A lot of things have to be addressed and dealt with after a loved one’s passing, especially on the financial side. How can you handle life after death in the smoothest way possible? I sit down with Pam Baker, who talks about her book “Where’s the Key to the Safe?” She discusses how she handled the finances of her late husband while dealing with the grief of losing her most beloved person in the world. Pam also shares how her widowhood journey inspired her to create Widows Who Wine™, a community centered on supporting and uplifting each other by celebrating their interests and passions.

I am sharing my experience of loving the same man for 32 years, a mother to two adult children, a retired military officer, a breast cancer survivor, and my connections with others. 

Anyone experiencing suicidal thoughts should reach out to a suicide hotline or local emergency number in their country: Psychology Today Suicide Hotlines and Prevention Resources Around the World.

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Securing Life After Death With Pam Baker

Our guest Pam Baker is going to talk to us about some essential information that she learned after the passing of her husband John. The book that we’re going to cover Where’s the Key to the Safe? She didn’t know where the keys were. This is not like a fictitious title. She did not know where the keys were to the safe when her husband died. Pam found out that there was so much more that she didn’t know.

She doesn’t want other people to struggle about things that they don’t know when someone that they love pass. This book and this conversation is not just for widows and widowers. This is for anyone that’s alive and needs to plan for the people that will be here after they leave or maybe you have people in your family that you’re wanting to support and need to understand their points. This is a conversation for you. Also, the idea of her group that she has for women who won, widows who won, you want to hear about this. This is something that you may be able to connect with where you’re adding your location. Let’s get into this conversation now.

 

 

Pam, welcome to the Widowhood.

Thank you so much for having me.

“Thank you for having me in the widowhood,” when you feel.

I know. That’s weird.

Let’s back up. What does that mean?

I know we’re jumping but it’s so funny because I’ve talked to you about my group Widows Who Wine™ and it’s a social group. Once a month, I’ll do a welcome. We have a private Facebook group and I’ll do a welcome to everybody like, “Welcome to,” then I’m like, “Wait.” I do that every single time because I want to be warm and inviting but then I’m like, “That’s weird. It’s like welcome to the tribe.”

How Widows Who Wine™ Came To Be

What is the name of your group? What do you guys do? Since we’re there, let’s talk about.

I’ll just back up a little bit. My husband passed away in November of 2021. He had brain cancer and I couldn’t find my way in the widow world and in the grief world because every grief group I tried felt like people stuck there. It didn’t feel like they were trying to figure out how to move through it and with it in a healthy way. To me, it just didn’t resonate. I hired my own grief counselor like a private one-on-one certified grief coach. I still work with her now. She’s more of a life coach now but the grief still hits when it hits.

That was in November of 2021 when he passed away. In February of 2023, I kept seeing on our local mom group Facebook pages, women who were widowed. They’d come on there and say, “I just lost my husband or my sister just lost her husband. Where are the resources?” Every time, it was those same resources that didn’t resonate with me and they may with them. It was frustrating me so I decided there needs to be something else.

At that point, you realize that when you get back out into life after your person dies, you’re like the third wheel with a couple of your friends from then on. They’re great and it’s fine but it’s just not the same. Your single friends are like talking bad about their exes and how much they suck and all of that. That doesn’t feel right either. The space was awkward, so I decided I’m going to start this group and it’s going to be based on your social network like your social people. You have people to hang out with who have that same shared experience. I always make fun of the head tilt and the, “How are you?” That whole thing that drives me crazy.

You just get it because they’re walking the same path. I wanted it to give that social vibe, so I call it Widows Who Wine™. I put it on my Facebook page and said, “Anybody want to come over to my house?” Fourteen women showed up that very first night and I knew of a couple of them. I knew one and then I knew of a few others. I decided I’d keep putting it out there. I’d organize one social event a month and that’s what I did. Everything from ax throwing to wine tasting to pottery. Sometimes we do educational things and home maintenance 101 and financial planning 101, etc.

It just has grown and grown and now there’s over 350 women in it in the Atlanta area and all kinds of offshoots like widows who travel, widows who dine, widows who golf, widows who poker, widows who Mahjong. There’s everything. It’s awesome. To plug this for a second because so many people reached out to me around the country. They said, “Is there anything like that in my area for my mom, my sister or my best friend?”

I’ve been developing this app, Widows Who Wine™ app to basically do this. It’s modeled after just like a dating app, where you just find the widows in your area. If you’re traveling, you can be like, “I wonder if there’s any widow of events.” It’s in the App Store. I’m a perfectionist and I don’t love-love it yet. I haven’t fully launched it but when it does, it’s going to be super fun because you can create events and build your whole tribe in your own area.

We have to circle back. Your husband’s name.

John.

Thank you for sharing that with us. You opened your home and let whosoever show up at your house.

Yes.

What was your family thinking or other friends said? I say this from a perspective but go ahead and answer this. I want to circle back, my husband died and I let anybody come to my house. Let’s talk about that. How did that land with other people that knew you?

It was not out of character because I’ve been accused of being a collector of heartbeats. I have a house that’s full of people and full of animals all the time. There’s always someone extra staying with me. I have friends who have stayed with me for a time. My relatives coming in and out. I had my niece from Vermont come and she went to school down in Atlanta for a year and a half and she stayed with me. There’s always extra heartbeats. I don’t think anyone was shocked by it. I laughed because if I were invited to that, there’s no way I would have gone. There’s no way. I’m very comfortable bringing people in but I’m not as comfortable going out.

