One of the major points in all this is: HAVE THE CONVERSATIONS while your loved ones are still able to fully participate, so that you can be doing what they would truly want instead of struggling through the agonizing process of trying to figure it out when you're in the midst of the situation.

And you will need to be pretty concrete and specific. My parents both had living wills that said "no extreme measures to be taken to prolong my death". The hospital staff said that was pretty much useless to them. Does the person want CPR? Under what illness conditions? Intubation? Food and water through a tube? Etc. This is not fun stuff. It's even less fun when you find yourself trying to divine what your parents might want if you've never had the opportunity to discuss it with them at all.

My parents were pretty clear about what they wanted and didn't want. My spouse---youngest of three boys--has never had this talk with his remaining parent, his dad, and it really needs to take place.

If you--the general you, this is addressed to--have a good primary care doc, they can help you walk through a form that specifies all this. And, by the way, we should be doing such forms for ourselves too--for exactly the reason I just described.