Retirement Planning for Seniors and Caregivers: Social Security, Medicare, and Income Strategies with Jeff Panik - Episode 203

In this episode of the Caregiver Relief Podcast, host Diane Carbo sits down with Jeff Panik, a Certified Financial Planner (CFP) and author of Your Future Is Now: Your Blueprint for Solving Your Retirement Puzzle. With over 25 years of experience, Jeff cuts through the confusing financial jargon to give seniors and family caregivers a clear, practical roadmap for managing Social Security, Medicare, and retirement income.

Whether you are 5 to 10 years away from retirement, already retired, or caregiving for an aging loved one, this episode is packed with essential insights you cannot afford to miss!

📋 What You’ll Learn in This Episode

• The Financial Life Inventory: Why you need 6 to 12 months to properly organize your finances before retiring.
• Social Security Pitfalls: The costly mistakes couples make when claiming benefits too early.
• The Medicare Transition: Why Medicare isn't always better than private employer insurance, and what you need to know about "cost-sharing" platforms.
• Tackling Debt: How medical debt and unexpected student loans (like Parent PLUS loans) derail retirement security.
• Protecting Seniors from Fraud: Practical ways to shield yourself and your loved ones from highly sophisticated financial scams.

🔍 Key Takeaways & Episode Highlights

1. There is No "One-Size-Fits-Old" 🙅‍♂️

"Whatever you do, don't do what your neighbor, coworker, or family member does, because that gets you into more trouble than you can imagine." — Jeff Panik

Your retirement needs are entirely unique to your health, your goals, and your debt. Jeff emphasizes the power of finding an accountability partner (like a spouse or a trusted family member) to keep you on track as you gather your financial life inventory.

2. The Social Security Waiting Game ⏳

Taking Social Security at age 62 might be tempting, but unless you have an urgent health issue or a short life expectancy, delaying your benefits can significantly increase your long-term, cost-of-living-adjusted income. Crucially, taking it early can accidentally slash future survivor benefits for your spouse.

3. Medicare: Look Beyond a $0 Premium 🔍

Don't be fooled by flashy Medicare Advantage plans boasting "$0 copays." Jeff and Diane pull back the curtain on high deductibles, out-of-network costs, and hidden restrictions. If you travel frequently to visit grandkids, choosing the wrong plan could result in catastrophic out-of-pocket costs.

4. Beat the "Fraudsters" with a Second Pair of Eyes 🚫🕵️‍♂️

Elder financial abuse is skyrocketing, and sadly, the perpetrators are often people the senior knows. Jeff's number one rule to prevent scams? Never click the link. If an alert claims to be from your bank, don't use the phone number provided in the message—call your local branch directly or walk in to ask.

🎧 Listen to the Full Episode Now!

Ready to clear out the financial clutter and take control of your future? Click the player below to listen to Diane and Jeff's full conversation.

🔗 Connect with Our Guest

Want more educational resources or looking to connect with Jeff Panik?

• Website: jeffreypanik.com
• LinkedIn: Jeff Panik
• Firm: Balance Wealth Partners
• Book: Your Future Is Now: Your Blueprint for Solving Your Retirement Puzzle
• Search for Jeff's educational videos on YouTube to break down complex financial topics into plain English!

❤️ A Note to Our Caregivers: Family caregivers provide over $1.1 trillion of unpaid care. You are the most important part of the caregiving equation. Without you, it all falls apart. Please learn to be gentle with yourself and practice self-care every day—because you are worth it!

Podcast Episode Transcript

Diane: Welcome to the Caregiver Relief podcast, where we help caregivers and older adults navigate the complexities of aging, healthcare, and financial decision-making. I'm your host, Diane Carbo, a registered nurse and founder of Caregiver Relief. For many Americans approaching retirement, the process can feel like trying to solve a complicated puzzle.

Questions start piling up. When should you claim Social Security? How does Medicare work, and when should you enroll? How much money do you really need to retire comfortably? And how do you make sure you don't outlive your savings? The reality is that retirement planning today is far more complicated than it was for previous generations.

People are living longer, healthcare costs continue to rise, and traditional pension plans have become far less common. That means many people must take a more active role in planning their financial future.

Today's guest has dedicated his career to helping people do exactly that. Joining us today is Jeff Panik, certified financial planner and managing director, who has spent more than 25 years helping individuals and families navigate retirement planning. He is also author of the new book, Your Future Is Now: Your Blueprint for Solving Your Retirement Puzzle, which provides a clear framework for understanding retirement income, Social Security, Medicare decisions, budgeting, debt management and financial planning for retirement.

