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Financial Preparedness and Community in Widowhood with Pam Baker
0 Playsin 11 hours
Pam Baker is the founder and CEO of Widows Who Wine™, a national community and app designed to help widows rediscover connection, support, and joy after profound loss. After losing her husband, Jon, to glioblastoma in 2021, Pam turned her personal experience into purpose—becoming an author and podcast host to guide others through the complexities of grief and estate planning. She is the author of Where’s the Key to the Safe? and hosts two podcasts: The Lost Love Stories, which offers heartfelt conversations for anyone who has lost someone they love, and Coffee, Cancer & Cocktails, a candid and compassionate space to discuss the messy intersections of illness, caregiving, and resilience. A seasoned philanthropist and community leader, Pam and her team have raised millions for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation following the diagnoses of two of her children. Based in Roswell, Georgia, she is the proud mother of four young adults and is known for opening her heart and home to a life filled with purpose, people, and plenty of laughter.
https://lastinglegacyconsulting.com/ https://www.instagram.com/bakereed/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/pambaker1818/ https://www.facebook.com/pam.r.baker.5/
Show Highlights:
- Background: Pam and her husband, John (a financial advisor), were married for 24 years. Pam's experience navigating her children's cystic fibrosis (CF) diagnosis prepared her for John's aggressive glioblastoma. John lived three years after his diagnosis, passing peacefully at home. Pam and John created the Facebook Live series, Coffee, Cancer, and Cocktails, to control their narrative. Pam's current podcast, The Lost Love Stories, encourages sharing honest memories of lost loved ones.
- Community (Widows Who Wine): Pam created this social group for women to find sisterhood and thrive after loss, as existing grief support often had a heavy religious overtone.
- Financial Preparedness: Where's the Key to the Safe? is a workbook designed to help manage the "business of death" and prevent major financial decisions during "grief fog.
Contact Kendra Rinaldi to be a guest or for Grief Coaching griefgratitudepodcast@gmail.com
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Transcript
Introduction to 'Grief, Gratitude, and the Gray in Between'
00:00:05
Speaker
Welcome to Grief, Gratitude, and the Gray in Between podcast. I'm your host, Kendra Rinaldi. This is a space to explore the full spectrum of grief, from the kind that comes with death to the kind that shows up in life's many transitions. Through stories and conversations, we remind each other that we're not alone.
00:00:27
Speaker
Your journey matters, and here we're figuring it out together. Let's dive right in to today's episode.
Disclaimer on Personal Stories and Advice
00:00:47
Speaker
Let's start with a quick disclaimer. This podcast includes personal stories and perspectives on topics like grief, health, and mental wellness. The views expressed by guests are their own and may reflect individual experiences that are not meant as medical advice.
00:01:05
Speaker
As the host, I hold space for diverse voices, but that does not mean I endorse every viewpoint shared. Please listen with care and take what resonates with you.
Meet Pam Baker: Founder of Widows Who Whine
00:01:16
Speaker
Welcome to today's episode. Today, I am chatting with Pam Baker. She is the founder and CEO of Widows Who Whine, and she is also the co-author of Where's the Key to the Safe?,
00:01:32
Speaker
which we will learn more about today. She has also two podcasts, one called The Lust Love Stories. And she also had another one with her husband, John, called Coffee, Cancer, and Cocktails. And today we'll be talking about her life, John's life, and just what led her now to be a co-author, a podcast host, and have your own foundation to help other widows. So welcome, Pam.
00:02:02
Speaker
oh Thank you so much for having me. It's such a pleasure. Thank you. I'm grateful that you are here. And so we're going to be diving in and chatting and getting to learn who you are. We already found out we have in common that we both, you live in in in Atlanta, in the Atlanta area, and and I used to live
Pam's Early Life and Meeting John
00:02:21
Speaker
there. So tell us about your upbringing and a little about your love story with John and how you ended up in Atlanta. Sure.
00:02:29
Speaker
Absolutely. So I grew up in Vermont in a tiny, tiny little town, 10 minutes from Canada in the New York corner and um didn't love the snow.
00:02:40
Speaker
So I went to college in Florida in St. Pete by the beach. And ah I was a freshman. My freshman year, I was working for campus activities as my little work study.
00:02:52
Speaker
and in walked this handsome guy one day. uh, I was like, who is that? And my boss who had graduated from the college too, it was like, oh, he's that's John Baker. He's a big volleyball guy. Like don't bother, blah, blah, blah. So of course that piqued my interest even more.
00:03:09
Speaker
And, um, yeah, we ended up, um, meeting a few weeks later and, um, started dating when I was 18 years old and he was 20. So went to, went to um stayed at college together. He graduated. He's from the DC area and he graduated, moved back.
00:03:26
Speaker
And we had a two year long distance relationship through college, which was challenging. and then i so I spent my summers in DC, um, in college after, after my first year. So had a lot of time there and ended up being his sister's roommate.
00:03:41
Speaker
in college after our first, our freshman year. So she's one of my best friends lives here 10 minutes from me. And, uh, yeah, so we, we dated for five and a half years in that time. He became a financial advisor and got offered the office to open the branch in Atlanta. That's how we ended up here. ok And that was the early nineties.
