some force us to do stupid vanity projects or unrewarding crap that has nothing to do with anything important. Unreasonable demands and obligation, who needs it! Even when things are going well they let their insecurities drive them to make irrational demands. We worked hard to get to where we are. Dealing with unnecessary stress and depression just isn’t right. Unfortunately for some retirees the bad unreasonable boss in retirement is yourself. I know because I’ve suffered a few times because of that bad manager in my retirement.

Beware The Unreasonable Boss In Retirement: Yes, It's You

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My Ride With The Unreasonable Boss In Retirement

All of the same questions we used to ask about a bad boss before we retired are valid to ask about yourself in retirement when things are getting tense.

  • Why can’t I just be left alone to do my job and finish my projects? 
  • What’s driving that idiot? 
  • Why can’t the boss see that everything is going just as planned? 
  • When will the boss ever be satisfied with good results without having to always ridiculously push for more?
  • Why can’t the boss just accept that the plan was spot-on and everything is being precisely executed? 

It’s easy to retire and get off track. You’re now the boss and you have to deal with both sides of this new lifestyle dynamic called retirement. Where we have to monitor and correctly take action to control both the financial and mental challenges associated with our employment liberation. Moving past decades of career centric conditioning can be a mind warp.

Some of the bad retirement boss drivers I dealt with

Ego – I‘m somebody, dammit! 

We are conditioned to recognize titles as a badge of success and respect. Oops, it’s all gone now in retirement. Now what? Take it out on the retiree that’s what. Make them do things to satisfy ego whether it makes sense or takes them away from what they retired to do. This monster takes as much effort to tame ego in retirement as it does while a career drone. 

Story Covet – Ok top gun, better cool your jets. 

Having a retirement boss that wants what’s perceived that others have is a recipe for our well-being disaster. Seeing online all of the huge retiree accomplishments of youth, portfolio, travel, activities, and wondering why we can’t also have a fantastic story can end up wasting time and money chasing unimportant or even undesirable targets. Everything can be going great and to plan, but then thoughts creep in about our own retirement story not being enough. Comparing and competing in retirement wasn’t part of my retirement plan. Yet the boss in the early months of retirement would sometimes have different ideas. 

Fear – Retirement rookie mistakes due to inexperience.

Getting mentally adjusted to being a retirement spender after decades of being a saver was tough enough without having a boss overreacting to problems both real and imagined. Whenever the market wavered, and it did a lot in 2010 – 2011, or hints of massive health care cost increases, etc., the boss would demand spending cuts. It didn’t matter that there were well planned expenditures and the budget was being kept. Encouraging words from the financial pro (CFP) were of little solace. There was too much negative info about the economy and retirement causing management to overcompensate. It takes experience to remain calm while living without paychecks and seeing how a well diversified portfolio stands up even with outgoing distributions.

Guilt trip – Not the kind of trip I planned for during my retirement.

Nothing’s harder on retirement bliss than your bad unreasonable boss telling you- I’m disappointed in you because I know you can do better. There are people trapped in cubicle hell wishing they could have time today and you’re dragging keister instead of getting yourself going.  Stop wasting time relaxing, there’s a hike, a bicycle ride, chores, projects, travel, gardening, all there waiting to be done. Don’t forget that you should be doing more volunteer work too. What a nag!

 

It’s easy to allow the unreasonable boss in retirement to talk us into doing things or being bothered by them when we first enter this new way of living. Being able to blank out the noise and pace ourselves is a skill that takes time to develop. These are just a few silly things my retirement boss pressured me about. Things that had me feel uneasy with from the get-go. Me and the boss have both learned a lot during this early retirement adventure. I’m happy to report that we get along great and we’ve been on the same page since fully completing our retirement transition.

Managing The Shifting Sands Of Retirement Passions

Early Retirement Lifestyle, Non-financial Aspects of retirement, Passion, ,

There Will Be More Changes Than You Think –

Coming up on retirement or recently retired? Think you’ve planned out and locked-down your retirement lifestyle for the years ahead? Not so fast pal. All those things you think you will spend your retirement doing will most likely change if not end. They are part of the shifting sands of retirement passions. Don’t sweat it. What we do in retirement evolves as our passions zigzag and change. It happens to most of us. But the key to enjoying this ride instead of lamenting a hole in our lifestyle lies in picking up some good retirement habits and ditching some bad ones.

Managing The Shifting Sands Of Retirement Passions

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Managing Retirement Passions For Inevitable Change

Planning Our New Retirement Lifestyle Based on Today’s Passions

We all know the importance of retiring to something and that includes our passionate pursuits. They include all the hobbies, sports, travel, and having a robust social life. In my case it also included some working pursuits.

They are the things we love doing, so why wouldn’t we believe it’s exactly what we will do during our retirement life? We certainly should budget for them in both our time and money. It’s a prudent retirement plan assumption. But realistically, those planned interests may only stay with us for part of our retired life.

The reason our passions will shift is we can either settle into a less than hot romance with them or completely fall out of love. That’s right, romance and love. Seems that things we love doing when we were under rat race schedules and obligations can lose steam once we retire and have all the time we want with them. Oh, it’s still hot and heavy initially in retirement. But I can tell you as time goes by, interest can wane on some of our retirement passions as our retirement lifestyle matures. I have seen this happen to me and with others. It is a normal progression for most people, one that we don’t initially think about or plan for in our retirement.

How We Should See Our Retirement Passions

Strike when it’s hot, set it aside when it’s not. Don’t worry about shifting retirement passions because if we are diligent then other things will either replace or push for its evolution. Sometimes what we enjoy and are passionate about today will open the door later on for something we consider better. In my case I followed many passions early in my retirement years that I no longer care to pursue. Others have cooled but are still enjoyed. I now even find myself pursuing interests that weren’t on my retirement radar years ago. In any case, when retirement passions fun hot, lean into them. Don’t be afraid to display your passions and interests either.

The Retirement Habits to Ditch
Rigid to a fault –

It’s common to plan on doing something you love to do throughout your retirement and sometimes with heavy frequency. But it’s like the old joke: Patient- Hey Dr., it hurts when I do this. Dr.- Then stop doing that.