Your husband is dying. Our spouses dying put you in a place that will crave connection with other people that understand this journey from the same perspective. I’ll tell you when my husband Mark passed, a co-worker introduced me to their cousin. At the time I was living in Pennsylvania. Their cousin was living in California. She and I spoke a couple of times and there was a widow retreat in her area.

I got on the plane from Pennsylvania to California. I stayed one night with my sister who lived relatively close. We met this woman halfway, like right off the road. I jumped out of my sister’s car and into her car sight unseen. My sister’s taking pictures of her license plate and different stuff and I was gone. I was talking and they’re like, “That was scary.”

Even though my family was amazingly supportive, talking to someone else who I knew had a grasp of how I was feeling. It was very different from conversations with people that we’re learning to understand. I could see but you may have shown up to someone else’s home because this drives you to something in a way that nothing else ever has for me.

That’s true. I’ve told this story many times but it’s one of my greatest examples of exactly what you’re talking about. There’s a widow’s book club. I only plan one thing and I tell everybody, “This is your group. It’s not my group. It’s our group. Do what you want. If there’s not already something happening, create it.” I tried to support all of those things and go. I love a club anyway, so I go to that one.

One night I was there and people didn’t necessarily know my face from the group. They know my name. I was there and this woman walked in and I hadn’t met her yet and she started crying as she walked in the door at the book club. I went up to her and I was like, “What’s happening? Talk to me.” She said, “I’ve been a widow for ten years and this is the first time I feel like I can breathe.”

That tells you right there. I told that story all the time because it’s the perfect example of exactly what you’re talking about, being with people who get it. There’s no false pretense. There’s no mask that you have to wear in front of those people. It’s just you and you can just be you and they understand. We understand. It’s huge.

It is life altering for that woman that had been in that for ten years. Society has placed this stigma that though we are sad, we are not thrilled about the situation. Our existence should not stop. I should not stop thriving. I should not stop having dreams, hopes, aspirations, community and connection. When society gives us this concept that we should be tucked away and never show pleasure or anything else because that’s honoring my spouse and that’s being a good widow.

You feel trapped and to realize, I don’t have to be trapped and there are other people that will allow me to say that out loud. I invite people to seek community because community has a way of rubbing off on us in ways that we never thought of. You only know as much as in your head and we know that’s not always a lot. I am excited for every woman that connects with you. It’s amazing.

It has been amazing. It is my greatest gift. I know people tell me all the time literally almost every day. These women come to me and say, “You saved my life.” In return, they have saved my life because it has given me so much joy that I was not experiencing in my life after my husband died. It’s just brought these friendships. I always say to people when they say, “What is this group all about?” I’m like, “It’s about finding the best friends you never knew you needed,” and they do. They become your best friends because it’s just an easy friendship.

It’s just exactly what you said. People think that when you become a widow, your life or your story is at the end and just because his story ended doesn’t mean ours has to end as well. Many of us were not the 85-year-old woman sitting in the rocking chair and being thankful for having a great life. We have great lives. I’m grateful for all the time I had with my husband. I’m grateful I met him when I was eighteen because I got extra time with him.

Just because your partner’s story ended does not mean yours has to end as well. Share on X

For so many of us, it’s hitting in the middle of our lives. It’s not hitting at the end of our lives and that’s the biggest misconception of widowhood. It’s the visual that people have. They still think it’s like that antiquated version of what a widow is and who we are. It’s not. With all of that path back to joy becomes the complicated feelings and emotions because are we allowed to feel joy? It’s like what you were alluding to. Are we allowed to? Do you feel like you’re dishonoring and not honoring your husband by then being happy? The people are like, “I guess she’s over it. Look at her laughing over there.” That feels weird and complicated too, because there are those judgments. We know that. It’s true.

There’s so much. I always refer to the many layers of masks that we have to wear as widows and that’s one of them. It’s not being allowed to feel joy because we’re going to be judged for being happy again while we’re also sad. You can grieve. The grief never goes away. As I said, you can still live with the grief and also live a happy life. It goes back to figuring out how to live with the grief in a healthy way. That’s step one. You have to process it and figure out how to manage that grief but it is 100% okay and acceptable to then go on to live a happy life.

 

 

Connecting With People Beyond Trauma And Grief

Thank you. What would you say to someone who says, “That’s just a lot of trauma bonding, people getting together, crying and being sad all the time. Do you need to have real friends?” What would you say to a person with that disposition?

That is such a great question because when I started this group, my brother-in-law was so worried that I was going to get stuck. I love him to death. He was one of my husband’s best friends. He’s like, “You’re choosing to be stuck in this place. You’re choosing to be stuck in this grief.” To me, it’s not. I’m not stuck at all. I’ll give you another example. It’s so crazy. I had this one woman join. Every now and then, I’ll do a new member meet and greet because we don’t sit around and share our stories. We support each other when the grief hits but we’re not a grief group. We’re drinking wine, having fun, going places and doing things.

When it hits, we support one another but every now and then, I try to do it once a quarter. I’ll do a new member meet and greet social. We do share our stories in that space and it does feel a lot more like a grief circle. One woman was sitting there and she literally looked like deer in the headlight shell shocked. She told her story and said she’d been a widow for about two years at that point. She said, “I feel like a shell of a person. I just wander around my house by myself aimlessly. I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m not even living a life. I’m surviving. I’m barely surviving.”

