What a Foster Puppy Taught Me about Estate Planning and Preparing the Next Person
It’s going to be bittersweet, and I’m definitely going to cry. This Saturday we’re taking our foster puppy, Boots, to an adoption event. There’s a very good chance she’ll meet the person who becomes her forever home.
We’ve spent the last month caring for little Boots. In that time, we’ve learned all of her quirks, what makes her happy, which toys she loves, what scares her, and what helps her feel safe. All this time, we’ve been preparing her for a life we won’t actually get to see. That’s the strange and beautiful part of fostering. You invest time, care, and energy into helping a dog become ready for the next chapter, and then you step aside so someone else can live that chapter with them.
When Boots goes to her new home, she won’t go empty-handed. I’m sending her off with a completed worksheet that explains everything her new family might want to know about her: the food she eats and how much, the things that make her nervous, the toys she loves, and the routines that help her feel comfortable. In other words, we’re trying to make the transition easier both for Boots and for the person who comes next. And that’s exactly what good estate planning does.
So often, when someone dies or becomes unable to manage things on their own, the people who step in are left trying to piece together information during an already stressful time. They’re searching through files, guessing about accounts, wondering who the financial advisor was, or trying to figure out what the person would have wanted.
But it doesn’t have to be that way. Good transitions don’t happen by accident; they happen because someone took the time to prepare the next person. That preparation might look like organizing financial information, writing down instructions, documenting accounts, or making sure the right people know where to find important documents.
Boots doesn’t know it, but she’s leaving us very well prepared for her next chapter. The people we love deserve the same kind of care.
