I celebrated my birthday last weekend with a veritable seafood feast. Shrimp! Fried calamari! King crab legs! And for good measure, I made sure I ate some pizza.
But after a few days of spiking my LDL and triglycerides, I had to remind myself: Now that I’m over the hill, I need to be mindful about my health. I like to think of it as making an investment in my body. The more prep I do now, the fewer complications I hope to experience later in life… without cutting out my favorite foods entirely. (Everything in moderation, including moderation, as Oscar Wilde said.)
That preparation for the future is particularly important given how healthcare costs skyrocket later in life. A recent study found that a healthy couple between 65 and 74 spends around $13,000 annually on healthcare. That figure jumps to $23,000 for couples between the age of 75 and 84, and for couples over the age of 85, it’s $40,000.
For older Americans, the financial toll of healthcare is bad enough. But once you retire, navigating the Medicare landscape can be unnecessarily convoluted. To help with that, we’re hosting Retire with Money's first-ever Medicare Month. We'll be dedicating our four August issues to Medicare, from plan options and IRMAA surcharges to preventative services and coverage gaps.
In the meantime, if you’re already enrolled in Medicare and want to share an anecdote about your experience, shoot me an email and we’ll feature you in an upcoming issue.
— Jordan Chussler, investing and banking editor 
