Transcribe your podcast
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This show is presented by the Commonwealth Fund, a nonprofit foundation whose mission is to promote a high-performing equitable healthcare system. The Commonwealth Fund supports research to improve healthcare policy and practice, and has a long history of exploring what the US can learn from the best health care around the world to do better here at home, especially for people of color, people with low income, and those who are uninsured. To learn more, visit at commonwealthfund. Org. It's no secret that comedian Sam B. Is pro-choice. Yes, that choice, but also not just that choice. Sam is pro-choices. Those crazy life-altering decisions that shift our life path and bring us to where we are today. Her next choice? Starting her new podcast with Lemonada Media called Choice Words, where she interviews celebrities, politicians, and people she admires about the biggest decisions they made in their lives. She'll get into the gratitude or regret that accompanies each their decisions and look at how that one moment impacted their life today. Choice Words is out now wherever you get your podcasts.

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Lemonada.

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It's hard to have your loved one, the person who raised me, slowly evaporate in front of my very eyes.

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I'm currently caring for my elderly mother. She's 79 with dementia, and it's really, really tough. Seeing your mother losing the things that are always true about her, that's a lot for one person to hold.

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That last voice is Jessica Guthrie, a 35-year-old caregiver for her mom, Constance, who is living with Alzheimer's. Like others we've heard from this season, Jessica has made many sacrifices in the name of caregiving, including the decision to move back home to care for her mom full-time in 2019.

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I was like, This is a big deal. I'm leaving my life. I'm leaving my friends. I'm starting over. I'm moving back into my childhood bedroom. For me, it was huge. Other people couldn't see it. But it was like, I'm supposed to be grown. At this point, I'm almost 30, and I'm moving back home. That's not what was in the vision board in plan A, B, or C.

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After years of caregiving from afar, Jessica packed up her Dallas apartment, said goodbye to her friends, and threw out her vision board, so to speak. As her mom's only child, making the decision to care for her was simple, even if it wasn't easy.

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I just felt like my world was crumbling. But I knew that it was my mom. Therefore, you do whatever you need to do to look out for your mom.

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This is Uncared For. I'm your host, Sujan Park. I think for many of us, we know that we will need to become caregivers for our parents at some point in life, but it can feel far off, something that will happen down the line. It's easy to push aside the small signs like, Oh, my mom seems more anxious than normal, maybe a little more forgetful, until you have to face it. This past year, my mom was diagnosed with dementia, and it's shifted the caregiving timeline for all of It feels like now we're racing against a clock that's on hyper speed. And as any caregiver knows, you need time to adjust to a new reality. But often, time isn't a luxury you get. Our guest today has had to adjust to the reality of her mom's Alzheimer's diagnosis on an even earlier timeline, becoming a caregiver at an age when most people are still figuring out their careers, their friendships, and what it means to be an adult. On top of that, Jessica has to fight for visibility as a young Black caregiver. She's become an expert on caregiving for her loved one with Alzheimer's. It would take some time before her mom got a diagnosis, but the signs were there early on.

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Let's talk about when you first started to realize, There's something not quite right with my mom.

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So around 2014, we started noticing my mom was just like, Forgetting things, but she would be like, Oh, I was just testing you, or, Oh, I forgot, or, Of course, I'm asking you again. She was just brush it off. My mom was also an educator, and so she was still driving to school doing all the things. But I could just tell that something was off because her normal routines were starting to be interrupted or disrupted by her forgetting where were her keys, or what was she going to do, or who was she supposed to talk to? Fast forward, she took her last trip to go visit her brother in Chicago, which a trip she every summer. She navigates the train, navigates the airport, knows how to, at the time, to get a cab, pre Uber, right? To get a cab and get to her, get to his house. And I'll never forget. I remember she said, Jessica, I'm worried. Can you type out the steps for me so that I can get from point A to point B? And I was like, Oh, yeah, sure. I typed, I typed out the steps. I gave her everything.