Today, Jeff is gonna walk us through some of the key decisions people face as they approach retirement, and share practical strategies to help you build a retirement plan that works for your life.

Diane: Jeff, thank you for agreeing to do this podcast. It's such a timely, topic because we are in a public health crisis, and with all the seniors coming, we're ill prepared.

And I know baby boomers haven't saved for their retirement.

Jeff: Thank you for having me. It's definitely a problem and, it becomes an issue of where do you even begin to start, if you're thinking about it. and usually what happens is you start looking at everything and you get all these different statements and you're trying to figure out what to do, and you just stop, because it just becomes overwhelming.

And I think that's one of the things that I always tell people, 25, 26 years ago when I started, everything, you would go to the library or you go to the bookstore and you try to get a book on it and try to figure it out. Now, with the internet, you can get, three and a half million hits on a financial topic, but it doesn't really do anything to help you, understand.

It doesn't understand what your circumstances are, which oftentimes are, very unique compared to your coworker or your neighbor.

Diane: So what inspired you to write Your Future Is Now: Your Blueprint for Solving Your Retirement Puzzle?

Jeff: Really, I think the main thing was to try to, with all, with the, my dealing with clients for the past 25 years and the confusion that I often see that they have, I view really retirement planning almost like a puzzle, or I would compare it to, moving.

You never realize how much stuff you have until you move. And the longer that you haven't moved, the more you have. That's really with retirement. you work 25, 30, in some cases 40 years, and you just have all these things, but you don't really know how they work together. And it's not really an issue while you're accumulating and putting money away, but it becomes a big issue if you don't really understand it when you start taking distributions and trying to manage it in retirement.

Diane: Yeah. I know you call it a puzzle, but why do so many people struggle to put the pieces together?

Jeff: I think, in all fairness, it's extremely confusing, and in some ways, I, we talk about Medicare or talk about these programs, it's like you start out where it's designed to be relatively simple, and it becomes an alphabet soup of, names, numbers, and other, other things that go along with it.

So I think, it's, it, the more as time has gone by, life expectancies have gone up, and what people accumulate, it used to be, i- in the 40s, 50s, you'd have Social Security, you'd have a pension, and maybe a little bit of savings. And, with the ch- the shift in the 70s and 80s from, pension plans to 401ks and y- you're on your own

It's become more and more important to for each person to understand what they have, especially as they approach retirement, i- in particular if they have debt, in terms of managing it.

Diane: Didn't the IRAs were supposed to be in conjunction with a pension plan at one time? Is that how they started out?

It was to help have extra income, not just the retirement from your busin- the company.

Jeff: Yes. Yeah, so the original, I think, intention was for that, but, what ended up happening over time with, companies, there are, with, they go through recessions and go through times where it's trying, and the pensions, they have to keep funding.

So what you're seeing, what you've seen really is a shift where you have, probably you had about 85 to 90% of, private workers that had pensions in the 50s and 60s to probably about 15 or 20% at most, and then with the public environment, the public workers, 90, 95% of those employees have pensions.

Really having the pension is really having a guaranteed source in addition to Social Security that, is predictable, and that's the thing about the 401ks and the IRAs and anything you put in investments. they're gonna go up and down, and more than likely do better over time, but when you get into a situation where you start taking money out, you really don't have time to make up for market losses.

Diane: Yeah. Now, many people nearing retirement, and we have a lot of boomers coming in the next few years, and we're gonna double the amount of retirees in the country, they still feel uncertain about whether they saved enough. What, where should someone begin if they want to build a realistic retirement plan?

Jeff: Yeah, so I think, people always say, what's my number?" "How much do I need?" what is the amount of, what is the amount of guaranteed income I need from Social Security pension sources versus, having more flexibility in income? And really it comes down to what your debt situation is, what your family circumstances are, and really it's a matter of, what I would call I call it the financial life inventory plan.

Really, you have to take inventory of your financial life. And if you can do that and not expect to do it over a weekend, but really take your time with it and do it, say, over 6 to 12 months, because it's gonna take a while to get all the documents, try to understand things and work through them, you can be very successful.

It's almost like a habit that you have to have, and you just can't wake up... The worst thing that can happen is you wake up one day, not just from the standpoint of your finances, but I also view it as, what you wanna do in retirement. For some people, they're gonna live longer in retirement than they did while they worked.

And so it's really important to understand what you wanna do. What are your goals? would you wanna volunteer? Do you wanna spend more time with family? Do you know you wanna do certain sports? And really, I suggest trying all those things out, minus spending time with the family, before you retire.

Diane: Good idea. One of the biggest decisions retirees face is when to take Social Security. What are some of the common mistakes people make when claiming their benefits?

Jeff: Yeah, so I think some of the times, some of, one of the biggest mistakes I see, especially with couples, is the fact that, by taking it early, they sometimes, forget that they're also, if it's a spouse that wasn't, didn't really have a big earnings history, they're really cutting back on what the spouse earns, as well as a survivor benefit.

The other thing would be if some people take it, say, "I'm gonna take it while I can get it," the reality is if you're working, you can only make so much before it goes away, in your working years. And so it's really important to understand, some people don't have a choice either because they ha- they have health issues or they have to take the income.

And that's really I think, the two categories where you have to because you don't have a choice or you have really a really short life expectancy. those are cases for taking it early that anyone else really needs to think twice. Especially I always tell people, if you have one parent that's alive still and you're almost to the point of, 62 or 63, you probably want to think twice about it because, you're liable to live another 10 or 15 years longer than they did.

I think the benefit of Social Security, the longer that you wait, the higher your benefit and, it's also cost of living adjusted, which means it goes up a little bit every year. But if you wait, it's going to go up on a higher number, so that's going to be more income for you down the road and your family.

Diane: Yeah, and when they make that cost of living go up, they also add more to the the Part B

Jeff: Yeah, Medicare Part B benefit.

Diane: Yes. And so it-

Jeff: Yeah

Diane: Negates that

Jeff: Right

Diane: Unless you've waited a long time and may get a little bit more.

Jeff: Yes, exactly.

Diane: So everybody gets excited, "Oh, I got a raise." And then you go, "Oh, no I didn't."

Jeff: No. And it's really, what you want to do is really take an inventory of your assets and really to try to understand where the best point or best place to take the money is from. And, I would argue with IRAs, you have to start taking those at 73 or 75 based upon your age, whether you want to or not.

There's a case to start taking those when you retire, maybe delaying the Social Security at least to full retirement age and, and spreading that out over time so you don't get a big tax surprise, when you you're 73, 74 and you have to start taking the money.

Diane: Jeff, your book explains that Medicare decisions are not always as simple as enrolling at age 65.

What are some things people should understand about Medicare timing?

Jeff: Yeah, so I think the first thing would be that you want to understand that, Medicare is usually not as good as your private employer benefit, if you have one. So that would be the first thing. it's one thing if you're, on the exchange because you retired early and you're just sitting there waiting to get to 65.

But for a lot of people, if they're still working through their employer, and they plan to work past 65, it's a good idea to compare the two. But typically it's going to be one where the, there's a fair amount of cost savings with the group plan if it's a large plan, versus going on Medicare.

And so you want to make sure you understand what the costs are. You want to understand that your plan covers, I always go back to, prescriptions, things that you don't always think of. But you want to make sure that do- it does it on the front end because, you have the special enrollment period where you can go in and choose what you choose- But if you have a health issue after that period, in most cases you have to be underwritten, minus moving and there's a few other exceptions.

And you just wanna make sure whatever plan you pick, you know what you're gonna be paying. And it's just not, there's Medicare Advantage plans with zero copays, zero premiums, that kind of thing, but what is the deductible? What's the out of network? What are these things? the other thing I see is if you travel a lot, if you have grandchildren and places you wanna go see, you wanna make sure there's reasonable coverage there because you don't wanna get in a situation where you're out of the state or out of the country and you end up finding out that you have no coverage, and you have to end up paying out of pocket.

It can be catastrophic.

Diane: I have a book, Medicare Advantage: Buyer Beware, and I want my listeners to know Medicare is moving to a cost sharing platform, and Medicare Advantage right now, and I took an insurance course and this is what they told us, that the government policy makers have created high deductibles and high copays to deter use of benefits.

And I know with managed care they are rationing our care. I also know that traditional Medicare, they are also trying to ration our care. And I've, I have this experience with, I have chronic pain. I go to my pain management doc. I, always go for, treatments because I can't take medications, and p- the interventional pain management treatments that, we have are meant to deter the use of drugs, pain pills, or to alleviate them altogether.