00:04:03
Speaker
And I came with him.
Family Challenges and Children's Health
00:04:05
Speaker
We ended up, we were dating for five, and a half years and then broke up for a year and a half because I wanted to get married and he was not ready. And I was like, okay, it's been, you got to figure it out.
00:04:20
Speaker
So I moved back to Vermont and we stayed broken up for a year and a half, but it was amicable. So we talked all the time, even though we dated other people and, you know, we're kind of going on. I, I moved around, moved to Charleston and ended up back in Athens.
00:04:33
Speaker
um Georgia. And yeah, then I was living with his sister again. She was getting her master's at UGA and um it was her birthday party. at John was seeing some very, very seriously at that point. He had brought her home for Thanksgiving and the whole thing. And my, my sister-in-law said, you know, my best friend at the time, she said, I want to have a birthday party. I want to invite my brother. Cause he and I actually weren't speaking at that moment. and And I was like, fine, you can invite him. But she's not coming. That girl's not coming.
00:05:01
Speaker
So he came without his girlfriend. That was in December. And then January, we went on our first date, got engaged in March and married in September. so So it was like, yeah, once you reconnected, that was, that was it. Now that must've been so interesting for your sister-in-law to have you as a roommate and for the girlfriend at that time, like it must've been very, yeah like, how is my,
00:05:29
Speaker
you know, boyfriend's sister, best friends with her ex, like, you know, roommates with her
Cystic Fibrosis Advocacy and Fundraising
00:05:36
Speaker
ex. Oh my gosh. ah Very challenging. Very challenging. Yeah. Well, you survived all that and you were married for 24 years and before he he passed. So tell us a little bit about your ah your home life, your children, and then his diagnosis, please. Okay.
00:05:55
Speaker
Yeah, sure. We... um We, so I was 26 when we got married. We had our first child when I was 28 and he was 30. Everything was great until Gavin was about six months old and he started having some medical issues.
00:06:09
Speaker
And two and a half years later, after many many many, many, many, many doctors, we found out that he had cystic fibrosis, which is a genetic disease that all affects all of your mucus producing cells. And at the time, um you know, I was 30, 32, like 30,
00:06:23
Speaker
thirty two like thirty um ga the life expectancy for someone with CF was 32 at the time. so and i And I was six months pregnant with my second child and it's a genetic disease.
00:06:35
Speaker
So I'm not super patient. So I immediately got an amniocentesis and found out that Jake would be born with CF as well. So I had my two for two kids that were going to have a very short life and a very complicated life. So that threw us into the whole world of cystic fibrosis. So John and I became really great partners in that world because we decided, to know, we're like, we know a lot of people, we can make an impact. And and we did, and and we just started fundraising and raising awareness and doing a lot. And um honestly, we became the number one fundraising team in Georgia our very first year.
00:07:09
Speaker
And, and we've remained one of the top fundraising teams in the whole country ah throughout the rest of the years, even, even now.
John's Glioblastoma Journey
00:07:17
Speaker
And so we both took on a lot of leadership roles. So we were a really great team in that, in that realm.
00:07:22
Speaker
Our third child, we always wanted three. um We did in vitro so they could, test the embryos and find out, you know, make sure that she, Sabrina wouldn't be born with CF. And then we had our fourth child who was, who is our bonus baker. I like to call him. So he was not, he was bacon in the oven. He was not planned.
00:07:42
Speaker
and but Oh God, he's my my greatest gift. And so he, he does not have cystic cystic fibrosis. So we, that was like our, our, um, you know, our, our thing that we did together, John was building his own practice at the time with financial planning. He went out, he moved here with that company, but then started building his own practice. And, um, yeah. And so life was good despite the challenging. Cause you were already,
00:08:06
Speaker
Cause you already basically were confronted with grief or anticipatory grief just from the diagnosis of both your children. So you had already been going through that together as a couple. Yes.
00:08:19
Speaker
with that and how you how you handled it was by creating a lot of awareness and fundraising. You were able to manage it that way. This is a lot. I did not know that about you in your bio. So this says a lot about how you are now, what you're doing now, because you already were carrying that torch years ago when you first became a parent.
00:08:43
Speaker
Yeah, I literally refer to that time as my training wheels for the cancer diagnosis, because when John was diagnosed, he's super he was always super healthy and ah and he had some headaches in October of 2018. And and um finally, after his clients said he didn't seem right, his friends and his family said, you need to go to the doctor. He didn't go to the doctor. But when a client said it, he went to the doctor one day after work and they found a tumor.
00:09:13
Speaker
And, uh, you know, that just turned our lives upside down. I always refer to like, when you get a cancer diagnosis, it's like learning ah a new language, but you're under a massive time crunch.
00:09:24
Speaker
He was given 12 to 14 months to live because it was glioblastoma, very aggressive and, He was 50 years old at the time and our youngest was nine and Gavin was 20. The oldest was 20.
00:09:38
Speaker
So ah we, because of the training wheels, we went to work.
