Articles Posted in Life/Death/Law Podcast

In this episode of Life/Death/Law, join me for a conversation with Dr. Shoshana Ungerleider, a physician, speaker, writer, activist, and the force behind two amazing movies about end of life: Extremis and End Game, both available on Netflix (so watch them!).

Dr. Ungerleider also (when not producing movies and making social change) works as an internist practicing hospital medicine at California Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco. She received her medical degree from Oregon Health & Science University in Portland, OR and completed residency at California Pacific Medical Center where she is now on the teaching faculty and serves on the Executive Board of the Foundation Board of Trustees.

Extremis, which is about end of life decision making in the ICU at Oakland’s Highland Hospital, won best Documentary Short at the Tribeca Film Festival in 2017, and was nominated for an Academy Award and two Emmies. End Game recently premiered at Sundance, and is about palliative care and end of life planning in the face of terminal illness, and was filmed at UCSF and Zen Hospice, in San Francisco. Both movies are heartfelt, engaging, honest and important. They show, without preaching, how important it is for your loved ones to know what you do and don’t want at end of life and how palliative care and hospice can add quality to that time.

In this episode of Life/Death/Law, Einat Sandman Clarke, Senior Counsel at Google LLC provides an inside look at how Google handles requests for digital assets (like emails, photos, and videos) after someone has died and discusses the broader legal landscape that governs all service providers facing requests to release digital communications belonging to their users.

Learn how to use Google’s Inactive Account Manger to control access to your digital assets (like email,  videos, images, and documents) and why service providers (like Google, Apple, facebook, and Yahoo) can’t give anyone access to your stored electronic communications without your consent, or a court order.

If you’ve ever worried about what will happen to your digital life after you die (and who hasn’t), please listen.

What is estate planning, really? I know that most lawyers focus on reducing taxes, or the creation of documents, but when you get down to it, what you’re really doing when you make an estate plan is giving everything away, right?

So, to me, understanding the practice of generosity and what gets in the way of being generous are central to effective estate planning, and who better to explore that territory than my guest for episode 3 of Life/Death/Law: Myoshin Kelley, an eloquent teacher on the key Buddhist teachings on the wisdom of opening the heart. Myoshin is a Senior Instructor with the Tergar Community, which supports the worldwide vision of Tibetan master meditation teacher and author Mingyur Rinpoche, tergar.org, and it is an honor to have her on the podcast.

If you’ve ever been curious about the practice of generosity or the value of it, or found yourself wanting to be generous but somehow holding yourself back, and wondered what was getting in your way, please listen.

In this episode, I’m taking a look at a difficult moment — you visit your parents and realize that your parents just seem…. a little bit different, just not the same as they used to be–more forgetful, more agitated, or suddenly involved with people that you don’t know or trust.

Join me for a candid discussion with Dr. Elizabeth Landsverk, a board-certified physician in Internal medicine, Geriatric medicine, and Palliative care medicine. She’s also the founder of ElderConsult Geriatric Medicine, a practice that offers house-call based medicine to seniors and their families.

Elizabeth offers practical help for those dealing with dementia: how to know if it’s time to take a loved one to be evaluated; what kind of cognitive and behavioral symptoms to worry about (or not to worry about); how to find the right doctor; avoid the wrong medications and offer a loved one with dementia the best possible quality of life. Join us!

In this first episode Emily Bouchard, a family dynamics and money coach and the managing partner at Wealth Legacy Group, talks to me about money and the difficulties that families often have in engaging in honest conversations about it. Emily offers  fascinating insights into why money can be such a hard thing to talk about, and tips for helping to get these conversations started. I asked her to be on my show because, so often, a long, uncomfortable silence falls across the room when my clients begin to sort out who owns what in a marriage, or how parents want their children to treat an inheritance.  As Emily points out, avoiding open and honest communications about money (like avoiding the same kinds of conversations about death and illness) means a missed opportunity for learning about ourselves, our families, and our most closely held values and hopes. I hope you enjoy it.

To read more: Emily is the co-author, with Emily Chase Smith, of Beginner’s Guide to Purposeful Prenups and the author of Estate Planning for the Blended Family.