And now the very procedures that help me relieve my pain are being denied and rationed once or twice a year. And it's so frustrating because, ... And that is the, our government expects us to pay out of pocket for any recommended care or treatment that you, want that is being recommended and it's not covered by insurance.

So that's where we're moving. now when many people enter retirement with debt, how does debt impact retirement security?

Jeff: Yeah, so it creates a lot of problems because, you have to account for the debt and the interest, and you don't have the income that you had while you were working to really, focus on it.

And so in a lot of cases, whether it's, you, you mentioned, medical debt's a big piece of what people carrying. It's also even student loans. People have Parent-

Diane: Yeah

Jeff: Plus loans that they bring into retirement with them.

Diane: Yeah.

Jeff: Ideally you want to try to get that debt down as much as possible.

And if possible, have none. But if you have some debt, you wanna understand what the rates are and have a plan really to work through that in the earlier portion of retirement, and so that you're not having to come up with that payment every month. Because, if you have a lot in 401s or pre-tax assets like IRAs and 401s, I always say it's if you need to get 5,000, you probably need to get 6,500 or 7,000 for the taxes.

It's, it becomes, by the time you take the taxes out plus the interest cost on the debt, it can make it hard when you factor what the grocery prices and inflation are on top of it. you wanna look eyes wide open. And I always tell people, you wanna really look at a couple different case scenarios.

You wanna say what's the best case, the worst case, and what the, what the really average expectation would be, and you wanna manage it accordingly. and you'll probably end up somewhere in the middle, but you always wanna look at, what's the worst-case scenario before you jump into retirement.

Diane: I was shocked about the student loans. But you know what? I worked with... I know a lot of medical professionals. And there's doctors in their 60s and 70s still paying off their student loans, and that shocks me. But it only shock... it makes sense now because every year since we've started with managed care, doctors make less and less money, and they have to hire more and more staff.

Right now we have doctors making less money now than they did 20 years ago. So I understand they have all this debt, and they're being told, actually the government is our doctor now for Medicare and Medicaid. and they just tell the doctors what they can and cannot do.

That's why we have a shortage of doctors and specialists in this country. But you talk about budgeting, and that doesn't sound exciting at all. No. I've always budged it. But you emphasize that it's essential for retirement success. Why is creating a retirement budget so important?

Jeff: I think the two biggest times really for, are for people starting out, where they're starting out in the workforce and then people that are retiring really to put a budget together. In between, people come up with a way that they do things, and they work through it. But really, you're going from people having income when they're starting out, where they're trying to figure out where to put it, to taking income to live off of.

And so it's really important to go through your expenses, understand where all the money is going, and then work through any savings, and then come back out to make decisions about where best to pull the money that you have to take. And, and to be realistic about, I mentioned inflation before, what that may look like in 10, 15 or 20 years.

And I, in the books I always say it's, it's a good idea to try out multiple budgeting methods because you could have two people, you could have 10 people, and they have completely different ways of doing it. The main thing is to find something that you can stick with and it develops into a habit, and so you can stick with it over time.

And I think if you can do that, you have a good understanding of where best to pull the money from, what the tax consequences are, and in the end, how you can end up, you and your family, with the most money at the end of the day.

Diane: Jeff, one of your chapters in your book talks about identifying income sources in retirement.

What are the most common income streams retirees rely on?

Jeff: Yeah, I think the biggest one is Social Security. it's the one that most people rely on. Unfortunately, a lot of people rely on it too much, and they think it's gonna cover more than what it covers.

Diane: Yeah.

Jeff: The other thing that I see with Social Security, people don't realize that the Medicare, you mentioned before, the Part B premium comes out of it.

Diane: Yeah.

Jeff: It's like where did this money go? And then you factor taxes if your income is above a certain amount on Social Security. that is the primary really driver. And then really when you get into that, it really gets down to ma- you know, mainly 401, IRA assets, and then, some people have pensions.

And then you can get into certain business interests and rental properties and that kind of thing, But Social Security by far, that is pretty much a check the box with having, but that really doesn't get you where you need to be if you wanna have a, I would say a good retirement in terms of doing what you want.

Diane: Now, healthcare expenses can significantly affect retirement finances. How do people prepare for those costs?

Jeff: So I think it's first is understanding, what's, The couple things. Before you retire, you should always, if you're, if you have a good, if you through, have a group plan and you have a good dental plan, vision plan, a lot of, anything that needs to be done, a lot of it can be done through, your employer's plans, where you typically can save more than if you're just out there trying to figure out, especially with dental I see a lot, where people wait till after retirement to get dental procedures.

