Caregiving is not the kind of topic that makes for pleasant chit-chat over tea, much like long term care and long term care insurance. Yet these are crucial issues to address boldly with vigor and verve, if you want future years to unfold gracefully.

So often our tendancies to ignore, deny, procrastinate and avoid can leave these issues unaddressed, and when the time for care is upon us (care which will VERY likely be needed, at least for half the population), then we could be left in an ugly, ugly situation.

Caregiver contracts are a new option for caring for aging elders. Use these formal agreements set up by an attorney.

A growing number of families are setting up caregiver contracts, in which relatives are formally hired to take care of elderly or disabled family members. These new arrangements, which can also be called personal-care or personal-service agreements, can help to reduce the size of a parent's estate. They can also minimize battles between siblings and various family members. And for many other families, these contracts can help compensate for the huge amounts of time, effort and money that family members all-too-often often spend watching over and taking care of an elderly relative.

Amazingly, some 44.4 million adult caregivers, or over 21% of the U.S. adult population, now provide unpaid care to frail adults with disabilities. On average, those caregivers provide 21 hours of care a week, and what's more, the average length of time spent providing care is 4.3 years.

Another reason to have a carefully-worded caregiver contract in place:

Recent legislation now makes it much tougher to qualify for Medicaid long-term-care assistance by faking impoverishment through outright gifts to family members. These laws were passed to prevent folks who have the means to pay for their own care from obtaining Medicaid, which is intended only for poor patients.

Attorneys say that if set up properly, a caregiver contract shouldn't be considered as a gift to children, because the patient is receiving a true, real service in return.

Still, there's stigma to overcome when recommending the idea to families. The main reason: Some people can still be uncomfortable with the idea of paying their own kids, say lawyers, and many folks choose to use long term care insurance coverage, instead of trying to fake their way onto the Medicaid welfare roles.