As the decade of the 1960s waned and the war in Vietnam became a vivid reality on home TV sets, our children were in their teens, our oldest son subject to the draft. Tense times. So when the family gathered each week to watch Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, we relaxed and laughed as Tommy whined to brother Dick: Mom always loved you best. It would be 20 years before this phrase lost its comedic value and became both a personal and professional concern. As my mother reached her 80s, she spoke more often about the wisdom of her estate plan. She had assets of about $300,000, which she planned to leave to her three children in equal shares. But she returned to the subject time and again, concerned that one of my brothers, who took pride in his nonmaterialistic ways, would give his share away and not preserve it for his family. A trust had been suggested. But would he feel less loved, be resentful? Yet was it not the wisest course? Back and forth. She changed her mind many times, finally opting for the trust. Even in her final year, after all documents were revised and executed, her decision continued to occupy her thoughts and our conversations. She yearned to be reassured that her choice would not damage her children's future relationships with each other, that one would not feel more or less loved than another. My older brother agreed to serve as trustee, and in the end all went well. Looking back, remembering how often I wished she would simply drop the subject, I'm now thankful I did not give voice to my impatience. For her eyesight was failing and her body no longer responded to her commands as she wished. This was one arena in which she could still make meaningful decisions, still have some control. I don't know if she told my brother of her plan before she died. A quandary for the elderly: to tell or simply keep their estate plans to themselves? There's no one right answer. But when a parent does disclose a plan and an adult child is not accepting of the decision and falls into mother always loved you best mode, the pressure on an elderly parent can become intense, even punishing. This was the issue I confronted when consulted by a friend of a friend in my professional capacity as a mediator. She asked if I could help her resolve a problem that was tearing her family apart. Now in her 80s, she had disclosed to her sons her plan to divide her sizable estate into equal shares. Her older son, a wellestablished attorney on the West Coast, was incensed. A harddriving professional, when young he worked long hours to achieve partner status in his firm, and now he took pride in continuing to accumulate wealth to support his lifestyle and his children's future security. Why was he incensed? Because his mother had given substantial sums to his younger brother over the years. The younger brother, although a gifted student in high school and college, married young, and he and his wife raised five children on a small subsistence farm, neither pursuing professional careers. This son often accepted significant financial aid from his mother. She lived nearby and was witness to the unmet needs of his growing family. She paid all the college expenses of his children. Quite a substantial sum, never really tallied, had been contributed over many years. Although the older brother was sometimes disdainful of his sibling, he accepted his life choices without rancor until told of his mother's estate plan. He'd always assumed, based on remembered comments of his mother years ago, that he would receive a larger share of her estate to compensate for the earlier gifts to the younger brother. …