The same goes for our retirement passions. When it hurts or stops being enjoyable, stop doing it or at least less frequently until the passion killing issue is worked out, one way or another.

Comfort zone ruts –

When we no longer are told what to do anymore or have to compete we can go overboard avoiding anything challenging. Retirement can have us wanting everything to be under our full control and easy. This can lead to boredom with anything we enjoyed doing.

Overdoing it –

The other end of human behavior is jumping into a passion like it’s a sprint when it should be a marathon. Nothing kills a retirement passion like becoming tired of it and burned out because of going overboard. It can turn into a unrewarding obligation and burden. Not to mention the possibility of physical injury overdoing active pursuits.

The Retirement Habits to Cultivate
Use moderation to save waning passionate retirement pursuits –

Learn to recognize that a change is necessary before it dies. If it’s something important in your retirement and lifestyle then figure out what needs to be done by pulling back on an overboard pursuit.

Spice things up –

Learn to recognize signs that you are in a rut. Spicing up a too comfortable and easy pursuit will keep it interesting and enjoyable.

Staying curious –

There are always different ways that things are done. Allow yourself to wonder what you could do differently to improve a pursuit. Also stay open to new pursuits and challenges that may appeal to you. Be curious to identify, fully investigate, and research new interests. Exploring different ideas and activities can be an enjoyable pursuit in itself.

Be open to new things, but also be able to say no –  

Balance sticking to things to explore it to the fullest. We all know we can do poorly at first with something new and it requires time to find out if it will become a valued pursuit. But stop once you’ve lost your romance with the challenges of a new pursuit or the passionate interest itself. It’s OK to say it’s not your thing and just move onto something else that will be.

Migrate toward family, friends, and community –

When in doubt, follow what’s natural. There are folks who have nothing they are passionate about doing. Others burn through what the thought they would enjoy doing throughout their retirement and found later that they no longer do. They have no idea how to fill the void that’s left. Passions can be found in simple interaction with those we care about. Volunteering, family activities, and cultivating a good social circle are naturally needed, enjoyable, fulfilling, and rewarding pursuits.

 

With over 9 years of retirement behind me, I have seen some of my passions run their course, change, or be replaced with new ones. There are necessary considerations for any retiree to mentally and financially manage as time passes and our retirement passions evolve.  

Mastering the Skill of Doing Nothing in Retirement

Non-financial Aspects of retirement, Workaholism, , ,

Retirement is an amazing time. I find it both interesting and amusing that I had to put effort into doing nothing in retirement. Before retiring it seemed it would be a no-brainer handling time just doing nothing. But in reality, after many decades of serving the employment masters, there is a whole slew of conditioning geared toward productivity that has to be unwoven.

The “doing nothing” definition flips after retirement and for me it is a humorous mind trip. There is doing nothing from the working stiff perspective and another point of view from the retirement side of living. That’s because from our time in school and throughout our working lives, doing nothing has been given a bad reputation. Well not anymore. Doing nothing in retirement is a useful skill.

Mastering the Skill of Doing Nothing in Retirement

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I’m Always Looking For Ways To Improve My Early Retirement

The truth is we can be way too busy in retirement. It’s easy to over commit and cram in as much as we can. Especially early in retirement. You can’t really grasp that until you are retired and living it. It doesn’t matter how many times you heard it from other retirees before entering the retirement zone yourself.

I have written about how I stay busy and how rarely I catch TV or anything close to being sedentary before 5 PM. Like it’s something to be proud of and a measurement of my early retirement success by having no chance to ever be bored. But something was missing. I now admit that it took my having a few years of early retirement under my belt to wise up. It took me a little time to learn how to be better at doing nothing. I jokingly call it a retirement skill because it is something that you get better at with practice.  

Skillfully Doing Nothing In Retirement

First off, having some structure in our retirement is a good thing. But sometimes we just trade one over-structured lifestyle for another. One that leaves no room for just doing nothing. I find it a little funny that I can become the most demanding boss I’ve ever had.

Part of the problem is all the cautions about having the non-financial aspects of retirement covered. Those constantly drummed warnings about people who retired into misery because of boredom. It’s best that we know what we plan on doing with all of our free time. Those cautions really do apply.

But there should be another caution in the retirement for newbies handbook: Beware of overdoing it with the commitment of your hard-won free-time. Our brains seem oddly wired to be productive and we can try to overcompensate once our initial retirement honeymoon of leisure ends. Mine sure did.

Four Steps To Mastering the Skill of Doing Nothing in Retirement

Step #1- Start by Recognizing the Health Benefits of Doing Nothing

It sounds strange but doing nothing is actually doing something. Doing nothing allows for us to have down-time from a busy retirement schedule to improve our mental and physical health. This is an important step because it all starts here for reasons that became clear to me in later steps.

We took breaks when we worked. The reasons for those breaks still come into play in retirement. Those of us who retired early are an ambitious lot. It’s something that carries on into retirement.

Doing Nothing will:

  • Allow time to clear our head and rest.
  • Improve our mood and wellbeing.
  • Lower our heart rate.
  • Increased our brain health.

I didn’t immediately embrace the concept that doing nothing would have health benefits. But I had to acknowledge that over the ages meditation has been shown to bring peace to one’s health and mind. Meditation is the ultimate form of doing nothing.

I now listen to my mind and body for signs that it’s time to step back and start a little retirement do nothing time. My doing nothing episodes lasts as long as it needs to. I just jump back into my busy retirement schedule when I am ready to step back into it.

Step #2- Embrace The Idea That it’s OK to Spend Time Doing Nothing

I had to ask myself: Why was my occasionally doing nothing OK when still working but not now?  Why did I let it bug the crap out of me now that I am retired? Taking a break is necessary, even in retirement. When I was a worker I used to spend whole weekends doing nothing. Especially after a busy and stressful work week. I would even proudly brag I did nothing over the weekend. That was my time-out from being under “The Man”. I’m now the boss. What is different now is that in retirement I get to decide when and take as long as I want or need to do nothing .

