For Children with Special Needs: Special Needs Trusts and Other Planning Options

• Author: Rebecca A. Iannantuoni, Keith Bradoc Gallant
• Pages: 30-33

30 FAMILY ADVOCATE www.shopaba.org

family member? So often this question is deeply seeded in

family dynamics and requires a great deal of open and

honest dialogue before making assumptions as to who will

serve in this successor role.

• How? How will the successor-caregiver know the child’s

likes, dislikes, wants, hopes? A letter of intent, described

below, is an excellent mechanism for parents to impart their

historical understanding and knowledge of the special

needs of their child. e process of creating this letter of

intent can be cathartic and tends to oer the parents a

dierent outlet for being heard. Will the successor be able

to manage? Nothing is more frightening to parents than to

think that their best-laid plans will not succeed. However,

there is a certain reality to this concern in these situations.

• Where? Where will the child live and with whom? Often

an adult child with special needs has a long-established—

and sometimes hard-fought-for—network of supports

(e.g., day program, work, community involvement,

medical providers), and recreating this network can be

dicult, especially in a crisis situation.

Parents enjoy a certain expectation that, at some

point, their children will assume responsibility for

themselves. is expectation transforms when a

child has special needs. e future care and

well-being of a dierently abled child can be an

overwhelming concern for parents, particularly when

coupled with the very real day-to-day anxieties of managing

the child’s special diets, treatment protocols, therapies, and

specialists and advocating for educational, living, and

vocational needs.

Parents’ Concerns: Physical, Emotional, and Financial

ese future-care concerns fall into two linked but distinct

general areas: physical and emotional care on the one hand

and nancial concerns on the other.

Physical and Emotional Care

• Who? Who will assume the role of primary caregiver after

the parents’ deaths (or disability)? Is it appropriate to place

this responsibility (and burden) on a sibling or another

For Children with Special Needs

Special Needs Trusts and

Other Planning Options

By REBECCA A. IANNANTUONI & KEITH BRADOC GALLANT

Plan for the dicult while it is easy; do what is great while it is small. — S T

Published in Family Advocate, Volume 42, Number 3, Winter 2020. © 2020 by the American Bar Association. Reproduced with permission. All rights reserved. This information or any portion thereof

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