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And then I was in Dallas, Texas, and she called me at the train station, said, Jessica, I don't know where to go. I remember being on the phone with her the entire way until she got to the airport. Then I called my uncle and said, You need to get to the airport and meet her there. Long story short, that was the first time where a routine that she had done every year had felt so comfortable with. She was a world traveler, was now something that she was very afraid of and didn't know how to navigate her way. That's when we took the route of getting a diagnosis and meeting with a neurologist and taking all the tests to make sure What's really happening? What is causing this? And that's when I found out it is likely early on that Alzheimer's disease, that she was only 66 at the time.

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Sixty-six. That is young, especially when you consider that Alzheimer's usually presents for a few years before diagnosis. I want to press pause, though, for a moment because so often we define people by their diagnosis. And don't get me wrong, being diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer's is a defining moment. But Jessica's mom was, of course, so much more than that. Talking to Jessica, I got an image of Constance or CG, her nickname, as a vibrant, worldly woman, a force to be reckoned with. She owned a hair salon for 17 years in Alexandria, Virginia, and it was her pride and joy. That is, until Jessica came along.

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My mom is someone who I would describe as just truly selfless and putting others before herself, hence why she sold her business when she had me. I was her 39-year-old surprise. But she sold her business and moved to suburban Virginia to ensure that I had the best education growing up. She sacrificed so much to make sure that I got what I needed to thrive. And so when I think about our relationship, it's not the material things. It's the time. It's the being present. It's being proximate, and knowing that she would always be there. So much so that when I got into college, I remember getting my acceptance letter to Dartmouth, and I'm excited just jumping around, and she wasn't excited. And I was like, Why aren't you happy? Ivy League, all the things. She was like, Because you're leaving me. And that's when I realized, Oh, I was my mom's everything.

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I love that. I mean, I had parents who were always in the restaurant business, and the proximity is really interesting. We didn't have much, but we were always together, whether we wanted to be or not. And I think that that creates a relationship, good or bad, that's just really, really close. You say you went away to college, and I know that you lived apart from your mom during that time. So I want to hear about your life right before you had to become a full-time caregiver. What was your life like?

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Absolutely. So I graduated Dartmouth in 2010 and flew to Dallas, Texas, to become a teacher, to become a high I'm a high school teacher. And living in Dallas was a great first stop for me because it allowed me to figure out who I was without my mom, but also what did it mean to have my first apartment? I bought my first car. It was very much like growing up and doing so many new things on my own that I never had the opportunity to do before.

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Can you take me back to that moment after you learned your mom's diagnosis? What was running through your head?

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I think for me, two things happened. One, I was like, Oh, no, I'm not prepared to help to take care of my mom. I just really started working. Actually, the first thing I said is, How am I supposed to pay for this? And that's the first thing I thought of, right? But then the second thing was, okay, you live in Dallas. She's in Virginia. That's where your job is at. Let's get some systems in place. I hit the ground running. I didn't give myself the space to feel the grief that I eventually learned that that's what it was. I just was like, no, you get into go mode, right? You create solutions. And I went into this space of protecting and preserving her dignity because she was Constance Guthrie. She was bold. People knew her as... You know what I mean? And so because she was trying to hide it as long as possible, it almost became my responsibility to also help her hide what was happening happening. My mom still went to work until it got to the point where her principal said, We're concerned. She can no longer be here. But that was still a number of months before that happened.

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And in hindsight, you're like, Jessica, Why didn't you pause to just be like, This is a moment. This is now happening. You need to adjust. But no, if I think about my relationship with my mom all these years, you hop into the mode to protect that and protect the image of her. That's what I did.

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Well, that's what was important to her. That's what she wanted you to do. And I also think that when you go through such a huge transformation, it takes a while to process, adjust, and figure out where are the edges, and then they keep changing. And so you're constantly adjusting. So I think for you, that adjustment period was necessary and natural. I want to talk about some of these systems because I saw some of it, and it just blew my mind how you and your mother created these systems while you were still in Dallas, and she was in Virginia, and she was dealing with some of these symptoms. Can you talk about some of that?