After decades under the control of the corporate world it’s no wonder I struggled with this aspect of freedom. It was too easy in retirement to push myself beyond a leisurely pace to fulfill my passions and interest goals. I was at times stressing myself out and it was a total mind-warp. I now know that the skill of doing nothing had to be learned through practice after all the years spent in the working mindset. This is the necessary mind-shift I had to complete from my worker self to my retired self. I had to reconfigure an ingrained doing nothing belief system. Retirement means never having to earn approval for downtime.

I gave myself permission by saying: Dude, you have already recognized the health benefits of stepping back and doing nothing, just let it rip. I made a mental flip to embrace doing nothing as valued and stopped caring about what others think. When I’m on a do nothing day and asked what I have been up to I smile and admit it instead of trying to always have something productive to answer back with. Remember, most everyone still working already thinks retirees are doing nothing anyway, no matter how we answer.

Step #3- Control The Productivity Beast Within

There is only so much time in a day and I had to stop prioritizing my chosen activities based on its productive merits. Productive purpose seemed to always come before purposeful fun. It was like one of those vacations where everyday there was something fun scheduled to do. Running from one thing to another where there was no down time to just enjoy a day of leisurely sloth to slow down. When the productive vacation ends you’re run down instead of rested and feel like we need a vacation from our vacation. Just because something should be fun, if we don’t pace ourselves, we end up turning it into something else.

I stopped assigning productive purpose to everything I do in retirement. It’s alright to do things that have productive purpose but it shouldn’t dictate it’s priority at the expense of doing nothing or even activity done solely for the fun of it. For instance, de-emphasize reading based on educational value. Enjoy reading without assigning or needing a side motive. Repurpose biking and hiking from exercise to fun by slowing down and enjoying the scenery. Taking a nap just because I want to. Turn on the TV and catch an afternoon oldie or movie and tune out for a while. The list goes on and on. Tame the inner productivity beast by understanding that purposeful doing nothing in retirement is different from wasting our valuable retirement time.

Step #4- Everything in Moderation

Warning: Doing nothing can be addicting. Overdose can result in boredom and severe procrastination. Like everything else in life, moderation is required. Doing nothing in retirement can be highly addictive and create unwanted habits. The retirement boredom cautions are very real and worthy of concern. There has to be a balance of productivity and purposeful doing nothing.

 

It took time for me to admit I had a productivity bias against doing nothing and had to adjust my thinking to accept it. I only do what I want to do in my retirement but I still lean a bit towards the productive side of things. There are still goals to meet and things that I want to accomplish that won’t happen when doing nothing. But I also see the benefit of doing what I can to master the skill of doing nothing in retirement.

Surviving The Final Stretch To Retirement: Fighting Emotional Urges

Non-financial Aspects of retirement, Retire Early, Retirement Plan,

Why is it that things always seem harder when there is just a little farther to go towards reaching our goals? I’m reminded of this psychological urge when dealing with the last mile to road trip rest stop relief. But the same kind of mind trips can and usually happens at work as we get closer to reaching our financial goals and announcing our retirement date. As someone who had to fight through it, surviving the final stretch to retirement will go much easier if we do a few things to help us push through.

Surviving The Final Stretch To Retirement: Fighting Emotional Urges

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Tricks To Surviving The Final Stretch To Retirement

When we plan for our retirement we should always focus on what we are retiring to. We envision what our life of freedom will look like and all the things we want to pursue. It not only sets the basis for what our retirement lifestyle will cost and what’s needed to fund it, but it also helps motivate us to establish sustainable smart budgets and save money to reach it. But face it, there is this thing we will happily leave behind. If we loved our job and truly enjoyed what we were doing, we probably wouldn’t have done everything we could to happily walk away from it. Love our job or hate it, there are always little things that we can’t wait to never have to deal with again.

For all but the truly blessed, your final stretch to retirement will have all of your workplace irritations amplified. All of the management buffoonery and self dealing that causes unnecessary rework. The plethora of unnecessary policy or process changes, finger-pointing, and scapegoating you’ve put up with over many years won’t change. The gaggle of incompetent and possibly insane coworkers, managers, executives, or clients you avoid at all cost will never change. Your commute most likely isn’t going to change for the better either. But we change as we approach the final stretch to our retirement and that is what we can and must control.

What’s needed is adding a new retirement goal.

We have a choice. Either gripe and complain while hating the last of our careers which can possibly end things before we are ready, or deploy some countermeasures to cut the work BS and our emotional urges. The idea should be to get through this final stretch to retirement in the best way possible to not only survive but win with a smile on our face.

The Last Stretch Is Important To Us

We have to understand and emphasize to ourselves that the last stretch is important, not only financially but also psychologically. Our target date was set for a reason that is most likely tied to specific milestones: Portfolio amount, pension eligibility, penalty free access to our retirement accounts, etc. We are generally earning the most from our careers at this time so we do need to stay to our plan’s end. Then there is the psychological aspect, we want to retire on our terms. That means sticking to our plan no matter how irritating our work becomes or how excited we are about our next chapter. We don’t want to do anything to screw this up and end up second guessing our retirement or regret ditching the rat race when we finally do. There’s enough mind-warps to deal with in our retirement transition without adding to it.

One easy trick is to set up a mental reminder of your retirement date.

We’ve all seen the retirement countdown clocks. If you have a great work environment and you’ve been open about your plans then something along that line is a good reminder for you and everyone around you about your joyous plans. For people in a less than perfect work situation it can be a great way to passive-aggressively mock an abusive coworker or manager without saying a word. You can also say it’s an unattainable dream to throw everyone off and leave them wondering why you smile every time you say that. If like many folks you are secretly on the path to retirement then use a picture or any other means for coded messages to yourself of when and what is ahead for you. The thing is this: The last stretch to retirement, no matter how trying it is for either good or bad reasons is only a temporary situation.  

