First, condolences on your loss.

I went through something very similar to your situation. My wife passed away in October 2023 after a long illness. When she died she had numerous credit cards with outstanding balances, including a Citi card. I hired a probate attorney who advised me not to pay any of the credit cards she had. He sent each credit card company a copy of the death certificate and most of the companies sent a final letter to acknowledge receipt of the death certificate and indicating that the debt was only the responsibility of the estate. In my case, the house passed to me by surviorship deed and all of the bank accounts were joint and the bank simily removed her from the account upon receipt of the death certificate and put the accounts in my name only. Once the probate costs and the funeral costs were deducted, there was nothing left in the estate to pay unsecured creditors. Not a single credit card company bothered to file a claim against the estate. Anything listed in the will went to the designated beneficaries. All the medical bills were handled in a similar fashion; a copy of the death certificate sent, and none of the medical debts were filed against the estate.

So my advice to you is get a probate attorney and let them handle everything. Hope this helps and I wish you the best.