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So I wanted to create as much independence as possible because just because you have a diagnosis or a dementia diagnosis doesn't mean that all your independence goes away immediately. And so a lot of my systems in the early years were, how do I give my mom what she needs to still have agency to complete and feel proud of what she's doing and to do it on her own? And so that was meals, that was activities. That was also medications. There was a full table of the medication she takes when and letting me know when she does them. Everything from also her time outside, the ways in which she was in the garden, in the yard. This was pre-wandering, so I've trusted her outside. And so, yeah, every system from labeling of the cabinets so that she knew where to put things after she washed the dishes to- Wait, what do you mean, labeling of the cabinets?

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Oh, give me that.

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Yeah. So my mom would get confused about where to put a cup after she washed it. And I would come home and said cup would be in the refrigerator or would be in a drawer where there's pots and pans. And it's like, okay, she's She's clearly wanting to help clean. She clearly wants to help put stuff away, but she's confused about where things go. I took orange, and they're still in the cabinets till this day, orange index cards and labeled every cabinet and what was in it. So this is cups, this is spices, this is pots and pans, so that she could actually just open things up and put things in the right place and/or find what she needed. I remember my mom saying, Jessica, you don't have to do this, but this is helping me, isn't it? And it's like, Yeah, it is. And so she began to realize that all of the labeling of things wasn't to infantilize her or make her feel like she couldn't do it. It was to help her feel as confident as possible.

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I've been thinking about these systems Jessica put in place for her mom. Of course, care often takes the form of doctor's visits, medication management, and cooking meals, but it also looks like an orange index on a cabinet labeled Pots and Pans. When we come back, we'll turn the spotlight on Alzheimer's disease, including how medical racism plays a role in who is diagnosed and when, something Jessica has experienced firsthand caring for her mom.

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Oh, my goodness. I felt my heart rate start to go up as soon as you introduced this topic.

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That's after this break. Voices matter. Stories create change, and perspectives are powerful. That's what the team at the Commonwealth Fund believes, and it's why they make space for the stories of people who have been affected by the inequities in our healthcare system, and for the voices of those working to root out racism in healthcare. Their Advancing Health Equity Instagram account shares news, lifts perspectives, and publishes data on the state of health equity in the US. Follow them on Instagram at Advancing Health Equity to keep a pulse on one of the most important issues at hand right now. Hi there. It's Julia Louis-Dreyfus. You may know me from my podcast called Wiser Than Me, where I talk to older women and get their wisdom from the front lines of life. After season one air, I was amazed by how many people told me our show made them look forward to getting older, which is why I'm here to talk about season two of the show. Sally Field, Billy Jean King, Beverly Johnson, Aina Garten, Bonnie Ray, just to name a few, and of course, my 90-year-old mom, Judy. All hail, Old Women. Wiser Than Me season two is out now from Lemonade Media.

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When Jessica's mom, Constance, was diagnosed with Alzheimer's, she joined the nearly seven million and other Americans living with the disease. It's the fifth leading cause of death among people 65 years and older. But even though it's widespread in this country, Americans are not affected equally. For Black women over 65, like Constance, The chances of developing Alzheimer's are far greater. The disparities are stark. Black Americans are 40% more likely to develop Alzheimer's than white Americans. And despite the prevalence in this population, they are are actually less likely to be diagnosed early on and often have to present with more severe symptoms to get the care they need. And it's not just Alzheimer's, by the way. Discrimination and racism are major issues in our healthcare system. According to one study, nearly half of all health care workers surveyed witnessed discrimination against patients. As her mom's advocate, Jessica has seen this play out firsthand.

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It's the thing that grinds my gears the most. It's the knowing that Alzheimer's disease, especially, disproportionately impacts the Black community. Yet, when you think about representation in clinical trials, representation in brochures, pamphlets, representation in the social media, in the media in general, you don't see our stories elevated. And you would think, Oh, yeah, that's all white person's disease. And you're like, actually, no, it's like a yes and. That's one of the reasons why I've been so committed to sharing my story so publicly so that other people could see like, oh, there are Black people not only navigating and living this, but they're doing it well, and there's joy, and there's excitement and energy. And it's not... Because the narrative, and I'll tell you this, the narrative is also poor Black people. They don't have resources in their communities. They have poor diets, high cholesterol, high blood pressure. These are all the reasons why they have Alzheimer's. And it's like, okay, there might be some correlations, but I think a thing that frustrates me the most is how quickly people generalize what's happening to the Black community around this disease without giving the space to say, where might there be bias in this system?