Disinvest Emotionally While Keeping Up Job Performance

Even if you love your employer and work, every job has its share of BS. We put up with much of it no matter how irritating it is because we care about what we do, we want our paycheck, and we want to do well to earn any yearly raise. By gradually disinvesting ourselves emotionally from our job we can carefully set aside BS that isn’t really critical for the business. “Carefully” because this is a balancing act as we need to fly below the “I’m close to retiring” radar and maintain our job performance so that we are allowed to continue to our target date. If our retirement date is beyond the next salary treatment or bonus payout, then that may also play into your disinvestment strategy.

It’s all about cutting irritating activity or avoiding jack-hole folk that offers little or no return on our investment. Concentrate on performing the company’s value added activities you enjoy doing. or at least the activities that don’t bug the fun out of you. You know how they always say to someone who they are laying off that it isn’t personal, it’s just business? Well, we have to have that same type of mindset when surviving the final stretch to retirement. A lot of times the on-the-job BS goes the path of least resistance. Start adding a little emotionally free resistance. See if it can go somewhere else or simply not even be missed.

Counter The Nagging Feeling That There Must Be More To Life Than This

Some of us will hit the wall hard during our final stretch to retirement and everything about our job feels pointless. This can happen to people who are in a truly perfect job and company or a hated one. We can lose all patience and think about forgetting our plan because we’re so close to pulling the plug and life is too short to waste doing this. It sure happened to me. The excitement about our planned future can be intoxicating. The call of our retired life that lies just ahead can be very loud, but we can counter it.

Increase your life outside of work. My job was all-encompassing including an irritating demand that I carry a pager 24/7/365 in my last years. I was excited about what I was about to begin in retirement. By pushing to get a life outside of work, job stress and being tethered via pager be damned, I was able to keep things in perspective. It helped me tolerate the last miles on the job. It’s about forcing ourselves to get more balance in our life. I concentrated on what I wanted to be in retirement and let that direct what I mentally focused and acted on.

By doing this before we retire we also start to build a bigger and better social circle outside of work. This is a major perk to help us during our retirement transition. Sadly, many of us have a social life that revolves around our job and coworkers. Most of that will most certainly drop off once we retire. There really is more to life than our jobs. The trick is to start bringing some of that life we envision in retirement into our life while still dealing with our final stretch.

Don’t Tip Your Hand Too Early: Maintain The Secret Until You Are Ready

If the final stretch to retirement is driving you crazy, then you should fight any urges to blurt out your intentions before you are really ready to pull the trigger. It can make both good and bad work environments worse. There is a right time to announce your intentions to retire. Something flipped in my brain where I got psychologically cocky on a subconscious level. I knew I was close and I wanted to rub their noses in it with every unfair demand being pushed on me. I doubt I am alone feeling this way. Maybe you work somewhere that treats everyone great and you are motivated by impatience and your excitement to let the cat out of the bag. If so, you should still fight your urges. The last of your working experience can end up less than desired.

Here’s what we should understand: Business has very limited or no morality. It’s all about numbers, profit, and power. Don’t underestimate the possible ruthlessness of your employer or people who may try to undercut your chances of reaching all of your plan’s goals and retiring completely on your terms. The final stretch to retirement can be trying. Especially when in a stressful work environment or one filled with jack-holes or unfair policies bugging the holy crap out of you. Mentally disconnect from the nonsense. Keep your head, keep your secret until appropriate, and keep doing what you can to stay focused on your dream.

Fight counterproductive urges in your final stretch to retirement

If you are like many, including myself, who weren’t blessed with a wonderful work life experience toward the end of their career, then the final stretch to retirement can drive you nuts. It can even be true for other reasons for those who are blessed with a great work life. The final stretch to retirement will be a time of excitement, emotion, and sometimes many urges to do something counterproductive to your plan. It’s also a great time to make positive changes. Changes to improve both your experience in the final stretch of your career and get a head start on your transition to a new life of employment liberation.

Retirement And Decreased Money Drive: The Evolving Relationship With Money

Non-financial Aspects of retirement,

No doubt about it, there comes a time when you just don’t chase after it like you used to. Don’t get me wrong, everything is working as it should. Needs are being met but those needs are far less than they were in the past. All of sudden you realize you have a decreased money drive. Don’t worry, it’s just a naturally evolving relationship with money that cumulates with retirement. It eventually happens whether you want it to or not.

Retirement And Decreased Money Drive: The Evolving Relationship With Money

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Our Evolving Relationship With Money

We will go through great lengths to get it when we are young and just starting out.

We do everything possible to make ourselves more attractive to ensure success. Lucky are those who do find the perfect fit for a partner. But most of us will enter into relationships that we know won’t be a happy long-term one. We simply rationalize doing it to meet our basic needs for it and for getting as much of it as possible.

Some of us will always be looking for something better. 

We will choose to be  promiscuous to fulfill desires, jumping from partner to partner or engaging in side hustles even when our primary partner would not like it if found out. Living complicated lives feeding our wants for it while juggling the needs of many and risking our primary relationship. Just to get more of it with no guarantee of long-term success.

Others will find themselves sticking to a less than perfect relationship through thick and thin.

They do it because it meets longer term goals where benefits outweigh other longed for desires.

Some people’s money relationships don’t evolve.

They never stop playing the field or doing whatever it takes to keep chasing after it. It is the life they choose to live right to the bitter end. Their end or when nobody wants them anymore and there will be an abrupt life altering relationship crash.

Those who get comfortable and feel safe in their partner relationship will stop trying to be the most attractive or desired.

They no longer fully chase after more of it. They instead settle in, knowing that at some point it will be over and time to leave them behind. Just going through the motions to keep their partner satisfied. But all the time wishing and waiting for their way out.

Things get really interesting once we do leave.

Suddenly the lack of regular access to it messes with our minds and we question our decision to call it quits. We have to adjust our mindset and accept that it will be limited going forward. It’s a natural transition that takes a little time to get through. And then it hits us, chasing after more and more of it really isn’t as important to us as it used to be.

The Clues of a Decreased Money Drive

There comes a time either before we leave or soon after when we are no longer tempted to chase after it. We even find it easy to turn down opportunities for it. It can be troubling for some of us, seen as unnatural after a lifetime of doing everything to score more of it. But we soon realize we aren’t the same as we once were.