John's Passing and Finding Beauty in Transition
00:09:43
Speaker
His sister that I mentioned, Jess, she's she's an academic and his other sister is also an academic. So they took on like research, clinical trials, all that stuff.
00:09:52
Speaker
My sister went to culinary school and loves all things, food and nutrition. She took on that part, like how to fuel his body in the best way. I, because of my stuff with ah cystic fibrosis, my boys, I knew early on that I wanted to attack the disease from all angles, not just Western medicine.
00:10:14
Speaker
So I was very much into working with naturopaths and Eastern medicine already. So I took that part on and incorporated that into our toolbox for John's health.
00:10:25
Speaker
He focused on his own self, you know, doing major workouts, eating keto, like doing all this stuff. So our whole family focus went to his health, of course. And, uh, but we had a great team and we all went, you know, to the appointments together and got, and I mean, I really attribute his, he, he lived very healthy two years.
00:10:46
Speaker
ah really very healthy two years, despite chemo, radiation, clinical trials, craniotomies, you know, he's doing all the things, but really healthy ah beyond what he was given. um And he, he ended up living for three years with, with glioblastoma. So ah it was a,
00:11:04
Speaker
ah A blessing in disguise. Yes, yeah. I know, yeah. I understand. It's the things that we, and and be it's it's hard to say it, but you can say it now in hindsight, right, of these blessings.
00:11:17
Speaker
I mean, even just, so you know, how I titled my podcast, sometimes it could seem like, what do you mean grief, gratitude? and they But there is an element of grateful, you know, being grateful in certain aspects of, know,
00:11:30
Speaker
of life amidst something that is so hard. and it really does kind of keep you anchored in those moments of hardship. For sure.
00:11:41
Speaker
For sure. And, um, you know, i I, I was telling you before we started that I listened to several of your episodes already and, uh, what one of your previous guests had said about the, the beauty and the gift of his passing. Uh, that resonated with me so much because he was home We were home. Everybody was with him. You know, the day that morning I woke up, I knew it was the day i knew it.
00:12:06
Speaker
And I called his mom and I called his family and I said, you need to come over. So he was surrounded and we, oh, we played his favorite music and it was so beautiful. And it's people like that, like the title of your podcast, people say that's so weird, but it was so beautiful. It was like watching a baby being born is such a beautiful, miraculous moment as was watching John's spirit leave.
00:12:31
Speaker
And it was, yeah, it was beautiful. Yeah. Because I relate a hundred percent. and That's how it was with my mom. The same. We were all around and the same. It was, it felt like one of the most spiritual experiences. yes Now this is not that to say that this is for everybody, right? Not everybody's Death is that way, but um but for us, the same. It felt that way. It's just what a yeah blessing. but A gift.
00:13:01
Speaker
It was a gift. you know Yes, to be witnessing that entrance into this other world. Yes.
Creating 'Widows Who Whine'
00:13:10
Speaker
um thank you for sharing that pam pam with with ah when once he got diagnosed at what point did you guys start doing the the little video clips that then you turned into now a podcast the coffee coffee cancer and cocktails um We decided um very early on.
00:13:31
Speaker
We're very enmeshed in our environment, in our community. John coached everything, so everybody knew him. um I was always involved in involvedd in the in the the team mom and all that stuff and with all of our fundraising.
00:13:43
Speaker
So... you know when some when rumors start flying about john's got this john's got that i decided that i was gonna kind of take control of the narrative and i did a facebook live for the first time ever and i was so nervous i was like shaking but i wanted people to hear the diagnosis see my face and hear my voice and not just read it and interpret it however they wanted so i did that and it had such a a good response that we were like well wait a second maybe we should do it like this throughout the journey instead of opening a caring bridge or doing something blogging about it, we just made that decision from day one to to do every update we did, pretty much all the updates. I started a a Facebook page called Coffee, Cancer and Cocktails and we Facebook Live to everything.
00:14:30
Speaker
And you know I did updates in between on there, but we had, oh my gosh, I wanna say there were 50 some odd videos um throughout the three years.
00:14:41
Speaker
ah You know, we didn't do him as much as the end. John wasn't as comfortable being on as he grew sicker. But um yeah it's just a ah really very raw, very transparent. Sometimes we were lapping, sometimes we were fighting, especially when he had steroids on board.
00:14:59
Speaker
Sometimes we were crying. um Sometimes we were celebrating. It just depended on what the news was that day and we shared it all and it was live stream. So there was no editing. There was nothing.
00:15:10
Speaker
And yeah, I just took all of those. I had them kind of sitting on a private channel on YouTube and then thought, you know, it's kind of our origin story for what I'm doing now. So I did just take all of those episodes and turn them into a contained podcast, did a wrap up, you know,
00:15:27
Speaker
where are we now kind of thing. And, and just did us like a standalone podcast as a place to hold the origin story. Yeah. Beautiful. And it, and it's just something that now you and the kids and future grandkids or whatever can now listen to his voice, see his videos like that is just a gift.
00:15:48
Speaker
It's what a gift, you know, that you're still able to connect in that, in that way to Absolutely. Yeah. Him as well. Boy, that's wonderful. Now, at what point did you decide to study it to start Widows Who Whine? Like in your journey, so you've gone through the grief, then you're like needing community.