Some of it at least would be covered through the group plan, but they end up having to pay a tremendous amount out of pocket. And so really, what you wanna try to do is really focus on, taking care of things and taking it, and really, making a list and working through it as best you can, and really not being in a situation where you're reactive.

Because, in a lot of cases people just don't get around to planning, and then they have either a health issue or they have, an employer where the employer says,we don't- we're gonna retire. we don't really need your position anymore." And then they're forced to make some decisions very quickly, and that's usually when you make decisions without very much thought, that's usually where you have mistakes that occur.

Diane: Now, for someone who is about 5 to 10 years away from retirement, what steps should they start taking right now?

Jeff: I think for anyone really, I think it's a good idea to see what you have, especially, usually that group you would see where, their last child typically is out of college, they're gonna be independent.

So they're gonna typically have a little bit more money because they're not giving it to the kids anymore for college and for expenses. And so really the question becomes you have a certain window of opportunity where you can put more money away. Where's the best place to put it? And really what you wanna do is you wanna weigh paying down the debt versus savings, and really to try to optimize to try to get the best outcome when you do decide to retire.

Diane: If listeners take one message, just one message from your book about retirement planning, what would you want it to be?

Jeff: I think the biggest thing is that it's not one size fits all, and whatever you don't, whatever you don't do what your neighbor, coworker, or family member does, because that gets you into more trouble than you can imagine.

And really, if you can't do it all yourself, it's not a bad thing to really have someone, a, an advisor, someone to try to help you through the process, and just make sure they always have your best interest in mind. And at the same time, I bring up in the books, a good thing is if you can have an accountability partner, whether it's a spouse or whether it's someone else that will help you or work with you to try to get you where you need to be as it relates to, if you say, "I'm gonna put together all my statements over the next month," there needs to be someone that's sitting there holding your f- foot to the fire, if you will, to do that.

Diane: Jeff, we have a lot of solo agers or, childless couples- ... more so than we ever have before. And also are in a situation where we don't have enough youth to provide care for our elderly, so we really are in a pickle as far as, how people are going to afford and pay for care. My question is how

I'm seeing seniors right now that are being taken advantage of. they have scams that are hitting them. How can you give us any guidance in how they can protect themselves?

Jeff: It's, even ... I've had clients that are very sophisticated that have had issues with fraud, and it's it can get anyone. It could get anyone in their 20s, 30s, 40s. the ... unfortunately, the fraudsters have become very good at, making you believe something that looks completely legitimate that isn't. And it's easy to go down what I call, a rabbit hole where, once you start going down the road, it's almost like you can't stop, and they just get you and they take advantage.

And unfortunately, that's becoming more and more of an issue. and you really, it's important, really, a- and this gets into communication, which is the other thing. I think, in life and relationships, communication is the most, one of the most important things, and that's especially true as it relates to family.

And, if you can have open communication with your family, or ... a- and it doesn't have to be ... If you don't have children, your nieces, nephews, someone that I would call, your the trusted contact or the trusted person, you can have them help you along the way. And I would say a second pair of eyes is always good.

If you get something that doesn't make sense and you're not sure about it, whether or not to click or not, don't click, and then maybe ask- a friend or your accountability partner or a family member. Or simply, I use the example, rather than clicking on something that may say it's from the bank, you can call the branch and find out or go into the branch and they'll tell you, rather than calling a number that may be legitimate or maybe not.

Diane: I'm also seeing a lot of, situations where seniors are, paying for care, but someone in the family, maybe their accountability partner, is taking their cash. do you have any suggestions? What I want to know is you're not a fiduciary, right? So you don't pay bills. You don't-

Jeff: No. we are a fiduci- I'm a fiduciary.

Okay. But I'm not ... I don't do bookkeeping or accounting. That would be ... And so that's something I always tell people. If you find someone to do that, you want to make sure you really extensively view their credentials Because they're handling all of your affairs. And as you mentioned, unfortunately, family, typically family, whether it's, the two biggest, victims of identity theft are children and seniors.

And and typically the, the, criminal is gonna be someone that they know, which is just it's terrible, but that's what the reality is. And, a lot of the crimes with seniors, they just don't go reported because the seniors, they just don't want, it's it embarrassing

Diane: Exactly.

Exactly ... it's embarrassing. Yeah.

