Are You Prepared for A Personal Emergency?

I am not prepared at all!! I really have been thinking about that since reading this book. You always think it's never going to happen to you, until it does.

Not prepared AT ALL (and we have children, a house (paid off), family business, AND a fair bit of debt....). Yes, this is something we should look into!

I'm definitely not prepared. But this gave me a lot to think about. And social media! I hadn't even considered that.

Though right now I don't have children, this book did bring a lot of serious, and unsettling, questions to mind in regards to what I would do if something were to happen to my husband. If a personal emergency occurred in our household at this moment we would be completely unprepared and that's more than a little scary. This book definitely put into perspective for me just how easily one's world can be turned upside down by an accident and I have been encouraged to make more preparations rather than to just talk about ideas of what should be done.

My husband and I have talked about it, but really haven't done anywhere near enough about preparing. We have insurance and shared bank accounts and such, but we have yet to make wills.

And our situation isn't unlike the one in this novel: I'm a stepmother who's been active in helping raise my husband's kids for the last six years, so the legalities aren't entirely straightforward. One of the kids will be of age this fall, but the other will be a minor for a few more years. Their mother is very much in the picture, so it's not entirely analogous, but the book definitely pushed a few of my buttons.

I haven't really thought about this and coupled with the fact that my husband is a freelance musician I'm still not really sure what I would need to do.... going to go google some things ;)

We're SO far from being prepared for a sudden emergency. I would be pretty lost if something happened to my husband tomorrow. We keep talking about setting up a will, especially to plan for our girls. It just keeps getting put off. Life gets busy.

A friend shared a post from the Wall Street Journal last week that really had me thinking. I think it was titled "25 Documents You Need Before You Die." I immediately shared it with my husband. I had no idea about some of the things on that list. It's amazing how much really needs to be done... and I think so few people plan for the end.

Nope, not prepared at all. Like you said, it's tough to think about, but it needs to be done. And my social media death? wow...I can just imagine preparing a blog post as a goodbye message and saving it in drafts in case of my demise....

i don't think anyone can truly be prepared for emergency. we can try to be, but in the end we deal with emergencies with what we have on hand. we dont know the future and can only hope for the best.

I'd say I'm probably medium prepapred. A lot of our paperwork is in order, but there is still more I could do and I have not thought about my social media "death" at all. Even though Joe left a lot of disorganization in his wake, I think he did a great job on the relationship side. Sometimes people die and leave something even worse behind than financial chaos, they leave bitter arguments unresolved and broken relationships. One think I'd like to do to prepare is make sure I leave behind letters for my son and husband making sure that they knew how much they meant to me.

I'm not prepared and the worst part is that I know it and have been dragging my (well, our) feet. We should know better after having dealt with my mother-in-laws death in August and all the things THEY didn't do. Denial for sure. I'm going to read this book and hope it inspires me to get off my hiney!

Oh, lord. I can't consider any of these questions without panicking. Absolutely panicking.

Am I prepared for a personal emergency? In short, "NO!" Like Ella Beene was told by her best friend, I find that I'm also in a sort of la-ti-da state of mind. After reading this book, I almost panicked because of all of the thoughts flooding my mind, all centering on "What if ..." I'm in charge of the financial side of our family, and would fare just fine if, God forbid, something DID happen to my father, but would I go to pieces? Would I be able to be a stable, steadfast rock for my kids? It's definitely something to consider when thinking about "contingency plans."

When I read the part of the book where Ella realized that she not only doesn't know anything about their financial situation, but also that she doesn't even know where they keep the bills and when they're due, I definitely saw myself in Ella. My husband takes care of all our finances, even my student loans. I wouldn't know where to start if I had to pay attention to bills coming in and get them paid on time! Of course, having that realization hasn't convinced me to actually DO anything about it yet. I'll live in happiness and denial for a while longer.

One thing struck a chord with me was the fact that Ella and I are the same age. While I am in a totally different place (not married, no children), I guess I have been living in a state of denial believing that as a single person I don't need to be thinking about these life and death questions. Now I realize I should be thinking about them even more because it's just me. No one is going to do it for me!

Short answer? No. Not in the least. While I could definitely survive if something happened to my husband - and vice versa, we so have not done all the we should. And my social media death? I'll be falling off the face of the earth where no one ever hears from me again and everyone wonders why. Oops.

