03/09/2026
🌿 A SUMMER ☀️ OF PROTECTION & REFLECTION 🌿
This summer has been a slightly unusual one for me.
Alongside work, holidays and everyday life, I’ve had a few health concerns of my own — some pre-cancer checks and a biopsy. Thankfully, everything has come back fine. ❤️🙏
But going through that process inevitably made me stop and think about my own financial planning. 💭
You might assume that because I’m a Financial Adviser, everything in my own world would be perfectly organised! 📂
And largely it was… but not quite! 😬 a bit like a builders home isn’t always finished 🤣
✍️ I realised my Will needed updating. There were people mentioned who I would no longer want included, and circumstances had changed since it was originally written.
🛡️ I also went back through my protection policies. Some had been established many years ago when my children were much younger, so I needed to check the trusts were still appropriate and, importantly, that the right trustees were in place to act on.
We have also recently paid off our mortgage so certain cover was no longer needed.
It was a useful reminder that putting financial planning in place once isn’t necessarily enough.
❤️ Life changes.
👨👩👧👦 Families change.
🏡 Children grow up and buy homes.
💷 Financial circumstances change.
🩺 And occasionally our health gives us a little nudge to look at everything again.
Interestingly, it also made me realise just how much of my work this summer has revolved around one word…
🛡️ PROTECTION
And protection doesn’t simply mean life insurance.
Over the last few months I’ve been looking at:
👵 Long-term care planning — helping families consider how they could meet the shortfall in residential care costs over the longer term with an insurance policy.
🏡 Mortgage protection — particularly relevant in my own family at the moment, with my children buying their first homes.
💷 Income protection — considering what happens to someone’s income if illness or an accident means they can’t work.
❤️ Life and family protection — making sure the people left behind are financially secure if the worst happens.
👵🏻👴🏻 Retirement income protection — looking at how pension funds can be used to secure a guaranteed income for life through an annuity, rather than relying entirely on drawdown.
All very different circumstances.
All different ages.
All different stages of life.
But ultimately, they have the same purpose:
🛡️ Protecting the people, income and lifestyle that matter to us.
Over my next few posts, I’m going to share some examples of the different types of protection planning I’ve been working on this summer.
Because being a Financial Adviser involves far more than simply talking about pensions and investments. 📈
Sometimes the most important part of financial planning is making sure the plan still works when life doesn’t quite go to plan. ❤️