Some of us will retire and again try to re-enter the game. Even making ourselves a little more attractive to new partners. However, with a decreased money drive we’ll do it smarter and be far more selective about who that will be with. The first clue something has changed is our focus goes from just having it to wanting something more fulfilling and rewarding in the relationship we are entering into to get it. We instead seek to have a good experience beyond just getting it to be truly happy. It no longer rules or drives us away from what we value or the way we want to approach life going forward.

A New Perspective About Money

My relationship with money has changed dramatically since I retired.

Money and the way I got it through job title no longer defines me. I don’t need to be the person who is always getting it or seen as trying to. Retirement brings all kinds of transformation. There is a big retirement transition from working and doing everything necessary for money accumulation to simply living off of it. I just had to give myself time to mentally adjust.

My retirement gigs paid me more than just money.

I chose opportunities that I wanted to experience regardless of salary and thought I was making a retirement work mindset shift. But it was really about transforming my relationship with money. When I make even a small amount of money doing something I enjoy doing, it means much more to me than my old career income did. It just takes being picky about any work I choose to do.

I refuse to let myself go to pot.

I may have a decreased money drive and have stopped trying to be the most attractive to recruiters and hiring managers, but I still maintain my professional network and LinkedIn profile. There are actually some of the people from my past life that I like. I also stay curious and invested in the payable skills I still enjoy doing. I see it as a great way to exercise my biggest asset, my brain.

My evolved relationship with my only early retirement income source, my portfolio.

It took time but I have learned to detach from my portfolio. Even as I have watched the bouncing market of late, any market declines caused less emotional impact than it did before my decreased money drive fully kicked in. I no longer chase after a specific number. It’s there doing its job and I now just trust my portfolio diversification and financial plan.

 

What matters to me more now is how I live a life aligned with my values and with people I want to be around. Maybe that’s the biggest sign there is a decreased money drive, when relationships with people becomes much more important than chasing after more money.

The longer I am retired the easier it is to embrace having a decreased money drive. I don’t think our evolving relationship with money ever really ends until we leave the planet. Hopefully things always go more in our favor and it will continue to evolve in only the happiest of directions.

The Retirement Calming Effect of More Cash and No Mortgage

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There are a lot of financial decisions a retiree has to make. How to best fund their retirement, when to begin social security benefits, etc. But once that is settled, there’s a couple of decisions a retiree might have to make that can bug us to no end. How much cash should I keep and should I pay off the mortgage? If you have the funds to even consider these questions then the mental conflict is to just keep the money fully invested in the markets. That way it can possibly provide decent returns. I made these retirement money moves and can attest to one under-reported and powerful aspect to these decisions – The retirement calming effect of increasing cash and being mortgage free.  

The Retirement Calming Effect of More Cash and No Mortgage

My Retirement Calming Decisions of Cash and Mortgage

It’s certainly a first-world problem for those of personal finance success. Even talking or writing about it feels a little dirty knowing the struggles of many underfunded retirees trying to figure out how to pay for retirement when there isn’t enough. I am only able to reign in guilt when I think about where I came from to get here. Just another poor working stiff who used frugal living to feed an early retirement plan.

I never questioned retiring with a mortgage when I retired in 2009. There was about $100K still on the bank’s books and I budgeted for the monthly payment. As to cash, I left my first career with only about $20K available. The rest of my retirement funds were all in recession diminished stocks and bonds within my 401k and IRAs.

The Retirement Calming Effect of Cash

Going To One Year Retirement Funding Cash

I did wish that I had set aside more cash but it didn’t overly disturb me. It was just there in the background of the normal “what ifs” all new retirees go through. I had always planned on living a “retire early and often” lifestyle and after a few months put it to action. With my first stepped down retirement gig I continued to live off of my 72t distributions and I used my salary to increase my cash to around $35K. That represented one year’s retirement funding. I invested the rest of my paychecks into the offered 401K and my IRA.

That simple cash increase gave me my first retirement calming taste of having a bigger cash cushion. It reminded me of how I felt when I became non-mortgage debt free. This small cash jump gave me a feeling of calm knowing I added to my financial strength and it told me something about myself. Not only did I feel more confident about my retirement funding, but I didn’t sweat all the market swings as much during this 2010 through 2011 period of my early retirement.

I was a proud risk taker regarding my ditching a long career for early retirement. But I mentally preferred a bigger cash cushion when it came to my portfolio. Financially rational or not, I simply had less market worry and higher retirement confidence.

Going To Two Years Retirement Funding Cash

Two years into my early retirement I left the stepped down retirement gig and started what I call my encore career. I stuck to living off of my 72t and used the new gig’s larger salary like I had done before. Knowing the retirement calming effect I received with my first cash increase, I decided to increase my cash to cover 2 years retirement funding. It provided even more early retirement confidence. I discovered that I find financial calm in using cash to hedge against market volatility.

Going To Four Years Retirement Funding Cash

Years after my encore career and last paycheck ended I decided to once again increase my cash. The market was at all time highs and when running my numbers I found that I could take some chips off of the table to pump up my retirement cash. There’s no doubt about it, I’m really calm now. I should be able to easily outlast a recession or market downturn when it comes and for me there’s nothing more retirement calming than that.

The Retirement Calming Effect of Being Mortgage Free

As I mentioned above, I had never considered retiring mortgage free. It seemed out of reach without staying on the job I no longer enjoyed a lot longer. My total house payment was reasonable after refinancing to lower interest rates and it made for manageable payments in my retirement. I had already dropped below Federal Tax ‘Schedule A’ filing thresholds and wasn’t getting any mortgage interest tax benefits. It was during my encore career after hitting my 2 years cash goal that I made the decision to focus my salary on the mortgage. It was dispatched just 18 months later and I joined the small ranks of mortgage free homeowners. I was surprised at how eliminating this payment made me feel. No matter what manufactured market crisis occurred, I would own my home. It’s an intangible value that provides long-lasting retirement calm and happiness.    

