January 8, 2018 will be a day forever ingrained in my mind. They day before, I received a call that my Dad was in the emergency room with diabetic nerve pain and flu-like symptoms. By the time I was able to get there, he was already leaving. We went to the local pharmacy, picked up his Tamiflu, and took him home. Everything was completely normal – he was himself, making jokes even though he didn’t feel well.
The next day, I planned to call my Dad and check on him and to see if he needed anything. Instead, my husband got the phone call that my Dad had passed away that morning. My Dad was 51 years old. 51 years old. I expected 10-20 more years with him. I expected him to be there to love and spoil his grandchildren. I expected texts of things he found interesting or asking about the weather. I expected hundreds more phone calls rubbing it in that he was at his favorite restaurant, or that he was watching my niece.
If you have ever lost a parent, you know that there is an intense grief and a hole in your heart that can never be filled. It’s not something that ever goes away, the feeling of loss. Add into this planning a funeral you never thought you would have to plan. My brother and I went with my grandmother and other family to make the plans, and I felt sick as I read the numbers across the table: $11,000. Keep in mind, the $11,000 does not include the plot or headstone which are additional costs.
My dad did not have life insurance. Ironic, right? An insurance agent who knows just how important life insurance is never helping her father purchase it. With my father’s health problems, it made the price go up every time I would get quotes, I would say maybe next month when my expenses go down. I repeated this to myself every few months until there was no time left to say it. Instead, we had to rely on our community of family and friends and their donations to help, but my grandmother ended up paying for the bulk of the service. She had to dip into her retirement funds – the funds that she had worked fifty or more years to save.
My story is not unique. There are people younger and older than my dad every day who pass away without life insurance. Their family and friends are left wondering: “How can we possibly afford to pay for this?”
My first goal, with telling this story, is to help people realize the true importance of life insurance. It’s not there to make your family wealthy after you leave this world. It’s there so they don’t have to wonder how they’re going to live without your income, or change their lifestyle. Life insurance is to protect your family. Just purchasing a $15,000 life insurance plan on my father could have saved our family from wondering about the money on top of the incredible grief you feel from losing someone suddenly.
My second goal, would be to urge you not to wait another day. With every birthday you celebrate, the price of the policy goes up. And let’s face it, there is no promise of tomorrow.
I rest easy every night, knowing that my family won’t have to worry about expenses when I’m gone. My $250,000 policy costs me less than a dollar a day.
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