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Where have we failed in terms of educating and creating access for people to understand this disease early enough? Why haven't we started thinking about working with medical professionals so that when a Black patient comes to you with concerns around memory loss, they don't get written off as just old-age memory loss, but they get the opportunity to get an early diagnosis, too. That's not happening, right? How do we actually start talking about it earlier? How do we help remove some of the stigmas? How do we help remove some of your assumptions about what it is and isn't so that you all can be equipped to really attack and address this when you start to see things happen versus what I often see is like, sweep under the rug, put them to the side. I'll pause there. But yeah.

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You've spoken about even going to Alzheimer's caregiver support groups and how even in those kinds of places, you're surprised that this experience continues to follow you there, which I find... I'm laughing because I'm also indignant, and it makes my heart race to my throat. Can you talk about these kinds of personal experiences to really paint the picture for someone who, A, has those experiences, or B, is like, really?

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So I was 26 when I started this journey. And people are trying to be helpful. They'll say, Well, have you gone to this support group? Here's these support groups. Or they'll be like, go to the Alzheimer's Association. Here's these support groups. And you go and you realize that people in these groups are older white people who are more established in their lives. They've already got the family, the picket fence, the careers, and they have the ability to either retire early or put things on hold, or they have the spouse that they can continue to finance while they take care. And you're just like, oh, wait, I This is not my life. I don't see myself here. And this is actually more isolating than before I came to this space. And so it's no knock on the support groups. They're really helpful. But when you don't see yourself, when there's people who aren't talking through or have been in your shoes, it makes it even more isolating. Because what I really needed was for people to say, Oh, the insamia that you're feeling, the sadness that you're feeling, right? Like the the sense of fear. All of that's grief, Jessica.

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And this is what it's showing up as for you. But I didn't have that support group to share that with me early on, which made it really difficult, which I think is also what led me to social media to find other young Black people. And as soon as I started sharing publicly, it was like, Oh, there's thousands of us, which is problematic, but also like, Whoa, there's thousands of us.

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My people. These are my people. This is my support group. Yes.

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And yes, I found Black women, but I also found people from all around the world, from all different backgrounds. And you start to realize Alzheimer's disease does not discriminate. And the experience of a caregiver is the experience of a caregiver, right? And that has been so helpful in finding connections and empathy and understanding that I didn't have from friend groups, colleagues, people that I was around.

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Let's talk about that a little bit more because you eventually did have to leave friends, colleagues, and all of that and move back home. Do you remember making that decision or the day you moved back in, what was going through your mind? Where were you emotionally and just in that head space?

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Up until then, I was traveling back and forth. And so I would fly home to Virginia, and I would spend maybe five days at home, and then two weeks back in Dallas, and then back on a plane, back to Virginia. And so I was hopping on flights at 6:00 AM to be at 9:30 meetings in Dallas. I was burning the candle at both ends. And my manager, my boss at the time, was like, Why don't you just spend more time at home? He was like, You're highly competent. You can keep your job and work virtually. I needed the permission to do it because I didn't know that was possible. This was March 2019. That move back while it felt so hard was probably the best thing I could have ever done for my relationship with my mom, spending time with her while she was still active and engaged waged. I'm sorry. The things we were able to do, that was the power of moving back. And so I share this because I think, especially for young people listening, or even if you're not young, it is a humongous sacrifice to say yes to caring for a parent and putting your own stuff on hold, whatever the stuff might be.

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But you cannot get the moments back. And I'm so grateful that I took the leap because I've got all these memories ingrained as I can no longer make those with her anymore. You know? Thanks for holding space for my tears.

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I don't know if they're yours or mine or what's happening here. I'm trying to get myself back on track, too, because, yeah, it's really nice that you had that time with her and that you get to hold that now. What Jessica is saying about moving back with her mom. It's a good reminder that this work isn't all pain and sacrifice. You can still build beautiful memories together, even after an Alzheimer's diagnosis. There's power in that time together, not just loss. But on top of all this is another looming factor, the finances. Like Jessica said earlier, the very first question that popped into her head after her mom's diagnosis was, How am I going to pay for all of this? That's when we come back.