Jeff: And they just don't wanna relive it. The numbers aren't even probably what the numbers are because they're not being a lot of them aren't, a lot of the cases aren't even being reported.

Diane: I just worry, I worry for my seniors that they worked so hard to get to where they are, and they think they're going to have this nice comfortable life, and then somebody snatches it, and I, away from them. and that's hard. But the key here is you just have to, actually start I encouraged my sons when they turned 18, open up a retirement account, and we did for them.

And now they're, my only son now, I had, I lost one, but, my youngest son, y- he's in his late 40s now.

I had him when I was 26, and he, he's, he always has received for retirement. And I think we have to as a culture really encourage saving because the government's not gonna take care of us. What if Social Security goes away? And they keep saying it's going to. I don't know. But, you have to worry about taking care of yourselves and financially, protecting yourselves for your future.

Jeff: Yeah, and it's like anything else. the earlier that you can develop that into a habit, and I even say with, with people that have grandchildren, rather than just giving them money, maybe make them do chores or make them do things for it.

Diane: Yes.

Jeff: And if, and in some cases I have some people that will have, they'll match.

So if a grandson, granddaughter, they work over the summer and they get income, they'll match the income, but they'll match it only if they put it in a Roth IRA, as an example.

Diane: Yes. Yeah.

Jeff: And then that's for the long term. Yes. And, compounding is wonderful when you start out early.

It's the opposite when you wait too long because it, you don't have any benefit of interest, earning interest on interest. And,unfortunately for people that are withdrawing, it's the opposite, where they're drawing their assets down. And so every dollar that they can save or put to the side

Because, that's the challenge with retirement planning. No one knows really how, no one knows how long they're gonna live.

Diane: Yeah.

Jeff: And they don't know what type of care they're gonna need. And so really, I view it as not just planning for retirement just financially, but also from a health perspective.

If you didn't exercise and you didn't do, go to the health checks and do those things, it's definitely a good idea to do that as you approach retirement to work through anything that could get you later as it relates to a chronic illness or something that could've been, managed earlier on.

Diane: Exactly. Exactly. 'cause we are aging. We're living longer, but we're not living healthier in many ways. and that's a big issue. Jeff, I wanna thank you for your time and sharing your information. I know there's so many out there that are gonna be ill prepared or I just recently had a girlfriend who says, "I just turned 65.

Do I retire? Do I not retire? Do I sell my house now? What do I do?" And she, and the financial planner sat down with her and helped her. And she made some wise decisions, She's gonna work a little longer and, 'cause right now I see so many seniors working everywhere. It's just a fact of life nowadays.

But, how do people find you?

Jeff: Sure. you could go to my, you could go, if you Google me, my last name's Panik, so it's P-A-N-I-K, so it's pretty easy. jeffreypanik.com. I also have a website for my business, Balance Wealth Partners, and I have YouTube videos which are, you can go on, but they're more ed- everything's meant to be educational

Diane: Yes

Jeff: on topics, whether it's, we talk about Medicare, Social Security, all these different things that are confusing. I try to at least explain things at least a little bit. And, unfortunately, the industry that I am in, the financial services, has done a pretty bad job in terms of the financial jargon, which doesn't make it easier for people to understand things.

And so it's almost I try to make it so that it's almost if you can try to at least understand the basic points, you're gonna be a lot further ahead than if you're just sitting there, they're just bouncing, pinging you with things that you can't even try to figure out.

Diane: Between the medical jargon and the financial jargon and the legalese of power of attorney and stuff, it's overwhelming to anybody. it really is, 'cause you're unprepared, you don't know. And, we have a situation right now where the family caregivers are being expected to do more, to actually provide care once provided by healthcare professionals.

So there's a whole avenue there of, financial strain because the family caregiver provides $1.1 trillion of unpaid care.

We... That's a challenge as well. thank you so much for your time, Jeff. I, will include your website, your, information on a permanent page on my Caregiver Relief.

And I don't know if you sent me a video, but if you didn't, I'm gonna get on your YouTube channel and include a video on that page as well.

Jeff: Perfect.

Diane: 'Cause it just helps people get started to understand and reach out to you.

Jeff: Yes. No, I appreciate it, and I appreciate the opportunity to talk to your audience today.

Diane: Yeah. To my family caregivers out there, you are the most important part of the caregiving equation. Without you, it all falls apart. So please learn to be gentle with yourself. Practice self-care every day because you are worth it.