The Happy Eating Podcast · Carolyn Williams PhD, RD & Brierley Horton, MS, RD

The Death List: The Checklist You Need Before Your Parents Die

April 9, 2026·1 hr 7 min·5 clips

A state and trust planning attorney reveals the biggest mistakes people make before their parents die.

1. The Happy Eating Podcast brings in Birmingham estate and trust planning attorney Jennifer Justice McEwen to guide co-hosts Carolyn and Briarley through estate planning essentials for aging parents and themselves. 2. Jennifer McEwen holds an LLM in taxation from NYU and a JD magna cum laude from the University of Alabama; she was named the 2025 Lawyer of the Year in Birmingham for closely held companies and family business law. 3. The episode's central premise is that people in their 40s and 50s are caught between preparing their own estate documents and scrambling to understand what their aging parents have — or haven't — done. 4. The trigger is Briarley's father, who lives with her half the year, shows signs of memory decline, and had no awareness of the term 'advanced directive' when she raised it at dinner — taking her from concerned to 'losing my mind.' 5. Briarley's brother is named executor and power-of-attorney holder for their father but admitted he hadn't read the documents; Jennifer uses this to open the broader conversation about document literacy. 6. Jennifer begins with state law specificity: all of these documents — advanced directives, powers of attorney, and wills — are governed by state law, so a parent who splits time between Pennsylvania and Alabama may need to clarify which state's forms they are using. 7. Alabama's Advanced Directive for Health Care has two parts: the advanced directive proper (yes/no questions about life-sustaining treatment if terminally ill or permanently unconscious) and the living will section (appointment of a health care proxy to make those decisions). 8. Two doctors must independently declare a terminal condition or permanent unconsciousness before an advanced directive becomes operative; Jennifer says in practice this process takes a while because doctors are cautious about liability. 9. The three levels of health care proxy authority range from 'follow my written directions exactly' to 'follow my directions but decide situations I didn't cover' to 'you can override my directions if you think it's right' — option three places the emotional burden of overriding a terminal declaration on the proxy. 10. A medical power of attorney is a separate Alabama document covering non-life-ending medical decisions — surgeries, rehabilitation, palliative care — and includes a HIPAA waiver allowing the agent to access medical records. 11. Financial powers of attorney come in two types: a general durable power of attorney (effective immediately on signing, survives incapacity) and a springing power of attorney (only effective after incapacity is proved, which Jennifer generally discourages because proving incapacity is slow and subject to manipulation). 12. The hardest dementia scenario is when a parent won't acknowledge they're slipping — they continue managing their own finances and may send money to scam charities, while the adult child tries to help; legally overriding this requires court proceedings that are costly and damage relationships. 13. Powers of attorney and medical directives are only valid while the person is alive; once someone dies, those documents lose all authority and the executor's role begins — but only after going through the probate and letters testamentary process. 14. Jennifer recommends keeping original documents in a waterproof fireproof safe rather than a safety deposit box, which can be inaccessible on weekends, requires sharing access, and presents logistical problems when the holder is already dead. 15. She advises sending copies of wills to backup executors and letting at least one trusted person know where originals are stored, while acknowledging that if you later change your named agents, you must notify former agents that their authority has been revoked. 16. A key practical recommendation is maintaining a secure running list of all accounts, passwords, and advisors — Jennifer suggests a master-password system — updated regularly, because so much of a parent's financial life is now online and not discoverable through collected mail. 17. Jennifer identifies the 'common disaster' gap: most wills don't include a provision for what happens if the testator and all named beneficiaries die simultaneously, leaving distribution to state intestacy law and potentially requiring a search through distant relatives. 18. She spent ten years on one case conducting a 100-person heir search through second and third cousins because no contingency clause existed in the will, and recommends clients designate a charity, church, or close friend as the residual beneficiary in that scenario. 19. Jennifer says to revisit all documents every three to five years — or after a major life event like birth, death, divorce, or a significant asset change — and to update not just the named people but the trust terms for children, which may specify trust termination at an age that no longer makes sense. 20. Best suited for adults with aging parents who haven't had these conversations yet, and for anyone who made a will years ago and hasn't reviewed it since.

As heard by us

A clear, humane guide to the legal paperwork families often put off.

This episode takes a familiar midlife worry and makes it concrete: what happens when aging parents need real planning, and nobody can find the will.

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Why you'd press play

When your parents' paperwork suddenly feels more urgent than your own plans.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

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