I've been thinking about this a lot since I read the book as well. My husband has a will because he's in the military and we've discussed what would happen with the kids but have never sat down and made anything 'final.' But this definitely pulled at my heart strings for what we'd do. Yikes. Such a scary thought.

I think this topic terrifies everyone. No one wants to talk about it because it is so painful. A while ago I heard the suggestion that once a year, you create a document with all your passwords, important info, paperwork, etc, and put it in an envelope in your safe in the unlikely event that you need that information. I was hesitant to do that at first, but after reading this book, I was reminded of how important it actually is!

After reading the book and thinking about it, I realize that I have been hiding like an ostrich in the sand when it comes to our state of affairs. I definitely am planning to sit down with my husband and get passwords, PIN codes, and an idea of where we are. I don't want to be caught like Ella in the dark when it matters!

I was suprised by how little she knew. I feel like I'm too hands on, maybe too much so, to leave all that up to my spouse. But that said, I know we're unprepared. I've been hearing & realizing this even more since we've announced being pregnant with triplets.

We don't have wills, life insurance beyond our small work policies, or big plans made. But I think soon, we'll be doing all that.

Also, until reading this, I've never thought about planning your social media death! Guess that's another thing to add to my to-do list!

i am the epitome of unprepared. i dont even know which bills are paid when or what companies we use or when our mortgage payment is due. we don't have a will so i'm not sure what would happen to my son if something happened to both of us. i guess when i think of something happening to my husband my mom goes to the emotional side of it (how would i ever be able to live without him?) but as i learned from ella things could very well happen and life would continue on so it's best to be prepared.

No, I'm absolutely am *not* prepared, and I know I should be. I'm usually a very organized person, but when it comes to things like this I confess to having my head in the sand.

I realize I need to do better with this. We just moved all the way across the country and we need to have plans in place for our kids and our "stuff" should anything happen to us. I think it's a little irresponsible of us to have gone this long without putting our wishes in writing.

After reading this book, I did sit down and have the difficult conversation with my hubby. We had made a will several years ago. But failed to update it when our youngest was born. We weren't on the same page with finances or passwords. We finally got it all on the table which is such a burden off my shoulders. One never wants to loose the love of their life, but we don't know what tomorrow will bring. It is better to be prepared for the what if's for sure!

Once we had children we planned a little. And I mean a little. Nothing that could have supported the other. Just enought to help with expenses for a short while. Then we bought a house. While dealing with all the new things you have to think about with owning a home we started REALLY planning. All i's dotted and t's crossed. At least we think. I'm sure if something ever happens there will have been something we missed, but what we have is the best we know how to make it right now.

My husband also never, and I mean NEVER, helped or was willing to help with bills and finances. He wanted me to take care of it all. About 2 years ago that changed because he had the realization that if something happened to me he would have no clue how to even pay the bills let alone what bills we have. Now we sit down every month and pay the bills together and go over our finances. EVERY MONTH. We are both on the same page.

write now the only true "personal emergency" that we're planning for is if my boyfriend loses his job ... which I think is still at the forefront of a lot of families agenda right now ... it's kind of hard to think past that

but the truth of the matter is there are much worse things than being unemployed and yes, we do need to plan for them too

You know, I think this book must have put that bug in my ear. Until I read your thoughts on this, I didn't realize why I have been obsessed with getting this information with my husband lately.

On Sunday, my husband bought me an iphone, and along with it, he showed me a password manager. He gave me all the passwords to all of our accounts: banking, insurance, loans, etc. It makes me feel better knowing I have access to this information now, but God forbid something were to happen, I don't know if I'd know what to do with it. I guess I just assume that someone will be there to help me.

It makes me feel a bit naive and 50s housewife not knowing how to use this information, but I think the trade off is that I feel less stress by not dealing with it. So, I guess the real issue becomes not that I am incapable of figuring it out, but do I really want to?

Jenna

I don't think it's possible to think of everything that you'll need, but obviously being as prepared as you can is important. I don't think I'm anywhere near as ready for a personal emergency as I'd like to be.

I watched my mother deal with the aftermath of my father's death when I was 19. They were not prepared at all either and it just makes the whole terrible situation even worse! I would say that I am prepared, but I would also say that preparing for the worst is something that sort of stays in the back of my brain at all times, so I'm not sure whether it is better to be blissfully ignorant, or always prepared. Either way I don't think it makes the pain of loss any easier to deal with.