00:16:10
Speaker
You created your own community. So share with us how that was. Well, after John died, i'm i'm a I grew up Catholic, um but i don't I don't subscribe to religion anymore.
00:16:24
Speaker
at this stage in my life. And I think that really started when the boys were diagnosed. I had a hard time justifying that in my mind. And then all the other stuff that bad stuff comes from a religion. I became very spiritual.
00:16:36
Speaker
And, um, when John died, i was looking for the grief support and I found that everything had such a heavy, heavy religious overtone.
00:16:47
Speaker
So I tried a bunch of different ones and they just didn't speak to me. So I was introduced to someone who's a life coach, but she's a certified grief recovery ah counselor. And i I hired her, I still work with her now, not for grief, but just for life.
00:17:00
Speaker
And ah I did my healing journey through her one-on-one. And that was a six months or so after John died, I started working with her. Well, I belong in Roswell, Georgia, you know, it's a big community and there's a, there's a Facebook page for Roswell moms
Activities and Community in Widowhood
00:17:18
Speaker
and it's huge 10,000 people.
00:17:20
Speaker
And so inevitably there's people posting about my, ah my mom, my dad just died. My mom needs this. My best friend's husband just died. My, you know, my sister. And every single time it was all those resources.
00:17:31
Speaker
And so I was like, Oh, this isn't for everybody. There's gotta be something else. So that's what got my brain spinning about how to create ah community for people that Didn't the that didn't resonate for them. the The church stuff didn't resonate as much. And a lot of people do both. It's which is totally fine.
00:17:49
Speaker
But so I want mind to have um not be a grief group, but be a social group. where people can, women can come together with shared experience and you don't have to have, I say all the masks of widowhood, the strong one, the you know the silent one, the every you know all the masks that come along with it, just be, just be who you are with people who get it.
00:18:10
Speaker
So I put it on my Facebook page and put it on that mom's page and said, I'm i'm opening my home. Anybody wanna come? Come on over and we'll drink a glass of wine together. And 14 women showed up the first night and that was February of 2023. And so we all just kind of together said, what do we want? What do you want this to look like?
00:18:29
Speaker
And we wanted it to be social. We wanted it to be joyful. We wanted it to be like a place to laugh and have sisterhood, you know? And so I decided I would organize one social thing a month.
00:18:40
Speaker
And so I did. axe throwing and candle making and wine tasting and all the different things. And, and it's just grown and grown to the point that now we have almost 400 women in just in our area, which is crazy.
00:18:56
Speaker
you know, 35 90 years old, and all these offshoots and all these offshoots to happened. I'm like, this is your group, ladies, whatever you want to look like. So we have book club, we have widows who dine, widows who golf, widows who ah poker, widows who mahjong, a coffee club.
00:19:14
Speaker
um Oh my gosh. Widows who trivia, widows who cornhole. I mean, there's all these, whatever. Amazing. I know. Amazing. so awesome. I love it because, and what you said, that it's not necessarily to talk about the grief, but the understanding of knowing that the people you're with have that shared experience. I heard this by...
00:19:36
Speaker
Esther, Estelle, oh my gosh, I'm going to forget her name. Esther Perel. Yes, thank you. Esther Perel and one of the podcasts, she was sharing how a lot of times when people have gone through something, they end up kind of gathering in communities. And there's this, for example, let's just say people that had gone through the Holocaust, yeah right? They come, they gather, they're together.
00:19:59
Speaker
And there's this, ah that it's not that you talk about it. But there's this knowing that you've had this shared experience. So therefore, every it's like it just it just changes how you interact because you already know the nuances behind this. And this can happen with any cultural thing. It happens, I think, often too when people move to a new world.
00:20:23
Speaker
country And you end up seeing like, why are all the people from, I'm from Colombia originally. Let's say, why are you hanging out with Colombia? Because there's these, like, I don't have to explain all my mannerisms or my the way I say things or anything. There's this known thing. Same with your community that you've created.
00:20:43
Speaker
And it's so um important to have that. So it's, this is incredible. And then within that umbrella, then you have all these other subgroups. It's so cool. I just sit back sometimes and I'm just like, it is like my proudest accomplishment. You know, my kids, of course, I'll say that. love for other kid But yeah, it is. i just like,
00:21:05
Speaker
I just see these transformations and what I've done a lot of work. I've worked with a branding company. I've worked, I've done all this stuff to really dial in on what I'm doing and what my purpose is. And in the, in, in, I've ahve discovered through that process that there are, so there are lots of resources. I won't say a lot, but there are resources for widows for surviving widowhood, but there are no resources for thriving.
Social Dynamics of Widowhood
00:21:30
Speaker
And so many of us, it doesn't matter how old you are. We're treated as though when your husband dies, it's also the end of your life, but we're all still living. We're all still in the middle of our lives. Many, many, many of us are still raising our children.
00:21:45
Speaker
So now we have all these different roles that we're trying to take on. And, you know, I always say your, your friends are great. They're really great, especially in the beginning. But they all move on and go back to living their lives. And when they include you, you're either hanging out with your single friends who are, you know, annoyed with men and talking talking bad about them.