Why How Much Retirement Cash To Have or Using Funds To Clear A Mortgage Are Tough Questions To Answer

The financial argument against cash is its inability to retain value against inflation. My cash isn’t dead money. I do get a little interest from my savings account and money market accounts. I am getting 2.5% from a 13 month CD and will continue to look at other higher interest earning opportunities. Yes, all pay less in interest than inflation. But the majority of my portfolio is invested in the market and I see the difference between cash’s earnings and inflation as the cost of what I call my retirement calm insurance. I find value in the emotional peace and that makes it worth it.

When it comes to paying off the mortgage the financial argument is about the loan interest percent saved in payments vs. the percentage that could be earned if left invested. I locked into a guaranteed return. No matter what else happens in the markets, I have that locked down. But the other benefit is it takes less to live on. When not working as I am now and living off of my portfolio, I’m able to reduce my taxable income by the payment amount. I not only have a guaranteed return but I now will pay less income taxes too.

The argument against both higher cash savings and mortgage payoff includes the lost opportunity for money left in the market for big market gains if invested right. Especially over the long-term. Depending on your goals, this can not only impact your long-term retirement funding but also any thoughts towards leaving a financial legacy to your family. That’s why it’s important to run your numbers through a good retirement calculator to make sure your portfolio will last at least as long as you do. You also need to have a clear legacy plan in place and make sure you can still meet it.

In the end, we all know markets don’t always go up which must also be considered in the arguments for and against having more cash and using funds to pay off the mortgage in retirement.

The Questions That Need To Be Answered

I’m not some super investor, had no inside secrets, nor received a windfall to retire early as I did. I am just an average Joe who decided that I wanted to be free of the rat race and figured out how to pull it off in a way that worked for me. But now that I’m retired, I prefer to not be looking over my portfolio’s shoulder all the time. I prefer the retirement calm of what the extra cash and mortgage freedom provides me.

The questions I needed to answer before making these retirement calming moves were –   

Is now the best time to pay off the mortgage?

We had considered long before retirement that we would sell our home and move to a smaller home in a less expensive real estate market. That way we could be mortgage fee. But after grand-kids came we nixed that plan. I don’t believe it would have made sense to use taxable retirement funds to payoff a mortgage. In my case I had income coming in and no mortgage interest income tax benefits. Payoff also meant reducing my taxable retirement funding needs in the nearer future. Yes, it was the best time to pay it off.

Do the numbers still work with so much cash on the sideline?

When I increased to one year and two years worth of cash this wasn’t an issue. I was happily in retirement gigs and used the extra income to grow cash. This question came in the jump to four years cash while I was relying 100% on my portfolio. Running the numbers through the FIREcalc retirement calculator was my first step. I then made my proposal to my CFP and they also ran my numbers. Yes, the numbers looked good.

If the numbers work, then why risk unnecessary injury playing in a game already won?  

The same question echoed during my decision to retire or stay on the job longer. Do I have something more to prove or can I be happy and satisfied by making the move. I never regretted giving up the title and salary of my career, I had enough. It was easy to answer this question. I had no doubts. I wouldn’t regret about my higher cash savings missing out on any market runs.

Would I really value this as retirement calm insurance?

History and numbers show that staying at two years cash with a diversified asset allocation would work fine over the long-haul. But what I was going for was gaining even less concern about market volatility and being able to fully enjoy my retirement without thinking about finances all the time. The sting of the last great recession hit me hard. When being truthful about what causes me more distress, either having this sidelined money miss out on a bull market run or not having enough cash to get through a long market downturn, the answer was clear.

Are there any other upsides other than the retirement calming effect of jumping up cash?

Along with the memory of the last great recession’s sting is also the memory of all the opportunities to buy heavily devalued investments if only I had some cash. In 2009 as the markets hit bottom and the years that followed, stocks were a bargain. Having higher cash reserves means being able to take advantage of any future investing opportunities.

 

Everyone’s risk tolerance is unique to the investor. Finding the perfect formula that meets both necessary funding needs without adding investor distress is the recipe for a retirement calming portfolio. My mentally preferred recipe just happens to love the higher cash allocation and being mortgage free.

Seek that which keeps you calm, Lokah Samastah Sukhino Bhavantu.

Small Changes You Could Make To Your Health, This Year

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Whether busy in the working world or in retirement, it can be hard to maintain a healthy lifestyle. You might try a diet for a few weeks before slipping into old ways, or you might try to quit drinking so much but you end up falling off the wagon when you go to a bar with your friends. Healthy living can seem like a chore, but it shouldn’t. With gradual steps in the right direction, you can start to form habits that’ll become part of your daily routine. Staying healthy shouldn’t be time-consuming. It should simply be a part of your existing schedule. Here are some small changes you could make to your wellbeing.

Small Changes You Could Make To Your Health, This Year

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Exercise every day.

First of all, you should aim to exercise every day. It’s a small change that could make a massive difference to your physical and mental wellbeing. Rather than fretting about strenuous sessions at the gym once or twice every week, you could achieve better results by simply doing 10 to 20 minutes of exercise on a daily basis. Run around your local park, do some push ups in your living room, grab a chair and do some triceps dips, or simply go on a walk with your family and friends. Staying physically active can help to not only keep your waistline trim but also keep you mentally healthy. Exercise releases endorphins in the brain, and that boosts your mood. Establishing a routine exercise activity and incrementally pushing yourself a little more as time goes will generate positive health results.

Reduce your unhealthy habits.

Everybody has unhealthy habits. For some people, it might be that they snack on junk food when they’re bored. For other people, it might be that they drink a little too much wine on a frequent basis. Whatever the unhealthy habit, you should aim to improve your attitude towards excessive consumption of things that are bad for you. Being healthy isn’t just about exercising or eating well; it’s about avoiding the things that are unhealthy for you.

If this seems an impossible task to get onboard with, some people have found success with hypnotism. If you’re struggling to kick a habit such as smoking then you might even want to look into nicotine patches, gum,  or getting a cheap e-juice as an alternative that is a bit healthier for you. Sometimes, weaning yourself off bad habits is easier than going cold turkey. Aside from the health benefits that can come from quitting bad habits, most come at great financial cost. Think about all the things that you could better use your money towards.