Fast forward yet again at the book club, she walks in. I don’t know how much time has passed. Maybe a year. With a tropical shirt on. She’s radiating and glowing joy. I was like, “Girl, what is happening? What are you doing with yourself? You look amazing. You’re just like a power full of life.” She was like, “I just got back from a trip with my cousin.” She was so happy.

It was being able to connect with people, process, do, show and have and have people who are walking that same path again show you that it is okay. You can get yourself back out there and you have somebody to do it with that isn’t going to be the third wheel, who isn’t going to be talking about their exes who may very well be horrible. You can talk about them.

You do feel like an out of place person in that circumstance when you’re the one that’s single widowed. It’s not like divorcing your ex. What I would say is, it’s definitely not that. You’re just finding people that just know, get it and are easy to have a relationship with and then go do all these things that will bring you joy. We have a group of us going to Costa Rica in October 2025. We just formed our widows who travel groups.

I’m writing that down.

We do so many fun things. It’s awesome.

Why Living Must Not Be Equated To Dating

I heard going forward, living, having companionship but not the dating thing because oftentimes people say, “You need to get back out there. You need to live.” They automatically equate that to dating. What I hear is equating this to living.

That’s a good point. I never thought of it that way. Incidentally, we do. I didn’t put together any widows who want to date someday at a workshop because that’s also hard. Some people may include young and flirted. You flirt with your husband but flirted or dated or done any of those things in decades.

The idea that this is a group of ladies being friends and hanging out and having to make dating the criteria for this.

It’s the loneliness and there are people across the country. In COVID, we saw it very hard with the loneliness pandemic and it just goes forward. If you have those people that you can call and it takes away that dependency on a man to fill that void for you. You don’t need to fill that void. When you’re only dialed in on that concept, does it have to be, “I have to replace this void with another man?” You’re apt to rush into something that might not be the best choice for you and you feel like that pressure to fill the space.

When you feel pressured to fill the void of your partner who passed, you may rush into something that might not be the best choice for you. Share on X

I want to ask you one thing. You dive in and you said, a man or a woman. There are widows that may have had dead wives that are open and welcome to come to your group and just to be clear about that. That can be another place where people feel awkward that they’re not understanding someone would welcome them because their widow experience does not look like theirs. Thank you for touching on that.

I’ll take that one step further because I’ve had this discussion with other women and women who have been engaged and lost their person. Women who have had a long-term partner that aren’t married or engaged who lost their partner. All of that, to me, qualifies you as being a widow. You know what I’m saying.

How Pam Found Her Most Trusted Core Group

This is a space for people who have lost a life partner and that may look different for everyone but you are welcome here. That’s important. As people are reading this and they’re wrapping up their wine bottles trying to figure out how they feel welcome. Thank you. What is something that you least expected in this experience that you have endured?

That’s a good question.

It could be with your little journey or with the women or however you want to praise that.

I will say I’ll go back to my Widows Who Wine™ because I honestly didn’t expect to have almost my whole friend group pivot to the widows. They are the people I choose almost always. I have a circle of best friends from college. I have a couple close friends that are still like part of my couple friends but in any social circumstance, it’s like, I’m going to them first like, “They are the ones I want to hang out with. They are the ones that are just easy and fun and get it.” Probably because we’re together a lot. I will say the women going on the Costa Rica trip.

We tend to have like the widows who dine and the widows who book clubs. They’re all like separate pockets of the women. You find your space. You find your circle. Each of us finds our circle and I’m not going to say it clicks because that sounds so high school. It’s your circle that you’re going to be naturally more comfortable with. There are people that are going to be naturally drawn to similar things that you like.

The Costa Rica trip was very interesting. I’m so excited for it because it is like a couple people from this group and a couple people from this group. It’s cool. I think that’s going to be fun. I’m not really answering your question but I would say that would be the thing that surprises me the most. These women have become my core group.

How Pam Wrote A Book After Her Husband’s Passing

That’s the answer. I’ll check on that. When you talk about book clubs and finding your group, how did you find yourself to write a book after John’s passing?

John was a financial advisor and had his own business. He was very successful. He had brain cancer, so his chances were not great for survival. We kept our hope alive with it. He lasted twice as long as he was given and I’m grateful for that. My point being, we had time to plan for it. He was a financial advisor. We had our own lawyer and CPA. We had a team. I had his whole people at his office.

When he died, I always say the business of death. The business of death was still hard and I was like, “If it’s hard for me, when I had three years to plan and a husband who was in the finance world, a lawyer and a CPA. How do women or anybody who loses someone handle it when their partner or their person just gets in a car accident and dies or has a heart attack? How do they do it?”

That was the catalyst for the book because it felt so compelled to find a way to make it easier for people to learn the lessons that I learned the hard way. In so much of it, as I’m sure you know. You don’t know until you know. That’s what was the catalyst for and I named it Where’s the Key to the Safe because I didn’t even know where the key to our safe was. I didn’t know. I’m like, “What the hell? How do I not know?” I couldn’t get into it and he always told me, “You got to figure out how to get into the safe.” I was like, “No, I don’t. You know how. I don’t need to know.”

Not okay. We have the name of the book. All the key is here. Who is Cameron?

Cameron is my nephew who is also a financial advisor. He worked for my husband. My husband was his father figure. He went through the whole post-death process with me and because he worked at the office. He knew all the players and did all the things. When I was wanting to write this book, I was like, “I can offer stories but I can’t offer a professional perspective.” He jokes about this all the time. I like making him write it. He came on reluctantly but he did a beautiful job.

He did such a good job. I wanted it to be very like you’re sitting down with your girlfriend having a cup of coffee and easy to understand. Everything about it. I read a lot of finance books after John died because I wanted to be educated. They’re all clinical and cold and boring. Everything about ours is like the cover is warm. The font is meant to be easy to take in. We had one of Cameron’s friends, Sydney, do the illustrations.

Everything about it is meant to be aesthetically pleasing, warm, inviting including the vibe, which I got pushed back from the proofreaders and the editors all the time. They didn’t like my writing style. I was like, “I wanted to feel like you’re sitting down with me having a cup of coffee.” We cover everything in there from where to keep your passwords.

You mentioned having a financial advisor, having an account, a lawyer and a CPA. If I’m a widow and I don’t have any of those things and that sounds like I’m out of my league. Why is this helpful for me?

With the book, we also created a workbook to go along with it. Each chapter covers something. Whether it’s how much car insurance you should have.

Since you just keep going there, let me read the table of contents. The first section is, Dear Reader. Chapter 1, How Did We Get Here? Chapter 2, The Bare Minimum. Chapter 3, Teamwork Makes the Dream Work: Building Your Professional Team. Chapter 4, Risky Business: The Ins and Out of PNC Insurance. Chapter 5, From Crutches to Conference: Disability and Life Insurance. Chapter 6, Passwords, Financials, and Deeds. Chapter 7, Designing Your Cashflow like a Pro. Chapter 8, Life After Death. Chapter 9, Taxes: The ABC’s of RMDS. Chapter 10, Ensuring Your Business Lives on After You’re Gone.

There you go. Thank you.

I have a few places I want to land at but just overarching for that widow this, hearing a trip to Costa Rica and all these other things. She’s like, “I don’t have all of that. Why would this be of interest to her or him?”

It’s for anybody who has a financial link to anyone else. It could be for your parents, your siblings or your children. It’s like, “Get it together. I’ll have it together so my kids don’t have to deal with all this stuff when I die.” It’s a financial link. The number one mistake that people make is they think, “I have a will. I’m good.” The will is meant as your backup plan and then people think, “I don’t have a lot. I don’t need a state plan.”

Your state plan is what keeps you out of probate. It’s what keeps what you have accumulated no matter what it is. Smaller or big throughout your lifetime and you get to decide where it goes. Not the government, when it goes through probate. Not the people who come out of the woodwork who want a piece of your pie because their kin of some sort. You avoid probate. That’s the probate pitfalls in the subtitle. You avoid those probate pitfalls because if it’s done right, it never goes to probate.

How To Avoid Probate After A Loved One’s Passing

This subtitle is, How to Avoid Probate Pitfalls and Maximize Family Finances. What is probate? Why do I not want to be there?

Essentially, anything is in a state. It goes to probate because you don’t have your plans set up legally to avoid probate. It goes to the government. It gets processed through the government. Once it goes in probate, into the legal system, it’s public knowledge. Anybody wanted to look you up. Pam Baker, look her up. Anybody. My third cousin from Oklahoma could be like, “I want a piece of that pie. I’m keen. Give me some of that,” and they can stick clean.

Probate is when it just has to go through the court system and then gets divvied up. If you plan accordingly and that includes your children, for the record. I even had and I don’t even know why but I know why it’s something we missed. I’ve been a stay-at-home mom my whole life. I’m a caregiver. I have an outstanding reputation in our community.

Did you know that in Georgia, I had to go have some person I don’t know because two of my four were still minors. I had to pay them to go on my behalf to probate to prove that I was a good enough guardian to take care of my own children after my husband died. I’d been a stay-at-home mom for many years. That was a part of the process that we didn’t know. We didn’t have that in our plan. That’s a horrifying example.

I was going to ask because somebody made me listen to go, “I’ve been a stay-at-home mom. I’m the only spouse. There’s no one that’s going to challenge this. Why is this important to me?” You answered that question before I even had time to express it. Thank you for that. Is there anything you want to say before I get into a couple pieces of the book that I’m interested in sharing?

No, I just want to reiterate. That is literally for anybody. The other thing I hear all the time is, “I’ll be dead. Why do I care?” To me, it’s like the best gift you can give to anybody that you are linked to and you love. Set up your stuff beforehand because what happens is when you lose that person, you’re left putting the pieces together or making important decisions while also in a fog of grief. It’s impossible. It’s impossible to make solids. I barely remember that whole first year.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t have a lot of memories of that first year. You’re trying to decide what’s going to happen with all of your finances, all of your kids or whatever. It’s impossible. You don’t want to bestow that upon anybody else. You also want to have yourself set up so that you don’t have to go through that yourself.

I would agree. That first year was a bit skittish. This is a section that says, “Dear Reader.” The portion I want to read what I have here and then if you would share what comes to mind for you. “I couldn’t stop thinking about how to make this whole death thing easier for the masses to manage and ultimately decided they’re writing a book would be the best way to do that.”

I can tell as many people as I want. I can tell the story, but until it’s out to people that are beyond my immediate circle, they’re not going to hear my story. By bringing Cameron into it, you’re not just getting the story and being like, “That’s a story I can learn from.” Storytelling is where it’s at. That’s why there’s podcasts. We’re storytellers, but you need that professional experience to go along. That’s why Cameron’s voice is so important in there too, because you’re getting that step by step instruction on how to be top notch setup.

Remembering The Best And Worst Of Your Loved Ones

Thank you. Chapter one, how do we get here? “On November 12th 2021, I lost my husband John. I had been married for 24 years but we were together for 32. After meeting him in my freshman year in college, John was a financial advisor and owned his own company. He was good at his job and because of that, he built a very successful practice.” Who was John when you met him in your freshman year?

I’ll tell you the funniest story. I had studied on campus and I worked for campus activities. I was in the campus activities office and John was big into volleyball. He came in one day. We were in Florida, so he had his neon shorts on and ready and all the stuff. He was a junior and I was a freshman. I remember looking at him starry eyed like, “Oh my God.” My boss who had also gone to Eckert. He had graduated a few years before. I was like, “Who was that?” He was like, “No, you don’t want to go there.”

I was like, “Why?” That made me go, “Yes, I do.” Which was hilarious because for some reason, I could say I was being snowed but he had a reputation as being a player. When I got to know him, he wasn’t a player. He was popular and people liked him. That’s what they thought. He had a girlfriend at home when I met him.

That is a beautiful story. When you think of other things about John and people say, “Share things about him.” Do you like for people to share John’s stories with you?

I love it and I will say that one of the weirdest things when you lose someone is people stop talking about them. When they talk about them, they only talk about the best version. We all have our moments of not being the best. One time, I was with my neighbor whom I hadn’t seen in a while. He came up to me and he started talking about John. He had a couple drinks but then he said something. He was like, “Remember when John? I just remember when he did this.” He was like, “He was such an A-hole.”

Talk about not just the best but also the worst version of your loved ones who have passed. Share on X

I literally high five him and I was like, “Thank you for saying that because he was.” He could be. That wasn’t who he was at his core but he had moments. That’s why he was good at business. He could go when he needed to go. He had some edge. He coached everything and everybody loved him but he had his moments. I just appreciated that so much that it was a real true memory of maybe not John’s best quality but, to me, it was real. I was so happy that he shared that with me. I love hearing the stories and I encourage it.

Thank you for sharing that because as you said, people often try to not mention their name or just say all these good things. I have found more often than not, we want to hear the stories of them. We think of them all the time. It’s not like you mentioned their name, it’s not going to make me sad. There’s a part of me. Though I’m laughing and living and experiencing life, there’s a part of me that’s missing now. You think invoking their name is not going to make it some horrible situation. What would you say to that?

That is so true. I don’t know if I told you this but I started this show that I’m calling the Lost Love Stories and it’s exactly for that reason because people don’t have a space. I want it to create a space for people who have lost someone they love to share their story in a way. I also want it to be a place where you can talk about real stories. My prompters are like, “Tell me how you met. Tell me about what you just did, your first thoughts or your first meetings.” Whether it’s your spouse or your best friend or anybody that you care about. Tell me your favorite memory but also tell me some of the times that they drove you nuts.

Talk to me about when they piss you off or whatever it is. Let’s talk about how you’ve managed that grief and how you found your way or have you found your way back to joy? Let’s talk about that. Jake is my first guest and he lost his dad but we’re not focusing on that. We’re focusing on his best friend. His best friend Blake died in a snowboarding accident six months before my husband died. Jake lost both of those people in a very short period of time.

I want to open with that as my first official guest because it will obviously be very heavily widow based because I have so many people in that world. I also want it to be something that young people can use as a helpful tool or a helpful space for healing but also sharing. I’m excited about that. I’ve literally just recorded my intro episode and then I recorded with Jake but we had too much reverb.

He was in my downstairs office and I was upstairs. I think we were working on each other. We’re going to re-record when I see him and that’ll be my first. It’s exactly what you’re talking about because it’s so important to keep those stories alive. If that’s where people who come in and have their story archived, that’s the space to that.

Dealing With Disability And Life Insurance After Death

I’m looking forward to hearing this conversation. Chapter 5, from crutches to coffins: Disability and life insurance. Let’s talk about this title.

That was Cameron’s suggestion. He liked that because it is. It’s like all the things in between. I just said to him, “I need to go reread that book,” because we read it five million times when you write a book but you’re reading in chunks. I don’t think I’ve ever read it from start to finish and I need to do that. That is like covering all those things you don’t think about like disability.

I can’t remember if it’s all chunked in the same chapter but how important disability is, how important umbrella policies are and all the things that cover you. Even car insurance. Do I have enough car insurance? You think, “Save some money and get this cheaper policy,” but then you get in an accident. I never thought about these things until Cameron, quite frankly, was writing this book. We do workshops, too. We just did one. He’s in this group called Tomorrow’s Leaders. It’s for young professionals.

We were speaking to that group. It was very different than somebody of our age group where they’re just starting out with the savings and getting renters insurance instead of homeowners insurance and stuff like that. It was fun listening to Cameron dial in with that age demographic to talk about the differences between what all the different health insurance and renter’s insurance, how to take advantage of what your company might offer for disability and all of the plannings, HSAs and all the ways you can do. He was like how to start saving from a young age.

It expands. This book is for people. This may have been leveraged from your widow experience but this is a tool for anyone. I’m going to read a couple of different sections in this chapter and then I’ll just let you come. You may have just covered some of that. “Life and disability insurance is your lifeline when the unthinkable happens. Life insurance can have many purposes.”

“You can use life insurance as a tax-free investment vehicle, a way to pass assets to your heirs tax-free, or a contingency plan if you own your own business. Insurance companies in the most basic sense operate in the same way. They offer you different types of life insurance policies at various prices. These policies have different time frames or benefits. Therefore, different odds that they will be profitable for you in a designated way.”

