When my wife was pregnant with our first child, I bought a combination of term life insurance (relative low cost) and whole life insurance (high cost). I wanted my wife to have a financial cushion if I died, where she would not have to work full time. After the baby was born, I bought a combination of whole and term insurance on my wife, to help pay the cost of child care and housekeeping if my wife died. I repeated all this with our second child.
Later, when I was earning a good income, I converted all the term insurance to whole life insurance. I had the dividends applied to buying more insurance.
When interest rates jumped, I borrowed from the policies at low interest and invested the money in high-paying utility bonds (but NOT junk bonds). As interest rates fell, I sold the bonds at a profit and repaid the policy loans. Through all that, I did not have to tap my own savings.
Much later, I was laid off. I looked at the policies and the dividends they were earning. The combined annual dividends exceeded the combined annual premiums. I contacted my insurance agent and had the premiums applied to paying the premiums with the excess dividends still buying more insurance.
Today, I could cash in the policies; but my retirement investment portfolio is sufficient that I do not need the extra cash. Our heirs will collect the benefits tax-free, which they cannot do with our IRAs.