Turning Loss Into Legacy: The Power Of Estate Planning With Adam Zuckerman
Estate planning is more than just paperwork—it’s about securing a legacy for your loved ones. In this powerful episode, Adam Zuckerman, founder of Buried in Work, shares how the loss of his father motivated him to build a company focused on transforming estate planning into a meaningful process for families. Adam talks about the importance of preparing for the unexpected and how his journey through grief inspired him to help others navigate the emotional and practical aspects of planning for the future. Tune in for an inspiring story of resilience, how to turn loss into purpose, and how estate planning can be a source of strength and connection. 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: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/suicide/suicide-prevention-hotlines-resources-worldwide — Watch the episode here Listen to the podcast here Turning Loss Into Legacy: The Power Of Estate Planning With Adam Zuckerman Adam, welcome to the widowhood. Tina, thanks for having me. I’m glad to have you. What do you think about “Welcome to the widowhood?” What do you think when you hear that? There are a lot of different ways I can think about that, but weirdly, I think about possibility. There are a lot of negative connotations with things in life, and I think we need to do our best to turn that schematic around. There is a comedian who said something to the extent of divorce being a bad thing to most people. It’s not like someone says, “It was amazing. I finished her sentences, she finished mine, I met her parents, we got along great, so we got a divorce.” It’s a culmination of something, and that something can lead to something that isn’t necessarily better but can be different. When you say “Welcome to widowhood,” I don’t think it’s necessarily a bad thing. It is a difficult and painful experience for a lot of people, but there can be some very positive aspects that we can find if we look hard enough. That’s fair. I would like to add, as you mentioned the statement about somebody getting divorced, that becoming a widow or a widower is a life goal. We take marriage vows and we say, “Till death do us part.” We don’t take marriage vows and say, “Till we get divorced.” When you say those are #RelationshipGoals, this is what it looks like. We don’t often think about what it would be like to be in my position or someone who has lost their wife, but this is what life goals look like. I love that. That is such a wonderful way to look at it. It is. In the idea of the inevitable, the reason we’re having this conversation is that the products that you support and you do are about life goals, the idea of wanting to have a plan, care for our loved ones, and leave everyone in a good space. Before we get into this, how did we get here with this, and who is Adam? Who Is Adam Zuckerman? I have a strange background. I’m an attorney, I have an MBA. The absolute last thing that I thought I’d be doing, if you spoke to me 5 or 10 years ago, was working in the industry that a lot of people refer to as death tech, which is neat. I have sold clean energy plants to prime ministers around the world. I was the entrepreneur and futurist for Discovery Channel’s parent company. I was somebody jumping off the top of Mount Everest, how you make the show better, go fix file sharing, or invest in startups. I was at a hedge fund outside of law school when I got my MBA. That grew to $1.2 billion while I was there on the ops team. This is all new for me, but it became very personal after my father passed away from leukemia. If you like, we can get into the story of how that happened. I would because that is the heartbeat of what you’re doing. Six and a half or seven years before starting Buried In Work, my father was diagnosed with leukemia for the first time, AML. Your dad’s name, Adam? He’s Andy. It’s funny, a lot of people called me Andy growing up. I don’t know, maybe it’s just the way. Maybe I’m an Andy by default. He named me wrong. He was diagnosed with AML. I donated bone marrow to him, so we got him some extra time, which is pretty neat. There’s only a 30% chance that I was a match, and I was. The procedure went well, and he relapsed once. He was at my house one day, and we were doing some woodworking in the basement. He walks up the stairs and he goes, “Adam, I’m tired.” My dad is not one to complain. He’s one to make a joke. When we say we’re tired, we go and take a nap, we get some tea, we read a book or something like that. When he says, “I’m tired,” it means something is not right. I have to go back to the doctor’s office. We’re in Maryland. He goes to Hopkins, where his doctor is. These doctors are phenomenal at Johns Hopkins, so shout out to them. They ran some tests. They told him to check in on a Thursday. Twelve days later, he passed away. It was quick. There are some positive narratives. If this happened twenty years ago, we wouldn’t have got those extra six and a half or seven years. My sister’s kids were younger when he was diagnosed first. That extra time that he got, he was able to build relationships that they’re going to have memories of right now, which is phenomenal. The
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