There are so many things to consider and when you’re considering that young professional group again versus, someone who’s in their 40s versus 50s versus 70s. What are the different types of things? When do you need that life insurance? Cameron was just saying this to the group, “They don’t need life insurance now.” Life insurance policies are meant to be a source of income for the people you leave behind. You don’t have a family yet. You don’t have a spouse.

You don’t need to have that expense now but you do want to get it before something health wise comes along that will exclude you from getting out life insurance in the future and all the different types of insurance, the universal and the terms and all that.” All of it is so dependent on what stage you are in your life and what assets you want to have to pass on. Things that we’re talking about with that. It can get complicated and Cameron does it very well.

I want to keep it very topical but just the introduction of that. Also, hearing the way that you’re writing. Going back to the ways you said you wanted it to sound comfortable. I wanted them to be able to hear life insurance that sounded like a regular conversation. As you mentioned, the idea that this is not needing to have a financial background. This is for people talking to people about real life things.

What I love that we did, it was an afterthought but it was a great afterthought. At the end of every chapter there are reflective questions. It’s like a summer of reflective questions. Those reflective questions are meant to guide you for whatever stage you’re apt to know, “I got to go in this direction. I have to go in that direction.” That’s what that whole thing is to let you know like this is the path to follow. If this applies to you, then do this.

I was reminded of those books that we used to read like, “If you want to choose this book, then go that way.” That’s why if you do it along with that workbook, you can have a full complete plan that you literally can take to a lawyer and have it be cookie cutter. Have it be very personally based and have a full plan in place and give me your workbook over and legalize this document and you’re good. You’re set.

How To Make Life After Death More Manageable

In the very beginning in the book, it’s said the unthinkable happened. Why is it so hard to just say that we have a timeline? That when I am no longer here, when my death, my transition from this world happens? It is a thing that we think about that we don’t want to talk about that we do think about. The chapter here, chapter 8, life after death. It’s okay to think about that. There’s nothing wrong with my spouse leaving me life insurance so I could continue living. Is it hard to redeem it?

There’s nothing wrong with the concept of planning to live after your spouse passes or your loved one that has done this. It’s not like you did something ulterior motive to make this happen and put yourself in this situation. This is what it was set up to be and to do. This chapter, Life After Death, says, “This chapter is essentially a checklist of all the things that need to be done once your person passes away.”

You spoke earlier about trying to operate with this mental fog and now know that a checklist would exist to be able to help navigate that. What does that look like for the reader? I want to read a two part section and then whatever comments you would like to share. “Bonus box. While mild trains are a lovely idea, I find them overwhelming and guilt inducing. Food delivery, gift cards offered our family a very welcome break from the endless supply of pasta dishes and casseroles.” From cam, which I thought was very interesting.

“Before John passed away, I had helped numerous clients through the death of the loved one but I was not prepared for the amount of work the family has to do. I had not been privy until I walked through this with Pam. Even in the most straightforward estate plans. It can be too much for one person to tackle themselves no matter how much you prepare for the passing of a loved one. The months following their death are always chaotic and the unfortunate reality is most people pass quickly without giving their family time to prepare adequately.” We ended where we started because of the necessity of that. What would you like to share in those sections?

First, I want to go back to the unthinkable because when you ask people, we all think about our death at some point but we don’t want to think about it. We go through a good chunk of our lives feeling invincible. “It’s not going to happen. We have plenty of time. We don’t talk about that now.” That’s what makes it such an uncomfortable conversation. As I say to people all the time, we are all going to die. We are. Why are we so afraid of this conversation and just because we’re saying it out loud doesn’t mean we’re speeding up the clock. We’re not wishing for it to happen.

We will all die someday. No one should be afraid to talk about it. Share on X

I didn’t jinx myself because I said that.

It’s so interesting because at our workshop, and again, this was the young professionals. One of the attendees said that she has tried to talk to her parents about their plan just so she knows what’s going on. She’s prepared and because she said, “How do I talk to my parents?” Every time she tries, they say, “Do you just want to see how much money you’re going to get? Is that what you’re after? You just want to know what’s going to come to you and make sure we don’t spend it all?”

There’s such a weird dynamic and so many different situations. Money is a weird dynamic and then death is a weird dynamic and all of this when it’s just like, “Let’s all get on the same page so we have a solid plan in place and everybody knows their role.” In that, what Cameron’s alluding to is, how chaotic and overwhelming it is. We go through this whole thing in there about picking the players on your team.

We have a whole team concept, whether it’s the executor, the guardian or the power of attorney. All those different things that we need in case of an emergency, in case of an accident or in case I get in a car accident and I’m in a coma. Who’s going to who’s going to make these decisions? Who’s going to keep paying my bills so I don’t come out and I’m in a ton of debt or everything is being repoed because I haven’t paid my bills? Who are those people?

You got to plan ahead. You ought to tell them that you’ve chosen them and have the conversation so they know. I hear that all the time that people just don’t tell the people. Also, then the players on your team that are the person who’s going to say, “I’ll contact the funeral home for you. I’m going to reach out and start this meal train or let everybody know my sister did that.” We went through many stages as you can imagine with cancer that we got meal training. That’s why by the time John died, we were done with the casseroles. Done with everything.

I felt guilty. If any of the food got thrown away or anything, I was like, “I just feel bad. Somebody took the time to do this.” I said, “I wish we had Uber Eats or any of those, where each kid could just get what they want.” I don’t know what you feel like eating. None of us do. We’re all grieving. I might want Thai food. You might want pizza. I don’t know. That just made life so much easier because people could just get what they want, when they want it and you didn’t know how these dishes were staring at you like, “Eat me.”

