By Jean Moore
October 2009

As women, many of us fill roles that can place crushing demands on our time, finances, and physical and emotional health. Have you considered how your business would be affected if someone for whom you have responsibility had a crippling stroke? If a loved one was robbed of his or her mind and memory and couldn’t be left alone, how would your business suffer? What would your role need to be? 

Stephanie*, a successful attorney, is struggling with these issues. She’s helplessly watched the pilfering of her husband Gregory’s mind over the last few years by Alzheimer’s disease. He now requires costly continual supervision, so Stephanie’s practice, her livelihood, is in jeopardy.

We met in 1996 when she expressed an interest in owning long-term care insurance. She recognized the need, but other more immediate demands kept getting in the way. Years passed.  Then her husband’s memory loss rendered him uninsurable, and now her loss of income makes long-term care insurance unaffordable. Extreme stress and care costing nearly $6,000 a month are exacting their toll. The future is bleak. Long-term care insurance wouldn’t have prevented Gregory’s disease, but it could have lessened the financial, professional, physical and emotional tolls Stephanie faces.

Unplanned events can play havoc with your business plan. How can you plan for the possible need for care resulting from a crippling accident or injury, for long-term physical disability, or severe memory loss? This checklist can get you started:

Identify the people in your life for whom you have a sense responsibility. In what ways would they need to rely on you? Be as specific as you can.

• Where do they live? Could it involve a need for long-distance care-giving?
• Identify others on whom you’d hope to depend to share the responsibility. Would they likely provide financial support, hands-on care or room in their home? Plan together.
• Become aware of the levels of care available, where they’re rendered and how much they cost. Identify community resources.
• If you have elderly parents or in-laws, learn if they own long-term care insurance. In any case, know who their primary care physicians are and how to contact them. Ask them for copies of their durable healthcare power of attorney.
• Put on your own “oxygen mask” first. Create your financial safety net. Learn about the tax advantages of long-term care insurance for business owners.
• Examine openly the consequences to your business and family of failure to plan.

Acknowledge your possible role in a loved one’s care and how it would impact your life and your business. Living a long life—yours or theirs—is likely. Planning for it is a real necessity.

* Names have been changed. 

D. Jean Moore, CLTC, is a long-term care insurance broker representing multiple companies since 1994. She focuses on protection for individuals and on executive carve-out plans for small businesses. For a free copy of “The Next Step,” a Kiplinger’s Personal Finance workbook to help you plan ahead for long-term care, or “A Woman’s Guide to Long-Term Care Insurance Protection,” call Jean at 760-724-2915 or e-mail her at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .