Capturing Family Stories: A Legacy Conversation Between Liz Smith and Her Mother

Legacy interviews are offered to estate planning clients so that they can pass on their loved one’s stories whenever someone passes away. In today’s episode, host Liz Smith is joined in conversation with her own mother guided by the legacy interview questions. She shares her life experiences, how she wants her body handled when she does pass, who she’d like to take care of her cats, and more. This is a difficult conversation at times and contains explicit language and discussions of past illegal activities.

In interviewing her mother, Liz discovered new things not only about her mom’s past, but about her own. When family members are given the opportunity to share their stories and the stories of their loved one’s, everyone benefits. These stories will be cherished by those who remain after a loved one passes on as a way to celebrate and honor their life. Liz’s mother tells of her own childhood experiences with her parents and half-sister, along with memories of parenting Liz. She expresses her desires to be cremated and for her cats to be looked after. When asked about her role model or hero, she responds with one powerful word, ‘you’.

Even though this conversation was difficult for Liz to have, she is happy to have had it. This legacy conversation will be incredibly meaningful for Liz and her family members when her mother does pass away. Use the questions from the interview as a guide and have these types of conversations with your loved ones in order to help keep your family’s history alive.

Quotes

• “The reason I tell you I love you a lot is because I don't remember ever hearing either one of my parents tell me they love me ever.” (9:21-9:29 | Liz’s mom)
• “One day, my mother was right next door visiting Meg, her friend. And I walked in the kitchen and my father and my sister were kissing.” (13:50-13:58 | Liz’s mom)
• “I would imagine cremation would be easier, I just want you to please make sure I'm dead, dead, dead and not just dead.” (17:51-18:00 | Liz’s mom)
• “It was definitely hard for me at times, but I am very glad that I took the opportunity to do a legacy conversation with my mom. And I'm sure I will be even more glad later when she does pass away.” (24:05-24:16 | Liz)

Links:

For all of Liz Smith’s resources give her a like on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lizsmithlaw

Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm