Minimizing End of Life Regrets

By Chris Daunhauer

I drove up into western South Carolina last month to get in a little hiking, to eat at the Beacon, and to spent a few days visiting with my TrustWell clients who live in that area.

They were a very enjoyable few days – light on portfolio performance numbers, charts and graphs but heavy on laughs and good conversation over meals and coffee. (I always have portfolio performance reports with me when I meet with clients, but I find they often want to talk about non-investment-related topics when we’re together.)

After a few days visiting with clients, I drove east into North Carolina for an overnight stop at the home of a dear friend in Raleigh who lost his wife (also a dear friend of mine) to cancer about six months ago.  My friend Jim is a single parent now, and a confirmed member of the sandwich generation – he has a high-schooler still living at home and he’s also the primary caregiver for his elderly parents.

It was very late when I arrived at Jim’s house and I needed some sleep.  But the next morning he cooked me a heart-healthy breakfast (somewhat out of character for him) and after eating it we retired to rockers on his back porch where we spent the rest of the morning drinking coffee and catching up.

I noticed that Jim had dropped a lot of weight since I saw him at his wife’s funeral and that rapid weight loss worried me.  I asked him about it.  I wondered aloud if stress or alcohol might be the cause.

“Thanks for being curious” he said.  “I know what you are doing, and I really appreciate it.  The answer is neither.  I’ve lost weight because I’ve made some big changes and gotten serious about my health.  I have a primary care doctor now, for the first time in many years.  I’ve completely stopped drinking, I got my first ever colonoscopy, and I’ve had some blood work done.  My doctor found some treatable issues, and I have changed my diet and started exercising in response to those findings.

“So, no more brown water and no more eggs?”  I asked playfully.

“No brown water, and no egg yolks” he replied.  “Egg whites are OK still.”

Jim told me he battles loneliness on some days.  “The sadness comes and goes.” he said.  “And it often surprises me.”  He’s thankful that his wife is no longer suffering, but he misses her help with important decisions and her encouragement during hard times. 

“We were married for many years, and I have a lot of regrets.  We wasted a lot of that time being at odds with each other.  The last year of her life was our best year as a team,” he said. “Cancer sucks, but I feel like we faced it together.  Caring for her as she got weaker and weaker was the hardest thing I’ve ever done.  And I think I did it well.”

Jim told me that he is increasingly feeling his age (he’s only 60, I noted) and that he’s not certain what’s next for him.  A couple of weeks before my visit he decided to take an early retirement.  He did so to reserve time and energy to care for his elderly parents and to focus on getting his son successfully launched.  In retiring early, Jim has permanently lowered his lifestyle expectations because he’s leaving behind a great pay and benefits package, one that included an inflation-adjusted government pension.  I sensed uncertainty, but not regret.  Jim told me he’s more aware of what’s important, not just on what pays well, or on what the other men his age are doing.  He told me his priorities have changed and he wants to focus on making every day count.

“I’ve seen the elephant” he said.

I very much enjoyed my time with Jim and that morning’s hours passed quickly.  I told him I admire how well he cared for his wife in the last year of her life and how encouraging it was to me to talk with him.

In the early afternoon, after some hugs and tears and some mutual promises to get together again “real soon”, I drove away from his house and made my way over to i-95 to begin heading south to Jacksonville.  I spent a lot of that drive time thinking about our back porch conversation.  And about the big changes I saw my friend making. 

And I contemplated something my dad used to call “the brevity of life” and about how the activities and focus of my recently widowed friend have become very different from mine.

Jim’s thinking differently now.  And he’s acting differently.  His success criteria have really changed.  “What does Jim know that I don’t?” I pondered.

Since I’ve been home, I’ve been seeking out books and videos on that question.  What are the most common regrets of people nearing the end of their lives?  From my research so far….here are the most common answers…

• I wish I had spent more time with the people I love. And made spirituality more of a priority.
• I wish I hadn’t spent so much time working. I wish I had accumulated more adventures and fewer things.
• I wish I had discovered my purpose sooner. And learned to express my feelings more.
• I wish I hadn’t spent so much time worrying. Most of what I worried about never happened.  I wish I had taken more risks.
• I wish I had cared less about what other people thought. And spoken my mind more.
• I wish I had been a better spouse and a better parent. I wish I had stayed in touch with old friends.
• I wish I had chosen a different career. And spent more time on things I really enjoyed doing.
• I wish I had taken better care of myself. And pursued more of my early dreams.
• I wish I had focused less on money and things, and more on people.

Americans have a real talent for putting painful episodes behind us and moving on to what’s next.  It’s one of the secrets of our national success.  We Americans also have a bad habit of putting painful episodes behind us and just moving on to what’s next.  But as individuals, each of us will one day run out of time to move on.  We’ll be forced to evaluate our lives with no chance to change our ways.

That sobering thought came from a book called Taking Stock by Dr. Jordan Grumet.  I’d read his book a few years ago when it was published, but I had not thought of it again until prompted by my visit with Jim.  Its author is a hospice care physician who’s had hundreds of earnest conversations with people facing the end of their lives.  What he has learned from those conversations is sobering.  And (if we act on his advice to the reader) it can be transformative.

Grumet writes:

There is very little that is enviable about receiving a terminal diagnosis. For many, it is the worst moment in their lives. I have had this conversation over and over again in some of the most agonizing circumstances. Yet, after the initial shock dies down, a much deeper, richer period of self-evaluation and introspection often ensues. We call this process life review.

Life review is a holistic and structured process of evaluating one’s past and present, including events and memories, in an attempt to find meaning in and achieve resolution of one’s life. Often what happens is that a hospice caregiver or chaplain will sit down with a person and ask them to look back at their life.

Dr. Grumet’s book argues that a “life review” can be done any time.  Multiple times over a person’s remaining years, in fact.  With no need for a hospice caregiver or chaplain.  He pleads that we not wait even one day longer (regardless of our age or health) to do our own life review — to examine how we are spending our time and our money, to compare those choices with our core values, and to make changes to reduce end-of-life regrets.

A verse from the Christian Bible comes to mind in this context.  (It’s another thing my dad used to tell me that I was not ready to hear.)  The verse is from Psalms 90 verse 12.  It’s a prayer, really, and it says “Teach us to number our days, Lord, so that we may have a heart of wisdom.”  I’m going to re-read Dr. Grumet’s book this summer.  I’m going to do a life review, and I’m going to act on what I find.