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Work on your mental health.

Remember, your mental health is just as important as your physical health. One important change you could make to your health this year is to look after your mind. Your mental wellbeing can be improved in many small ways. For starters, you should talk to your family and friends as often as possible. Sharing your feelings, whether that means laughing or crying, is crucial to your mental health.

You might also want to start making smarter financial decisions. For many adults, the root cause of their high stress levels is money. Whether you’re having problems with your finances or not, you probably worry about money a lot. You might find that it helps your mental health to start being more organized with your finances. An organized budget leads to an organized mind. The point is that you need to think about aspects of your lifestyle which could be improved in order to improve your mental wellbeing.

Home, Health And Happiness: The Retirement Practicalities To Think About

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A lot of us look toward the future with a prevailing sense of dread. Whether it’s about getting old, or about the fact that we are more than likely going to be working until our dying day. These are all thoughts that add up to a continual sense of unease. But, there are ways for you to age with grace, like there are ways for you to be practical as each decade comes and goes. If you are someone who hasn’t got a retirement plan in place, because you think you might not be able to retire, it’s now time to consider what the essential retirement practicalities that each and every one of us can acquire.

Home, Health And Happiness: The Retirement Practicalities To Think About

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Making Your Home A Retirement Haven

While you may be renting a property, or you might own your own home, either way, where you live needs to be as practical for your retirement as possible. While there are so many different considerations in a financial sense to think about, if you are someone that owns your own property, do you actually need to downsize? It’s worth thinking about this now, because when the day comes that you didn’t consider selling up and this property is now a millstone around your neck, it can cause a lot more stress as you age.

Instead, it’s worth considering what you actually want out of your twilight years. Do you want to stay where you are, location wise? If so, is your current abode suitable? If it is, but there are some things that need changing, trying to invest in the most practical of changes now, rather than having to get a part-time job when you are retiring, will be easier as far as paying for things like costly foundation repairs, fixing structural damage, but also, altering your home so you can live there. You might think that it’s a considerable cost now, but it will be a far more difficult prospect when you are living on a more basic income. But to get to this point, you need to ask yourself what you really want out of your retirement years.

You might think yourself too young to even ponder the notion. But when you think about what you really want, in terms of your material goods, as well as what you want for your dependents, you are going to form an image in your head of what your ideal vision of old age is. And from there, you can start to sculpt the ideal scenario for you, but also, your loved ones.

Facilitating Your Spending Requirements

Once you have understood what you really want out of old age, then you can begin to make the necessary financial sacrifices. Of course, you can’t take money with you when you go, and a lot of people have the frame of mind that you should spend it all now. While you can get a basic government retirement fund, you will need to examine whether this is enough for you to live off. This goes back to your goals in retirement, but also, how you imagine spending time in retirement.

Do you have a lot of things you want to accomplish? For example, do you envision yourself going on various vacations? If so, you might consider saving more now, and constricting your spending so you are able to live this vicarious lifestyle. But one of the biggest things that people worry about when it comes to the essential finances in retirement is that they think that they will spend the same amount of money throughout their retirement years. In fact, when you build up your retirement fund, you need to imagine spending the highest amount at the very beginning of your retirement years, and the figure will gradually taper off. This is because of the fact that you will become less mobile and as you gradually begin to downsize your life to suit your practicalities day-to-day, you can then begin to think about if you have too much spending money, in which case, you can think about things like inheritance for your dependents and your next of kin.

The Cost Of Health

We all want a healthy and happy retirement, and whether you have nothing in the bank and it looks like you will be working well into old age, or you have enough money stockpiled for one massive vacation a year, your health is still one of those clichéd things that you have to focus on. Healthcare should be one of those things that you don’t give a second thought to, because you are adequately insured. But also, you should view your health as an investment. After all, if you have a lot of money, but you are unable to enjoy it because of an ailing health condition, what is the point? And so, this is where the old fashion advice comes into play, such as healthy diet, but also exercising.

In addition to these, your mental health is something that has to be invested in, because the potential for isolation is something that increases as we get older. And why you may view things like vacations as essential ways to give you peace of mind, it’s important, in retirement, to invest, financially or emotionally, in routines. This is why the cliché of taking up something like golf always springs to mind. Not only is it a great way to get all those health benefits of being social, outdoors, and so forth, but it also is a minor physical challenge, and benefits your brain in various cognitive ways.

 

Because retirement is one of those things that you don’t give a second thought to, especially when you’re in your 20s or 30s, the reality of the situation comes around sooner than you think. And while lots of advice online will tell you to consider life insurance, writing out a will, investing, and all the other common approaches, you still need to consider your home, health, and happiness at the core of your retirement plan.

Becoming a Caregiver, The Retirement Game Changer That Can Happen To Anyone

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Surprise! I never saw it coming. It was something that escaped all of my early retirement planning and it touches everything from finances to lifestyle. It can consume dreams if you let it. Taking on the role of caregiver is a retirement game changer. It is seldom planned for but chances are good that the caregiver role will touch many people.

In my case it was rather sudden. But even if we can see a loved one’s health declining, it is usually a slow-moving but unstoppable train and we fail to grasp ahead of time the challenges to come. For me it was doubly heartbreaking as illness struck my bride right in midst of our early retirement.

My wife and I worked hard to save enough money to retire early and stay as healthy as we could. We made all the lifestyle and financial plans that everyone does to finally live free from the obligations of the rat race. We had looked at and carefully planned for our early retirement of energetic youthful bliss. Even making considerations within our plans for long-term care in our old age. It was all about living life on our terms for what was left of it. Well, life is messy, and the terms were changed. It can happen to anyone.

Caregiver- The Retirement Game Changer

Our planned retirement life together was thrown into the air. People tend to only focus on the awesome parts of retirement, not plan for this. We didn’t plan for it, at least not for this at our young age. This meant learning on the fly in real-time. Saying it is a challenge can be an understatement. Here is what I’ve learned through this experience so that you can at least think about the possibility and plan accordingly

Shifting Finances

I was already retired and didn’t have a job that I was relying on. Having to give up a job to become a caretaker not only interferes with earning income, but also interrupts adding to retirement accounts. Saving for retirement is tough enough for most people. Working folks who become caretakers have huge financial hurdles to overcome and many end up using their retirement savings earlier than they planned.