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Hello. I'm Joel Berville, Medical Myth Buster and host of The Dose, a health policy podcast from the Commonwealth Fund. Each season, I sit down with a leading health policy expert and medical professionals to have real conversations about the issues that keep them up at night. We talk about breakthroughs in their research and their new ideas to make our healthcare system work better for all Americans. This idea of equity needs to be taken up by everyone. And wherever you are in your work, whatever sector that you're in, we need to have conversations about what tomorrow looks like. I hope you'll check out The Dose and enjoy listening to our interviews. You can find us at thedose. Show or by searching your podcast app for The Dose from the Commonwealth Fund.

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Can't get enough of your favorite Lemonada Media podcasts? By subscribing to Lemonada Premium today, you'll gain access to fun and inspiring bonus content from all of our podcasts across the Lemonada Media Network. As a subscriber, you can listen to never before heard interview excerpts between Julia Louis-Dreyfus and her A+ guests on Wiser Than Me. Laugh along with Elise Meyers as she and her guests play a rapid fire questions game on Funny Because It's True, and continue to uncover new ways to make life suck less through our exclusive subscriber audio. Check out a free trial of Lemonada Premium today in the Apple podcast app by clicking on our podcast logo and then the subscriber I button. I want to talk a little bit about the financial implications. I mean, because I want to make sure I get to this. I want to talk about how you're managing, what are the biggest costs? Those are two questions, and the third one, because I'm just going to let you go, is what's changed now that you've also left your job? How are you managing financially?

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So I told you, as soon as I found out that we got a diagnosis, the first thing I said is, how am I going to pay for this? Because at the time, my mom owned her own business, and then she worked in the education system or the local school system. And so by all accounts, she was a hard working person, but didn't make a significant amount of money. But my mom made too much money to qualify for Medicaid. And so literally everything has come out of pocket all these years. I knew that my first responsibility was like, How do I make sure we keep paying her mortgage? How do I make sure we keep this house? That was the first stressor that I was thinking through. Long story short, she can cover her mortgage. But all the other things that pop up, whether it's medical bills, clothing, food, things that happen to the house. All of that came from Jessica, working a nonprofit job, on top of flights home and then my own expenses. Fast forward a For a few years, my mom reaches the wandering stage where she is now bolting out the door.

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And at the time, she was going directly to the neighbor's house. And at some point, my neighbor just could not handle it. I was like, I now need external help. But when I first started this, I was using a care agency. I could only afford three days a week for four hours at a time. And that was still bringing me to $4,000 plus a month.

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On top of everything else.

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Again, out of pocket. So what's happening? Credit card bills, you're running up debt. I was easily spending close to $6,000 a month on care. And so how did I do it? I made a lot of sacrifices. I didn't go on trips. I couldn't do the things that my peers were doing. I wasn't making investments. My friends talk about stock portfolios. No, investment portfolios. I don't have that. And so what did you lose? You lose both the building of your own financial security all the while spending at the same time. And then fast forward to now, 2023, I left my job at the end of May because my mom is on the late stage of Alzheimer's disease. I made the choice to be home because we don't have the financial resources to put my mother in a memory care facility or a community. But even if I did, that's $9,000 a month. Who has that? And I'll never forget meeting with the Medicaid specialist at the local area Agency on aging. And I said, So what do families do? If you don't qualify for these supports, you work all your life, what do families do? She said, Oh, well, they just exhaust their resources.

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Have you thought about selling your mother's home? And I said, Absolutely not, because she built that home for me. And so I've really, honestly, the universe, whatever you believe in, has truly been looking out for me to make it work month by month is where I'm at at this point, to be honest.

