I would make out a budget every month to make sure we didn't have more money going out than what was coming in.
Being a mother and a nurse working full time—it was hard—and I knew I didn’t want to work forever.
By the time I had retired, I felt like I was where I wanted to be. That was good.
And about that time, my brother had just gotten into high-risk tech stocks. They were just going up—great guns, you know.
I wasn’t a person that took a lot of risks, but it just seemed like hey this is great. I can do this too, and I can have it all too.
I took all my money out of my retirement fund and put it in to high tech.
The market started to go down, probably within the year.
Not knowing that much myself about the whole market, I just didn’t do anything.
I lost a good half of what I had in my retirement account. I should not have invested so aggressively in high-risk funds in my retirement. I definitely should not have done that.
First thing I did was talk to my son, Jeff. He helped me get the other money out of there, and he told me what he thought about what I did. And that was ok. I deserved it.
You know it’s not like I lost everything, but I learned a big lesson from that.
I think as you get older, you do have to look at your funds differently than when you're younger. As you get closer to retirement, you need to be more conservative.
I think it's very important that people get guidance from someone who they can trust.
I made a mistake. And if I can keep someone else from making that same mistake, it makes me feel like I'm doing the right thing.