For already retired folks the budget gets blown apart. Medical costs can climb much higher than other budgetary items that may decrease like travel and entertainment. We hit our health insurance out-of-pocket maximum before mid-year. Not only did we spend much more for medical but when treatments and medications were ineffective or failed, we also paid for natural remedies in an attempt to increase my wife’s quality of life. You are willing to try anything that looks promising when illness hits hard.

Takeaway: It is important to have some flexibility in your budget. Have at least enough extra funds easily available to pay up to the health insurance plan’s out of pocket maximum amount each year.

Emotional Challenges

Taking on the duties of being a caretaker comes with a lot of emotional tugs. Not only do you have to recognize and help your loved one through their physical and emotional challenges, but you must deal with your own thoughts about what could have been had this not happened. It is all too easy for frustration, sadness, disappointment, anger, resentment, and depression to creep in for both parties.

Be prepared for an emotional roller-coaster for all involved. We communicated what we were feeling and both deployed super patience with each other. With open dialog it is easy to understand that it is a difficult situation but one that we are lovingly willing to fight for the best outcome. We both were disappointed about all of our unrealized early retirement plans and an unknown future, but we kept a positive attitude by agreeing that everything was postponed, not cancelled.

Takeaway: Everyone feels frustration in this dynamic. Over communicate instead of hiding feelings. Keeping a positive attitude has healing powers for both the cared for and the caretaker.

Self Imposed Isolation

We are private people and that can be a detriment. It has never been easy for me to ask for help for anything. To all around us it was obvious something was going on. I was always seen alone and my wife seldom left the house for other than medical appointments. People with good intentions would ask how things were going. I would hold back and just say that things were going good and that she had some health challenges but was doing well. I wouldn’t complain or talk about how things really were going or express our fears and concerns. Even when our daughters called we would downplay how things were. When they visited we both tried to hide the seriousness of the situation.

I just couldn’t ask for anyone’s help. We both felt that everyone has busy lives and we don’t want to burden them with our problems. Many months went by before I started to leak the situation. Once I did that I then found I wasn’t alone. So many people had experienced similar life hurdles and had helpful advice. There were sincere offers for help. Even the littlest of things were a huge help. We loved when our daughters would prepare meals to give us a break from my grilling everything and my poorly skilled cooking.  

Takeaway: Share what is going on with the people in your life. Self isolation is unnecessary. It’s alright to accept help, especially when in a possible long-term caregiver situation. Then appreciate and be thankful for any help and to anyone who can make the time to lend a hand.  

Wasteful Worry

It’s easy to get caught up in worry when you don’t KNOW the outcome. Will this get better or will it become worse? What if medical treatments continue to fail? What if something happens to me, what will we do then?

It can cause sleep disorders, which is exactly what I experienced. My sleeplessness left me physically run down. Not only was I dealing with the mental side of being a caregiver I now was adding another negative physical dynamic.

Instead of worry, let the doctors work through what they do and take care of yourself. As a caregiver, aside from our worrying being a waste of time, it can cause us to neglect our own health. The caregiver role is demanding and we need to stay up to the task by doing things to stay healthy while also allowing joy in our life. I found I was concentrating solely on my wife’s health, needs, and everything related to her medical treatment. I needed to set aside time so I could introduce healthy actions for myself too.

Takeaway: Exercise, go for a walk if you can get away for a short time, get outside in the sunshine, and eat right. Allow your mind daily mental escape and relaxation to recharge. All the healthy things we know we should do goes a lot farther towards our health and means much more when we are in a stressful and challenging caregiver situation. Strive to find some balance.

Becoming a Caregiver, The Retirement Game Changer That Can Happen To AnyoneAnd Now?

My retirement caregiver experience lasted about a year. Although my bride will live with her illness the rest of her life, thankfully the doctors found the right treatments and medications for her to return to a fully functional and active life. That breakthrough was almost a year ago. We know we are very fortunate and that many people have to deal with much more than we did. Living through this really opened our eyes. We appreciate and cherish our health more than ever.

What happened came out of nowhere and totally sidelined our retirement for a year. Fortunately it didn’t come at a time in our lives when we were depending on our employment for income to live. Our retirement budget did take a hit but nothing catastrophic because we did have decent medical coverage once out-of-pocket limits where breached. We plan to happily take advantage of this second chance and live our retirement to the fullest. The future is always unknown so we don’t want to waste any of our young and healthier time of life that we have left.

Why I Shared Our Story

I know our story is unique, there are many different caregiver scenarios. Even within our story, my wife’s experience from the cared-for side in her early retirement will be different from mine. The caregiver role can come with many different requirements like making your home wheelchair accessible or even having to move. It could be a retired couple caring for a parent and having to curtail their planned retirement life. The reason I shared our story is that I believe this kind of retirement impacting situation can happen to anyone and some of the issues we worked through will be common.

At Least Think About The Possibility

As we look at our retirement plans we should consider thinking about the impacts of a spouse, parent, sibling, child, or grandchild needing us to step-up as their caregiver. Even when we aren’t an in-home caregiver but taking on some care activities for an independent but failing loved one may mean being anchored close by and disrupt our retirement lifestyle and travel plans. This retirement game changer is becoming far more common than you think. It is an uncomfortable reality.

We should all understand that our plans for our retirement can turn out a lot different. We should prepare ourselves both financially and mentally for the possibility of becoming a loved one’s caregiver and if the unfortunate should occur, go into it happily and courageously as just another detour in our life’s journey. As far as I am concerned, we have one life to live the best way we can so don’t allow a bump in our retirement plans derail us.

Update 10/4/18: For anyone who has interest into looking at long-term or short-term care insurance I have found an informative article at ALTCP that compares short-term vs. long-term care policies.

Do you have frustrations or concerns about and/or have tips to counter the disruption of your retirement plans because of being a caregiver in some capacity?