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I was stunned when Jessica was laying out all of the numbers here. $6,000 out of pocket every month for care. Let me say that again. $6,000 every month. Not to mention a Medicaid specialist suggesting she sell her mom's home, which I wish I could say was outrageous. But from what I've learned this season, it's not. If you have too much money, like in Constance's case, you won't qualify for Medicaid. And unfortunately, Unfortunately, there are a lot of instances of people having to spend down their life savings or selling assets in order to qualify. Medicaid could even come after your home once you've passed away. As a result, we have a whole swath of Americans caught up in the middle with too much money to qualify for Medicaid, but not enough to cover those essential needs out of pocket. What about Medicare, you ask? Well, many in-home health services aren't covered by the program. Medicaid expansion could help support these families, as would increasing the in-home services covered by Medicare. Medicare Advantage Plans could also offer more comprehensive supplemental benefits, such as respite and adult daycare. But even these changes won't have real transformative power until we can make the systems easier to navigate for caregivers like Jessica, because it should not be this confusing.

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Listen, I've got multiple degrees, and it's confusing. I don't understand the systems, okay? And so I had to go talk with someone to break it down for me. And my mother only has her retirement from the school system and then her social security. And the woman looked at me straight face, and she said, your mother makes too much money. And I said, What do you mean? She's barely just paying her mortgage, right? What do you mean? And it's like, your mother is literally maybe $100 over the cutoff. And I said, so that then means that she doesn't qualify? And at the time, yes, that's exactly what it means. My mother now, though, given the state that she's in, she actually qualifies what I stand for long term care assistance. And even all its confusion, they do want to keep your loved one at home. In the end of the day, they want your person to stay at home as long as possible. But to be completely honest, the system is So confusing and so unclear. I almost said, I don't even want to do the paperwork. I'll just continue sacrificing because I don't have the energy to navigate that process.

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Yeah. Knowing that this is the final stage of the disease and your time with your mom, and you walked away from your job, knowing that, Listen, I want to spend this time. I want to know that I was here for her, that my presence was felt. I think that that's so powerful. It got me thinking about, we talked about finances and the implications of that, but just the trade offs in general of caregiving. I want to talk a little bit about that, about what you have traded off to, so to speak, what you see caregivers trading off, that isn't just about financial, but it's also about all this other stuff we've been talking about.

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I didn't realize that caregiving would be as lonely as it has been, because the people that I expected to show up for us actually ran the other way. My mother is one of 10 siblings, and I was commuting from Dallas, Texas, to Virginia on my own. She has two siblings who live in Virginia. That paints the picture of my experience, and also not unique, but how quickly family stops communicating, they stop engaging. You give up friendships, or friendships, they evolve. This sense of friends that stopped inviting me to things They stopped calling. They stopped checking in because it's a nine-year journey. This is a long time. I think that they always thought like, Oh, well, she's too busy. Oh, she won't have the time or the space. When it's actually like, I would kill to have a gossip session about reality TV. You know what I mean? I would love to not talk about caregiving. So there's that that happens. I think about relationships. I am single. I am 35. I have no kids. And I can say that I am fine with that for the most part, because we don't have that much time left.

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But at the same time, I'm 35 and single. My mom had me at 39. I think about it all the time. I don't want kids after 39 because I know what my trajectory is in terms of this potentially being a disease that I will be living with. So that way is heavy on my mind. And so I also just think beyond the job and beyond the career, I do think there is a reshaping of what success looks like. What does your contribution look like? Because I grew up highly achieving, highly competitive. You do all these things. But that's completely shifted for me. And so, yeah, the sacrifices are great. But what I will offer is that in the midst of all of those sacrifices, so many people have shown up to wrap their arms around me in ways I didn't expect. The friends, like people that were acquaintances It became some of my close friends. Like groceries, sending money, like coming to sit and be with my mom, complete strangers on the internet, filling out Amazon wishlist. You realize that community and family changes when you're a caregiver. And it's often people who are not blood, who have not known you for years.

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It's the people who understand the realities of your experience that show up for you in droves. Yeah.

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What advice would you give knowing what you know now for others who find themselves in a similar situation as yours, which is young, alone, being a caregiver, all of the above, what would you say?