00:22:06
Speaker
And then there's your couple friends and you're the third or the fifth wheel. So there's not, you're always sort of the outsider in these social settings. But when we're all together, we can talk about dating. We can talk about this. We can talk about, you know, ah you know the I always say the annoying head tilt that you get. How are you? like And how annoying that is. And you can, you can do all the things. Cause like you said, everybody gets it. Like you just get it.
00:22:34
Speaker
And I share this story all the time, but to me, it is like the biggest example of why this group is so important because at book club one night I was there and, um,
00:22:44
Speaker
This woman walked in and it was her first time coming to any Widows Who Wine event. And she walked in and literally started crying. And I went up to her and I was like, okay, talk to me. What's happening?
00:22:56
Speaker
What's going on? And she said, I've been a widow for 10 years and this is the first time I feel like I can breathe. And I was like, that to me, I mean, I share that story all the time, but because that to me was such a powerful moment, a light bulb moment to me that creating the space where you can just be,
00:23:15
Speaker
and and be understood and you don't have to wear all those masks and you don't have to explain or talk about it or if you wanna talk about it, you can't. you know it's just It's just like sacred space that you can just be.
00:23:27
Speaker
And there's so few places where you can just be. I love that. And and what what you just shared too, that part of itself, like not only community with people that understand, but the fact that you can do something social when a lot of times you do feel like the fifth wheel here or the, you know, or things like that happens a lot too with women that go through divorce or anything that they're kind of like, now what is my social life going to look like now because I you know like that I don't get invited to dinners now because so this way you create that social you always have your plus one in your case you're plus 399 other women yeah exactly we do that too we're like anybody want to go do this anybody want to watch this show i know it's awesome yes you always have someone that you're able to go that is fantastic
00:24:19
Speaker
Hi, I just wanted to take a quick pause and ask that if this episode is speaking to you, I'd love for you to subscribe to my newsletter. Just go to my website, Grief, Gratitude, and the Gray in Between, and you will be receiving some of my newsletters I send every probably couple of weeks.
00:24:41
Speaker
Also, if someone has popped into your mind and you feel that this is something that would resonate with, please send them this episode right now because it may just be what they needed to hear.
00:24:57
Speaker
Now let's get back to the show.
New Ventures: Podcast and Book
00:25:02
Speaker
Okay, so those are the stories then with how you started then ah Widows Who Podcast. Now tell us, podcast, did you just hear me say, Widows Who Wine? You do podcast too. So let's talk about your other podcast and then we'll we'll kind of navigate into the book. So talk tell us about your most recent podcast.
00:25:24
Speaker
Well, it's funny because listening to yours, it's kind of similar to yours actually. And I got the idea um soon after John died. And ah then it got backburnered because of all the widows who whine stuff. I just didn't have the the bandwidth, but I've since come back to it and it's called the lost love stories.
00:25:40
Speaker
And what I realized is being a widow or anybody, anybody who's lost someone, ah people become afraid to talk about them because they don't know how you're going to react or they don't know if you're going to start crying or it's going to upset you or whatever.
00:25:53
Speaker
So people just stop talking about them. And I'm like, that's so weird. And it's just a weird sensation. And so, Then that kind of was the idea, like a place to come and talk about your person, right? Your love story.
00:26:06
Speaker
Doesn't matter if it's your husband, your wife, your sister. your best friend, um whomever it is, a place to talk about them. What I also found is when someone dies, you're not allowed to talk any about any of the bad stuff anymore.
00:26:17
Speaker
Like the times that my husband bad drove me freaking crazy. Yeah, the part that we put people on pedestals, it's something that I also don't like. It's so weird. Yeah, it is. It's like there were a whole person. They were not just this, right? They're a whole person.
00:26:36
Speaker
Exactly. yeah Exactly. So it is, it's like glorifying or, you know, it's what's the other, it's like, you know, I like idolizing them into this idolizing, like, yeah, they're this things like a saint, like saint, yeah i like sanctify. But then you're missing the true person because none of us are that way.
00:26:56
Speaker
So, you know, I ah want, I want it the podcast to be a place where you talk about the things that drove you freaking crazy, but also the great times, your love story, like the the best things, but then how important it is to find your way back to joy and heal and learn to live with that grief. It doesn't go away. You just learn to to live with it in a healthy way so it doesn't destroy you. We've seen grief destroy plenty of people, right?
00:27:21
Speaker
And so how do you live with it in a healthy way and and find your way back to joy and find you know that that purpose, that passion, whatever it is. So it sort of takes people through that. And I only have a couple of episodes out. My very first episode, um, that was my real guest episode was with my son, my second son, Jake, who, um, he actually lost his best friend to a snowboard accident six months before his dad died.
00:27:47
Speaker
So two massively important people in his life in such a short period of time. And he was 20, yeah, 20, 19 at the time. so um He did a great job on the podcast. He did a really, he's my. He was so natural. heard part of that interview. He was just so natural. And I love seeing that little conversation between the two you. So that is, that is so nice.