That’s all part of it and just having that whole like proactive conversation about these are the players and these are the way it’s going to go. Again, going back to like normalizing the conversation. This isn’t meant to say, “I hope you hurry up and die so I can get your stuff.” It’s, “Let’s make a plan so that when you do or I do or anybody does, we can spend our time honoring and sitting in that loss and honoring that loss and honoring the person.”

Spend time telling stories and instead of going, “How do I pay these bills? Where are the Bills? Who do I even call for this?” All those questions like, “I don’t know how to get into this laptop because I don’t know my dad’s password. How do I do it?” Those are all important things that are crippling if you don’t have the information.

Where can someone find your book?

It is on Amazon and because of the way Amazon works, we have like 50 reviews. We’ve even hit the best seller on Amazon. This is what they say, until you have 100 reviews, you don’t fall into the algorithms. Everything has to be very specific. If you put, Where is the Key to the Safe, it probably won’t come up because the book is Where’s the Key to the Safe? For the workbook, you have to put, Where’s the Key to the Safe workbook. They won’t come up together. It’s weird. That’s Amazon’s little quirky thing until now. Supposedly, when you hit that magic 100 number, it will start populating in your stuff.

Taking A Deep Breath And Asking For Help

In everything that you have experienced, if you could go back and talk to Pam the day after John passed and you get to keep everything you’ve learned. What would you tell her?

The first thing that popped into my head was take a deep breath, girl. We can do this because it felt impossible at the time. My kids were 12 to 22 when John died. It’s very different stages and whatever. That’s what your priority is. It’s making sure that they are having the space to grieve and being heard and feeling seen and just supporting them while also having to go to the bank and shut this down and shut that down and do all these things.

What will I say? Take a deep breath. That’s it. None of this has to be done at this moment immediately. The focus is on the kids and yourself. Take the time you need. Ask for help. Assign people like, “Can you please go take care of this for me?” I’m not one to ask for help ever, but that is a big thing I learned. I cannot do this by myself. I cannot. Some days I cannot even get in the shower. Please, go pick up my child at school. Get help. Ask for help and take it when it’s offered because everybody wants to help anyway. Give them a way to do it. That would be meant for one thing because I resisted that for sure.

Pam’s Questions For Tina

I have asked you a lot of questions. Is there anything that you like to ask me?

I have a million questions.

Maybe I’ll make it to the show.

You will definitely. I’ve been on a few shows now as a guest because of the book. It’s been so fun connecting and meeting people. I feel like I learned something new from every person, which is like my goal in life. In every encounter, I want to learn something new. I would say that to you like, what was a turning point for you when you lost your husband? Where was your turning point to say, “I can live this life again. I find joy?” When you felt compelled to get your message out into the world?

That is a good question. Thank you. The conversation to live again started before Mark died. His family had a long history of heart conditions. I hate that he was right. He gave me the idea that he didn’t see himself living past 55. That being the case, he wanted to make sure that I was prepared economically, spiritually and physically. We had a lot of conversations about my life in his absence then he wound up being.

I’m like, “It was worth every conversation.” Oftentimes, I speak to people and there’s a lot of guilt that they hold about the idea of continuing living, laughing or joy. I had his approval and the conversation. Sometimes, people have to go back and reinvent what that discussion would look like with their loved one. We had that conversation to the extent that our oldest daughter overheard some of the conversations.

Years later, Mark and her dad have passed. Her mom is dating. She doesn’t have to go, “What would dad have thought?” I know I’m very fortunate to have that experience. My husband died of a massive heart attack. We were on vacation. It wasn’t as if there was a lumpy sickness that we would have had time to cross over into some of those conversations. I’m a talker, so we talked about a lot of different things. I will encourage people to have a hard conversation. Whether it’s with your children or whoever it is you’re with because there are people reading this conversation that support people who are dealing with profound grief.

The burden that is lifted by that is huge. Also, for the people that never had the opportunity to have that conversation. I recommend sitting down at a table. Write your loved one a letter about the things that you have guilt howling up or feeling difficult. Let that letter set. Come back a day or two or later. Move the letter to a different part of the table, a different chair and write what your loved one would have written to you in that response.

You know them well enough to have a sense of what they would have responded to. It’s an exercise but it can provide closure. It can provide a sense of relief and just letting that go and being able to live that because oftentimes, people don’t talk about the difficult things and we did. That made it easier for me.  That was helpful.

That’s an amazing gift that he gave you. I don’t think I’ve ever heard of anybody. Even knowing family history. I’ve never heard of anybody proactively doing that. He’s amazing.

He was. The second part of your question was telling my story or the nonprofit that I started it. I have remarried and my chapter two husband had a cousin that passed. I connected with the widow and she had posted something on Facebook about it being her husband’s first birthday. I will never tell another person what I understand how you feel because how you feel is unique to you and your unique relationship with your spouse. I don’t know how it feels for you to miss John in that most intimate way but I have a concept from my own lived experience.

I’d reached out and asked her, “Do you want to talk?” She said, “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.” I was like, “You can talk now.” She called me and we were on the phone way past my regular bedtime, but I knew what it was like to be in that space when you didn’t have to qualify how you feel and you could speak freely. When I got off the phone with her, I feel like God was prompting me to do something on a larger scale to be able to support people to create a space for community, networking and the widowhood and my mom who at that time I want to say was in her late 70s had a show talking about things she had learned in her life.