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The things that come to mind, the first is a diagnosis. So whatever illness you're navigating does not mean the end tomorrow. You still have time with your person and to make the most of the moments that you have and to commit yourself to seeing joy and finding joy, even in the mundane. Because it's the creation of memories and finding the joy, even in your routine habits, that will sustain you when things get really hard. I think the second thing is, do not be afraid to use your voice and your power, especially if you are a younger caregiver, navigating people, systems, policies. This journey is already hard because your person's sick. It's 10 times harder when you think about all the barriers that get put in the way because of just the systems we have to work within. And I think society has taught you to just trust the doctor, trust the system. It'll be okay. But the advice I have for you is to blow it all up, disrupt the system, to speak up, to advocate, because you are your person's eyes, ears, their mouth. And if it wasn't for me speaking up for my mom in many different ways, She wouldn't be here today, right?

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And so you have a responsibility, not just care, but to advocate for your person because no one else is going to.

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I saw a clip of you singing to your mom. And I think for those that may not know, singing is such a vital part of connecting and healing in the dementia space. I'm just learning about this myself, especially if a person had a lot of music in their life. Can you talk about that moment and those moments when you can still in there connect with your My mom has been a musical person.

[00:38:33]

Gospel music is... If you ever came to my house growing up, my mom would have these records in '45s playing of old gospel hymns. My mom was the director of the gospel choir at church. And so singing and gospel music is the way to connect with my mom. And so every day we have sing-along time. And for the longest time, CG would sing with me, or she'd be clapping her hands. It would be like a back and forth. And now she doesn't sing with me. However, what do I see? I see her eyes locked on mine. I see her holding my hand tightly. I can see the smile on her face, and that lets me know that she feels it, she hears me, and she's so connected. And it is those moments that remind me she's absolutely still here. She hears me, and she's loving what's happening, and that is what makes me keep going. No, not one, no, not This video of Jessica reminds me of the small moments I still have with my mom today.

[00:39:53]

Just being in the kitchen, cooking something we both love to eat. My mom spent her whole life in kitchens at home and at work, and now that's where I think we're both the most at ease. When I watched Jessica leaning over her mom's bed, singing, I understand how powerful these moments can be.

[00:40:15]

Until the day is done. Jesus knows all about our troubles.

[00:40:30]

There's more Uncared For with Lemonade premium. Subscribers get exclusive access to bonus content like unaird interview clips from caregivers across the country. Subscribe now in Apple podcast. Uncared For is a production of Lemonada Media. I'm your host, Sujan Park. Muna Danish is our supervising producer. Lisa Fu and Hannah Boomershine are our producers. Our mix is by Ivan Kurayev. Music is by Andrea Kristenristen's daughter. Our associate producer is Isauda Aceves. Jackie Danziger is our VP of Narrative Content. Executive producers are Jessica Kordova Kramer and Stephanie Wittelswax. This season of Uncared For is presented by the Commonwealth Fund, a nonprofit FIT Foundation making grants to promote an equitable, high performing health care system. Help others find our show by leaving us a rating and writing a review. You can follow me on Instagram at Sujan Park and Lemonada at Lemonada Media across all social platforms. Follow Uncared For wherever you get your podcast and listen ad free on Amazon Music with your prime membership. Thanks so much for listening. See you next week. This show is presented by the Commonwealth Fund, a nonprofit foundation whose mission is to promote a high-performing equitable healthcare system. The Commonwealth Fund supports research to improve healthcare policy and practice, and has a long history of exploring what the US can learn from the best healthcare around the world to do better here at home, especially for people of color, people with low income, and those who are uninsured.

[00:42:16]

To learn more, visit commonwealthfund. Org. Feeling decision fatigue about what to make for dinner? We get it. I'm Jane Black. And I'm Liz Dunn. We're veteran food journalists, and as parents ourselves, we know how hard it can be to feed your family. That's why we created Pressure Cooker, a podcast that offers practical strategies for navigating the marketing madness and cultural expectations around mealtime.

[00:42:40]

Each week, we'll check in with the experts.

[00:42:42]

From social media diet trends to baby lead weaning and AI meal planning, we have all your food-related questions covered. Listen to Pressure Cooker wherever you get your podcast.