00:28:11
Speaker
I would love to be a guest if you're ever new guest. I would love it. Yes, absolutely. I rarely end up like looking for myself to be guest in places, but I love when I'm a guest. I love being, it's very, it's terrifying to be on the other side. I love asking the questions. So it's usually terrifying to be a guest.
00:28:31
Speaker
and It's like, wait, yeah I don't know. What am I going answer if they ask this? ah Yeah, exactly. So i I feel you as you're here with me. And I try to make my podcast be very just conversational so that that way it doesn't feel like, oh, my gosh, what am I going to say the wrong thing? right And yours yours is that way, too. It's just very natural.
00:28:52
Speaker
yeah So I love that. Okay. Now you wrote a book, you co-wrote a book with your nephew. It's called, Where's the Key to the Safe? And share with us because it has a whole other, ah the other part of the title is ah ah a long one that says more. So but I can look or you can tell me because I'm like, as I'm opening here.
00:29:12
Speaker
Yes. Yeah. So it's called, Where's the Key to the Safe? And the the subtitle is how to avoid probate pitfall and maximize family finance. So that really gives you the idea of what the book is about.
00:29:24
Speaker
um My husband, as I said, was a financial advisor, had a really successful business. um He had brain cancer. We hoped that it would not end the way it did, but knew that it would very likely end that way. And we had three years to prepare for all of that.
00:29:39
Speaker
You know, our own CPA, our own lawyer, we had a team. And when he died, it's all the things you don't know until you know. Right. And so as we're going through the the business of death, I, I refer to it as, um, my nephew. I can call it the same.
00:29:55
Speaker
I call it the same. Yeah. Yeah. i'm like all this business that it really does not even allow you time to really grieve really in that first view. Cause you're just really doing all the business, the admin, all the admin stuff that goes in.
00:30:09
Speaker
Gosh. Yeah. yeah Okay. I'm trying to do it in a, in a fall. When you have a foggy brain. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Impossible. Impossible. So Cameron, my nephew was also a ah financial advisor. He worked for my husband and my husband was actually his father figure.
00:30:23
Speaker
So he went through the whole thing with me, the the business of death. And, and I started thinking, you can see how my brain works now.
Financial Planning and Preparedness
00:30:32
Speaker
I started thinking like, holy cow, if this is this hard for me, when I had time to plan, I had a financial advisor for a husband.
00:30:40
Speaker
i had a team of people. How does the regular everyday person whose husband or wife or anybody dies of a heart attack, like suddenly unexpectedly, and they don't have a whole team? How do they manage this at the worst possible time? Like I said, when you're in that, that grief fog, I don't have I have very few memories of the entire first year after my husband died, much less trying to make massively important financial decisions affecting your family.
00:31:05
Speaker
So that's what gave me the idea to write the book. So I started writing it. And then I was like, I don't really know anything about financial planning. I can talk.
00:31:17
Speaker
I can talk about it. I know. You come in now. I know. Exactly. i need to know how to do this. I'm sure he's laughing like, yeah, okay. Because every time you try to say, come on, we got to sit down. We got to do this. We got to do that. i'm like, no, that's your job. Nope, nope, nope.
00:31:33
Speaker
And the key, the the reason for the title is because I didn't even know where the key to our safe was. And I didn't know how to open it when I finally found the key. And he would always say to me, you got to figure out how to open this safe passports or whatever in there. I'm like, no, I don't.
00:31:47
Speaker
I have you. And Cameron and I were literally like YouTubing how to open this stupid safe. So that's why I called it. Where's the key to the safe? um And it literally, we we created a workbook to go along like chapter by chapter and it covers everything from everything. Like, do you have adequate insurance on your car, on your umbrella policy, on your life, on your health, on your everything, um, to business continuation plans, to celebration of life, to where do you keep the passwords, everything so that anybody you're financially tied to, you do all this work ahead of time, fill out the workbook. You can take the workbook to your estate planning lawyer and just be done. And it's the best gift you can give
00:32:30
Speaker
anybody you're financially tied to. So again, your parents, your siblings, your children, your spouse, anybody that you have financial, your business partner that you have a financial connection to, get all this stuff done ahead of time. So you're not left trying to figure it out at the worst possible time when really big, serious mistakes can be made. All right.
00:32:50
Speaker
Now you guys had already then planned certain things. What was one of these that was still, even with all the planning that gave you so much insight headache during the business of death time, you know?
00:33:03
Speaker
done Well, one of the craziest things that I still cannot believe, well, everybody thinks all you need is a will, which is not true. You need an estate plan. Doesn't matter how wealthy you are. People think only rich people have a estate plans, but everybody should an estate plan.
00:33:20
Speaker
um But we had a will and knowing my husband, I know somewhere out there in the world, there's an updated will because our will was so old that my child, my fourth child was not even included in the will.
00:33:34
Speaker
And so, you know, thankfully everything felt to me anyway, but I was like, how in the hell did we not think about that in the three years since he was diagnosed with brain cancer, like things like that.
00:33:48
Speaker
The other things that were really challenging were like credit cards because If I'm an authorized user, thankfully I had my own credit cards. Like we kept a lot of things very, like he had his own checking accounts. I had mine. We had some, come wait we had some combined.