The show, the nonprofit of creating space for people to connect. We just had our first butterfly release ceremony. We have a church that’s donated land to have a memorial garden. We’re having a retreat in Atlanta. I hopefully get to meet you while we’re there in December. In 2025, I’m doing every Wednesday when I’m sharing journal prompts from my first year and a half after Mark passed. I’m reflecting because I don’t remember all that. I see that the foundation Widowhood Real Talk with Tina is leveraging some of those same principles that I used in my own grief jury. That is how I got here.

That is amazing. It’s so incredible when you think about it. I say this to people and they say, “How do you do all the things you do?” Everybody says I’m the busiest person they know but I get a lot accomplished as well. You say, God and I say spirit. Whatever. It doesn’t matter. It’s all the same person concept thing. I literally just say, “You stay open to what the messages that’s supposed to be sent to you.” I say it every single day like, “Help me stay open. Whatever the direction I’m supposed to go in, I’ll do everything I can to stay open. I will follow the path to take me for the biggest impact for the greatest good.”

That’s literally my guiding spirit, too. It sounds like the same for you. I think that people that do the things that we do, we maybe are consciously more open to, I say receiving the downloads. I get downloads. I get thoughts that just pop into my brain. It’s like the Widows Who Wine™ thing. I was like, “That’s what I need to do.” It suddenly corrects me and I spin obsessively until like vetted out but then it’s there and I just make it happen. I don’t know. It’s a beautiful thing but we’re all capable of it. We just have to be consciously open to receive.

There is a lot to say about choice because I know everyone travels this grief journey very differently. It is a daily decision to choose to be a participant in my own experience. Not just sit down and quit and let that be the last thing of my life. This was the most difficult experience in my whole life. I was there when Mark had this massive heart attack. I don’t want anyone to think like, “They look so happy and they’re just doing stuff.” This is a daily intentional step to be here on a regular basis. It’s worth the intentional steps to me.

 

 

It is. I literally had this conversation, too. You can choose and you do. Sometimes, you do have to choose every day and sometimes it’s not as big a choice. You can train yourself to just naturally go towards happiness and joy, especially in those early days. You’re like, “What am I choosing to do now?”

Mark’s birthday was just a couple of weeks ago and it was hot garbage. There was a choice to either sit in the house and just be miserable. Some friends convinced me to go to the beach. I live in Virginia and watch the sunrise and think of renewal and a new day and hope and to create that. I spent the rest of the day hanging out with our son. I have a Jeep Wrangler and we went to different murals and took pictures and stuff like that. We laughed and just enjoyed that but this is years later. It’s still a choice.

Isn’t that crazy? People say, “I guess she’s moved on, or when are you going to move on? When are you going to get over it?”

My children will get married. My children will have monumental events in their life. Their dad will not be present. That doesn’t change. I’m going to say something to our readers and I would like you to close up. Maybe there’s something we didn’t cover or something you want to make sure that you get to talk about. I want to say thank you for this conversation.

Thank you so much. It’s been amazing.

Get In Touch With Pam

I am so glad that you found us and were able to participate in this conversation. I am sorry for your loved one that has allowed you to be here, but I’m glad you found us. I look forward to seeing you.

Widows have to reinvent themselves. Support their rebirth without judgment and be there for them to cheer them up. Share on X

I’ll just close out by saying something that goes along with widowhood. It goes back to what people ask me all the time. How can I support widows? What do I do as a friend to someone? In those early days, you support them and help them out when they need to be held up literally at times. When you’re moving on with your life, because everybody does, support her in her rebirth because this is a rebirth. We’re moving to a chapter and to a path we weren’t planning on taking. It’s real. We quite literally have to reinvent ourselves. Support the rebirth without judgment and be there to cheer her on. Lift her up as she’s navigating this new path. That’s all.

Thank you.

 

Important Links

• Pam Baker on LinkedIn
• Pam Baker on Facebook
• Where’s the Key to the Safe?: How to Avoid Probate Pitfalls and Maximize Family Finances
• Widows Who Wine™
• The Lost Love Stories
• Tomorrow’s Leaders
• Widowhood Real Talk with Tina
• Lasting Legacy Consulting

 

About Pam Baker

Pam Baker is the founder and CEO of Widows Who Wine™, a community and app designed to help widows find connection, support, and the best friends they never knew they needed. Her mission is simple: to help women rebuild a life filled with laughter, friendship, and joy—even after unimaginable loss.

Pam never expected to be navigating widowhood in her 40s. When she lost her husband, Jon, to glioblastoma in 2021, she was left to untangle the overwhelming financial and legal challenges that come with probate—even though Jon had been a successful financial advisor with an entire estate planning team. If she struggled despite having every resource in place, she knew others had to be drowning. Determined to help, she became an author to make estate planning easier for families before they needed it. She also launched The Lost Love Stories podcast, a space for widows to share their journeys through love, loss, and the road back to hope. Before stepping into this role, Pam spent years leading philanthropic efforts. When two of her children were diagnosed with cystic fibrosis, she and Jon rallied friends and family to help raise millions for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. She’s a natural problem solver, a relentless optimist, and someone who believes in bringing people together to support one another through life’s hardest moments.

Originally from a tiny, freezing town in northern Vermont, Pam chased the sunshine to Eckerd College in St. Pete Beach, Florida, before finding her perfect balance in Roswell, Georgia. She has four incredible young adult children and considers herself a collector of heartbeats—her home is always filled with people, pets, and laughter.