I have a Lifebook which I update every so often. I also have letters for those who I love and who love me.
www.ageuk.org.uk/information-advice/care/housing-options/home-safety/lifebook/# - is the lifebook link you can download and print it page by page and tell someone where it is.
It can lead them to other info exp don't add credit card details etc but I describe where they are in such a way that my loved ones will know but no one else could decipher as it doesn't make any sense outside my immediate family
Im waiting to go into hospital myself for an extended stay for treatment and have a thread on here. www.mumsnet.com/Talk/_chat/3367874-Tips-to-prepare-for-going-away-for-an-extended-time?watched=1&msgid=81531628#81531628
I have Xmas presents bought and wrapped, (I have a list for myself of what each person is getting and the card which is inside the wrapping paper tells everyone how much they mean to me but I tell them anyhow when I speak/see them) so that makes you wonder how will they know which one is which, I have stick-on bows on them if someone raises the side of the bow slightly there is a strip of white sticky label underneath stating who it is for. You cant tell otherwise.
Birthday presents are sorted up till March,
I have written all the cards I need to do between now and May just to be on the safe side. They are stamped and in a file folder by month. If anything comes up in between, I will only have a limited number of cards to get over time.
It's a very slim chance for me that things will be a lot worse and leave me potentially unable to resume life at a better quality than now but I am prepared for that. (prepare for the worst and hope for the best) -
then when the best happens you have assured yourself that your loved ones have what you want to tell them for keeps in your handwriting from you, via notes, special gifts and what perfumes you like etc
(Rachel Bland who recently passed from the big C, has handwritten diaries and notes for her son, so he will know how she wrote, loads of photos of her in the good and bad days, so he knows the good times and the bad times she had, and her favourite perfumes all put away in a box to preserve them so he knows what she smelt like, I think she also did letters till he is 21)
@Coconutcreampie massive hugs re the breakdown, I wrote letters to my loved ones at the point of my last suicide attempt, I don't remember writing them but they were mostly illegible. I had no intention of waking up again. I lay unconscious for several days. I had been yelling for help for weeks at that stage and couldn't take it anymore.
The paramedics took them out of the house and gave to hospital staff who gave to the psychiatrist when I was transferred to the unit and he showed them to me and we talked about them. He then said now that I had seen them, they needed to be destroyed so as not to be possible there for future so, with 2 nurses and him, I went into the courtyard and the nurses watched me as I burned them with a lighter, they provided the lighter and all 3 made sure I was safe with it. Therapeutic in some ways
The paramedics found them underneath me once they moved me to transfer to the ambulance. They made sure no one close to me got to see them to save them that distress, they knew once they saw letters what they were.
I know that's different to what you need but letters can be good to remember the person however sometimes when they aren't needed anymore, you might need to destroy as when you come home after your op, you don't want someone to find the words you wrote to them at this time.
You can rewrite them at your own pace, detailing how you have felt, what happened with your surgery and how you are getting on with recovery and your life forward from here on.
When my mum was dying, I was her calming influence, so I sat many hours by the bedside and while she slept, I wrote a kind of diary and I treasure it very much, It had the ups/downs /visitors comments / what made her laugh / the jokes she shared with staff. Its all in the diary/book.
She wasn't able to write herself but it helped keep track of things and when she was lost in herself, I could keep track on who visited and what they talked about. Its lovely to have 10+ years later, bittersweet memories but cherished all the same
One of her friends had got both knees replaced at the same time, the friend was 85+ and my mum kept forgetting that she had told us so every few minutes she would announce to whoever was there to (friends name) got new knees - the friend was visiting and said to all what do you think I am (my mums name) a centipede?
I was delighted to find in my mum's house after she passed, shopping lists, to do lists, clothes sizing lists, phone number lists, all sorts and loved her handwriting so appreciate the small things like that.