00:34:04
Speaker
ah So I wasn't put in a circumstance where I had no money available to me, no liquid money. i have friends now in the widow world who they were their husband's credit cards and they were just an authorized user and they're shut down, no access to money.
00:34:18
Speaker
um Same with accounts. We had some of that with some of his credit cards. titles of our vehicles, you know, my car. He bought it for me. I was stay-at-home mom my whole life.
00:34:30
Speaker
He bought it for me, um but it was in his name. So when it came, you know, time to sell that car, ah I had to, it was just the extra work instead of being co-titled, you know, where I could just go do it. I had to go then bring the death certificate and do make everything just much, much more difficult instead of just having everything be, you know,
00:34:52
Speaker
co-owned instead of just a user or not on the title at all. So just things like that, that were just annoyances that were not necessary.
00:35:05
Speaker
Yes. No, no. And yeah. And the fact that that takes so much time away from you being able to then really fully even just be present in your group, be there for your kids because you're dealing with all these things in the book. Does it have it like a little bit like timeline, like what things you should like really have done, like by but order of importance kind of thing?
00:35:31
Speaker
Sort of. we We kind of did it like Cameron, Cameron does such a great job. So each, so hit Cameron. So his, his name is Cam. Um, we started every chapter, say it's insurance.
00:35:44
Speaker
it says Pam and I come in and give a little anecdotal story. I'm a storyteller. So I give the story and then Cam and he comes in and gives the professional opinion, the ah professional insight. But um he and he asked a lot of reflective questions and just to get you thinking about things.
00:35:59
Speaker
And ah but he's he's a great writer, too, in that it's not sterile and cold like typical finance books are. It's very conversational. And we really purposely did that so that people weren't i I read all those books after John died because I was determined. I was like, nobody's going to take advantage of me. I'm going to know what I'm doing.
00:36:19
Speaker
And they're so freaking boring that I was like, oh, I couldn't even stay focused. So we really wanted it to be warm and and easy to digest. So Cameron's advice being the the they person, the professional, he is like, take the chunks that you can manage right now.
00:36:36
Speaker
Like take the chunks and it it doesn't have to be done in order. So the book is not ordered in in order of importance, like read through and be like, today i can handle figuring out whether I have enough car insurance.
00:36:50
Speaker
Tomorrow, maybe I can figure out how, what it looks like to revamp my will. You know, just whatever works for you in that time, just be doing something toward completion.
00:37:02
Speaker
So that's the main thing. um Getting all your beneficiaries set up on your, ah you know, your 401ks and your... That's a big, a big one that people we do now, we do speaking engagements and workshops and seminars for people.
00:37:16
Speaker
And, uh, it, this one I hear all the time and people are shocked by it. Like if you, you mentioned getting d divorced, if you had your life insurance policy or your Roth or whatever, and your, and your, um, previous spouse was a beneficiary and you never changed it.
00:37:33
Speaker
Even if you get remarried and you die, that ex gets all the stuff that they're a beneficiary on. So it's like those things you don't think about because they're like money's going into that.
00:37:45
Speaker
yeah Yeah. So it's like all of those things that you go, Oh my God. Okay. You know, everyone's eyes go, what? When we mentioned that thing. So that's a big one. So yeah, it's just like taking you through each, each step to really get your, get everything in a good place and, you know, leave the best gift you can leave for the people you're leaving behind.
00:38:05
Speaker
Yeah, because it really, I keep, oh gosh, I'm going to have to get your book because my husband, I do this all the time. We're always on podcasts, all these, I know the frailty of life, you know, I know it. Yet there's a lot of things we're not prepared for financially
Importance of Estate Planning
00:38:23
Speaker
and stuff. I'm like, if something happens to need to leave clear so that we need to leave it clear so that things like probate, like things like probate. and Can you explain like, how does that work?
00:38:34
Speaker
What is is, it's like the state always ends up kind of holding things or not always. If you have a proper estate plan, it doesn't go to probate. And that's what you want to avoid because if anything goes to probate, it's public information.
00:38:51
Speaker
So anybody can find out all your business, including people that are kin that might say, oh I'll take a stake in that. You know, i'll I'll have some of that. And if you don't have it set up properly in your estate plan, they might have a right to come and get some of it.
00:39:06
Speaker
So it's all that, like having all of that spelled out. And I learned so much of that when I was doing reading for um especially for state estate plans. And I'm so glad I did because my lawyer, our lawyer that we had at the time that John had the relationship with, um he was a great, but ah he had a very standard way of doing things.
00:39:24
Speaker
So by reading and he was old school, you know? And, um, and so I just learned new things about my kids and like potential, my kids aren't married yet, but if they get married, what is that going to look like? What, how do you, how do you plan for all of these different scenarios? And, uh, you know, we have a, we have a lake house and and just really protecting the lake house so that if something happens to me, the kids aren't trying to figure out who's going to pay to fix the roof. And then you, the all these things that create division within the family that I've seen happen.
