The big turkey drop: What are the biggest threats to your independence?

There are two things that pose the greatest threats to our independence as we age: Our finances and our health.

Fortunately, there are lots of things we can do protect our finances and our health, and many of these will be topics for droptheturkey.com.

Just to tick off a few of the steps you can take to ensure your independence:

Take care of yourself. Eat right, exercise, get to the doctors for preventative maintenance, be safe, and keep yourself busy. Plan for the contingencies… Make your wishes known with a health care proxy. Make sure where you’re living makes sense for you now, and promotes good health.

Take care of your pocketbook. Invest prudently, don’t put all of your eggs in one basket, protect what you’ve got with the right insurance products, get the help you need to make sure you’re not paying more in taxes than you need to. Make your wishes known. Have an estate plan, and a trusted person assigned as your power of attorney. Make sure where you’re living makes sense for you now, and makes good financial sense.

Failure to pay attention to your health and finances puts you in a spot that no one wants to be in: Dependent on others for your next meal, your care, and the even the very roof over your head.

Hold onto that turkey.