00:39:59
Speaker
Uh, you know, if somebody, one of your kids is making a lot more money than somebody else and they're paying, then they're suddenly the owners of the house, you know, I've set all that up. So that house is protected from anybody, anywhere,
00:40:11
Speaker
costs are covered. My kids will never fight over the lake house, you know, like those kinds of things that, that I just taught myself by reading. And so that stuff's all included in our book too. It's just things really, you don't, again, you don't know until you know, and because I've seen different situations happen with other people, it raised my awareness that, okay, this could happen to me.
00:40:31
Speaker
So we tried to put all of the stuff in there to really cover all the bases. That's wonderful. there's It's a great resource then for anybody that's listening to this, whether you've already gone through grief or not. you're that Like you said, this is for anybody else that you have any financial connection at all to make sure to be prepared.
Support Systems and Thriving After Loss
00:40:53
Speaker
Again, that that book is called Where's the Key to the Safe? And I'll make sure to link all the websites below here so that people can get that as well as Widows Who Wine, which right now is in the Roswell, de Atlanta, Georgia area.
00:41:09
Speaker
So people can check that out as well as your podcast. Pam, is there something I have not asked you that you want to share with the audience? um You know, I think that... ah I just went the other day to ah one of the women in our group. It was her one year anniversary of her husband's death. And and so she did a vigil for him and i went and I never knew him because i ah I've only known her since she became a widow.
00:41:37
Speaker
And ah so someone came up to me and asked me how I knew him. And I was like, I did i didn't. And I explained the situation and she was like, oh, and I said, how about you? And she said, oh, our sons grew up together and you know, all this. So we're taking care of her and we we're you know, taking care of him and, and we're just always there for him And I said, good, make sure it stays that way. Cause here's what happens.
00:42:00
Speaker
First year, you don't remember anything. Second year, you start feeling all the fields because you are more present and really feeling the absence. And I said, that's when the friend circle starts going back to their lives.
00:42:13
Speaker
So I said, remember that and and keep checking in on her. Keep checking in on her son because it gets very lonely in year two. And then you go into year three.
00:42:25
Speaker
It's like everybody's gone. And so, I mean, I didn't feel that myself specifically, cause I had created this group, but also because ah my sister actually moved in with me after my husband died.
00:42:38
Speaker
Um, she's been single cameras, mom, and she has a 17 year old daughter. So they moved in and we're, we co-parent where the, where the dos madres. And, um, and so that could be your other podcast. i know that grace yeah She wants to do a podcast on all the,
00:42:58
Speaker
not so fun dating world. Cause she, she's single too. She wants to just make fun of all the dating apps, which it would also be fun. um But ah so I think that's my number one, that's my number one thing. um Also, i mentioned that there are all these resources for, for surviving and not thriving. And, and I, I would say to anyone who knows ah someone who's lost their spouse,
00:43:24
Speaker
widows, especially support them in the thriving, you know, there's so much, i feel like there's a lot of judgment. Like if you start dating too soon or you start, you know, you're out laughing, you feel like you're going to get judged for laughing. I guess, you know, I remember I gained a lot of weight when John was sick and it happened to be COVID. It happened to me, I was going through menopause. I literally gained almost 40 pounds and I didn't want to start losing the weight after he died because I felt like people were going to judge me saying I was getting myself ready for the market.
00:43:54
Speaker
And and I was like, I don't want that judgment on me for that. So it took me a while to like, come back to taking care of myself. Um, because of that.
00:44:06
Speaker
And, and you hear that a lot, like, oh she's, I guess she's gone over him. She's ready to get out there, you know? So, uh, there's a lot
Balancing Grief and Joy
00:44:13
Speaker
of judgment. So I would say don't judge support the thriving stage because there's a lot of chapters left in her book and help her reach those, find the joy again, live her best life and and thrive.
00:44:27
Speaker
Get rid of the masks for her, get rid of the judgment from the general population and just support one another and, and, and everybody lift everybody up and and support to the thriving stage.
00:44:41
Speaker
that's fine I love that. Those are fabulous words. And that, for that goes for everybody to just as they're grieving, like just ah widows and anybody else. 1000%. Yeah. Just support them while they're thriving and, and celebrate that they're doing well, like as well. And their grief will not go away. Like you were saying, it's just, they are choosing, choosing joy in in certain parts of their life too. So, so that is awesome. Thank you, Pam, so much. you're welcome It was a joy getting to chat with you and getting to know you and getting to know a little bit of
00:45:18
Speaker
John through you too and the stories. So thank you once again. Again, this was Pam Baker. Make sure to check out her website. And again, the links will be in the show notes.
00:45:30
Speaker
Thank you again. Thank you so much. It was awesome. Thank you.
00:45:44
Speaker
thank you again so much for choosing to listen today. I hope that you can take away a few nuggets from today's episode that can bring you comfort in your times of grief.
00:45:58
Speaker
If so, it would mean so much to me if you would rate and comment on this episode. And if you feel inspired in some way to share it with someone who may need to hear this, please do so.
00:46:13
Speaker
Also, if you or someone you know has a story of grief and gratitude that should be shared so that others can be inspired as well, please reach out to me.
00:46:26
Speaker
And thanks once again for tuning in to Grief, Gratitude, and the Gray In Between podcast. Have a beautiful day.